As the Democratic convention begins, this is why Kamala and Coach Walz are a runaway train

I like to think I’m not superstitious, but I am when it comes to important things, so I took great pains to knock on all the wood I could find before I sat down to write this. But as the Democratic convention starts this week in Chicago, I can’t help but be optimistic about what the upcoming election holds for the party’s two top stars.

I’ve been connecting the dots for the last few days about the prospects of Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, and how they will fare in November, and the best analogy I can come up with is that they are a runaway train — but in a good way

Let’s connect those dots. First, Donald Trump is a very bad candidate, full of negativity and doom, with no message, with no organized support from varied constituencies, with a criminal and civil record of guilty verdicts, and — and this is most important — people have had it with him. They are exhausted. To have him everywhere, all the time, for the next four years? No, thank you.

Trump was always a bad candidate from the minute he came down that escalator in 2015. But at the time, to some, he was a breath of fresh air. He ended up being nominated in a plurality of candidates — he did not have a majority.

Then he went up against Hillary Clinton. She had been omnipresent for almost 25 years in 2016, and Americans were exhausted with all the Clinton drama. They looked at Trump and said,“ Why not?” Enough of them, anyway, to squeak out victories for Trump in enough battleground states. Enough of Clinton, they said. But there weren’t enough of them for Trump to win the popular vote. Clinton beat Trump by almost 3 million votes.

Trump lost the midterms in 2018, lost the presidential election in 2020, with Trump at the helm of the party in the 2022 midterms, Democrats held the Senate and lost seats in the House. Trump had never been a winner. Never. And he’s just gotten worse the longer he’s been around.

In 2024, Trump’s only advantage was being three years younger than Joe Biden and being more…mmm…demonstrative. President Biden’s age was always the Democrats' biggest liability. Not only because he looked and sounded much older than he did in 2020, and age always wins. Biden’s age prevented the Democrats' message from getting through. After the debate, there was no chance that the message would ever get through. Biden equals old. That was the only message.

That was an easy liability for Trump to go up against because Trump has never really had any strong messages, just a list of grievances. Trump was coasting with Biden on the other side. Every speech, word, and walk by Biden was the news of the day. Trump didn’t have to do anything but look like he was healthier than Biden.

And Biden’s slowness and its hold over the media, took the wind out of the sails of a Democratic Party that was bursting at the seams for change. When the change didn’t come, and things were getting worse, Democrats became tepid about the whole thing. For context, I have a Democratic friend who told a pollster he was for Trump. “I did it more out of spite,” he told me. He wasn’t the only one, I am sure. Trump became a proxy for alive and kicking.

Then Trump, to underscore that, survived an assassination attempt. Then a good convention — according to some. And he got the proverbial convention bounce in the polls — not much but enough to show that he had momentum. His pick of JD Vance as his running mate started to come under intense scrutiny, a harbinger, perhaps, that the ticket wasn’t healthy.

And then the bottom fell out. Biden withdrew, endorsed his vice president, and then the Democratic dams burst open — with glee united against weirdness.

Money poured in, mostly from small donors. Volunteers banged on the doors to help. And organically, coalitions started springing up: White Dudes for Harris, Win With Black Women, Latino Men for Harris, LGBTQ+ for Harris, Rural Americans for Harris, Cat Ladies for Harris, Republicans for Harris, Evangelicals for Harris, and on and on and on. And the numbers amassed for these Zoom meetings were eye-popping, i.e 70,000 Republicans.

Trump’s trying to campaign on high crime, but it’s actually plummeting. Immigration and migrants — most numbers are better under Biden than Trump. Inflation — the latest numbers say it is easing. In fact, retail spending unexpectedly surged in July, proof that the economy is heading in the right direction. Try as he might, Trump can’t find any policy footing — not that he ever had sound policy to begin with.

Case in point: Trump gave an economic policy speech in North Carolina recently. He called it an “intellectual speech” and compared Harris’s laugh to that of a “crazy” person, and said she wasn’t “smart” or “intellectual.” And believe it or not, it got dumber. Trump said he would call on his cabinet secretaries to figure out how to lower inflation in the first 100 days. That is about the most unintellectual economic policy ever uttered by a presidential candidate.

As a side note, like he did in his North Carolina speech, Trump will not be able to stick to the script, and will continue to hurl all manner of insults toward Harris, which has been a major turn-off for voters.

In other words, Trump has nothing. No ideas, no record to stand on, no character, no campaign strategy, no constituencies beyond the MAGA base, no credible running mate, no joy, no positivity, and no momentum on the campaign trail or in all the polling. And he is no longer the “youthful” candidate.

Trump is not on the winning side of abortion, and regardless of how he tries to undo himself, he’s stuck with being fervently anti-choice. There are abortion amendments in several key states on the ballot in November, including Florida, Arizona, and Nevada. There have been clues about how these initiatives might turn out. Abortion rights have won in every state so far, including in California, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Ohio, and Vermont. Women have come out in droves to support these measures.

There is nothing positive about Trump’s campaign. The only thing he does have is a strong opponent against him that is the antithesis to all the above — and more.

If history repeats, after the Democratic convention this week concludes, Harris should get a post-convention bump in the polls which will augment the trajectory she’s currently on — that is, if polls matter;, just depends on who you ask.

I can’t help but think that Harris and Walz will win the upcoming election in a landslide. The confluences of events and circumstances are all moving in the same direction for Harris — up, and for Trump, down, way down. The key component in all of this is to sustain the current voter enthusiasm for Harris through election day, so that turnout is convincingly strong.

Unless there’s some unforeseen catastrophe, and God knows this election has been full of surprises, the upcoming election should be a historic one. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to knock on all the wood I can find in my apartment.

Voices is dedicated to featuring a wide range of inspiring personal stories and impactful opinions from the LGBTQ+ community and its allies. Visit Advocate.com/submit to learn more about submission guidelines. Views expressed in Voices stories are those of the guest writers, columnists, and editors, and do not directly represent the views of The Advocate or our parent company, equalpride.