Gavin Newsom addresses the nation

[Paine]

Well, you might want to look around you. I'm not the only one reacting in this way.

The problem isn't that you're disagreeing. It's that you're caricaturing. Saying Newsom would be talking about energy credits is not a concise way to do anything except mock. If you want to say Gavin will come across as out of touch, then say that. You don't have to create a bullshit straw man to knock down.

To be concrete: I have absolutely no problem with this statement of yours: "That’s the concern with Newsom. He’s got polish, but he doesn’t project any lived struggle or emotional depth that resonates with working-class or disaffected voters."

That's a fair critique. Notice that what you're saying here is tightly focused on Newsom's image, one that he chooses to project himself. I'm not sure that projecting lived struggle is actually all that important (and again, your guy Beshear has no more of that quality than Gavin), but that's an opinion. That's worth talking about.

Another way of putting the point is: can you imagine a hundred thousand screaming European fanboys showing out for a visit from Gavin Newsom as they did for Barack Obama? I can't. And while those are Europeans and not directly relevant, there's obviously a difference in relatability between those two candidates, and surely that was a big part of Barack's success.

But you were spending hours yesterday trying to lecture me about corporate finance. How do you think I should respond? It's not that I don't understand your point. I do. As you have surely seen, I'm not some frat boy turned corporate lawyer. I have a depth of experience in the same theory you do -- come on, do you think I don't understand historical materialism? The problem here is that your point is wrong, at least in the way you apply it. Actually, it's not even totally wrong, but you chose to fight over the part that is. Then, when it was explained to you by someone who actually knows the field, you kept coming back with this class consciousness bullshit. Equity finance is not some bourgeois capitalist plot. It existed long before capitalism. One crucial competitive advantage of Flanders and Venice in the early Renaissance was their liberal incorporation law. It made trading possible in a way that it was not elsewhere.

You keep saying you’re not the only one reacting this way, but let’s be honest: nobody else in the thread has told me to “go fuck myself” or launched into multi-post rants about my tone. Every other poster, aside from Centerpiece for some reason, has engaged with my points respectfully and vice-versa.

As for the green energy credits line, it wasn’t a straw man. It was a rhetorical shorthand to highlight the contrast in political instincts. You even admitted you agreed with the broader point when stated differently. So maybe take the win instead of demanding that everyone speak in a style that flatters your sensibilities.

I’m not here to debate the finer points of Renaissance merchant law. Go back to the other thread if you really want to continue that discussion.

I’m here to talk about how voters, especially disaffected ones, respond to candidates. You keep reaching for your resume and theories of finance while ignoring the basic emotional pitch of politics, which was my whole point from the start.

If we’re going to talk about what actually wins elections, then yes, we’re going to have to talk about emotional connection, projection of authenticity, and, yes, how candidates come off to people outside elite circles. That’s not mockery; it’s reality. And if you really want to beat Vance or whoever’s coming next, maybe we should be talking more about that and less about your frustrations with my tone.

 

[superrific]

You can tell yourself it was tone deaf but I think you are dead wrong. The response has been overwhelmingly positive.

I think Trump is playing with fire.

To Paine's point above: Newsom's persona doesn't project personal struggle. But if Trump goes after him, tries to arrest him, and he resists -- well, that's a pretty fucking personal struggle, isn't it?

 

[theel4life]

He absolutely crushed Trump, SecDef, was the most cogent and compelling political speaker since at least this last election cycle, came across as logical, lucid, sane, Presidential and a patriotic American. He almost sounded like a founding father. That he could accomplish such things in response to this administration’s latest antics shows just how far our government has fallen.

You can tell yourself it was tone deaf but I think you are dead wrong. The response has been overwhelmingly positive.

I think Trump is playing with fire.

 

[TarSpiel]

I think this is true by definition...

 

[ZenMode]

I think this is true by definition...

 

[Mundial]

To Paine's point above: Newsom's persona doesn't project personal struggle. But if Trump goes after him, tries to arrest him, and he resists -- well, that's a pretty fucking personal struggle, isn't it?

To be clear I am not sure that Newsome projected that way previously but life and history are made up of pivotal moments and this stand against Trump’s first attempt to cause and use civil unrest as a pretext for declaring martial law may have given Newsome the moment that he needed to redefine himself to the American public as precisely the law and order candidate for President that will uphold the morals and virtues enshrined by the founding fathers in our Constitution. Trump clearly does not care about such things and the juxtaposition between the two was striking.

Add in that Newsome is a younger, better looking, and taller white male (which clearly matters to most of the voting public) and I definitely think that Trump has cause to be afraid.

Whether Newsom is the best candidate that some on the left prefer is almost beside the point if this plays out as Newsome leading the fight at the turning of the tide against a facist dictatorship.

 

[Paine]

You like him because he looks like a good ole boy. The idea that Gavin Newsom is somehow a nepo baby while Andy Beshear, son of a [checks notes] former governor, is beyond belief. OK, he has rural NC hair instead of big city hair (note: Newsom's hair probably does not do what Beshear's hair does; Beshear's hair is sort of like mine but my son's hair is nothing of the sort).

The idea that I like Beshear because he “looks like a good ole boy” doesn’t hold up under five seconds of scrutiny. I supported Bernie Sanders in 2016 and 2020. A cranky, disheveled Jewish socialist from Vermont who couldn’t be further from that aesthetic. The common thread between Bernie and Beshear isn’t their style, it’s their ability to connect with working people in emotionally resonant ways and speak plainly about material issues. That’s what I care about. If you reduce that to optics, maybe that says more about how you evaluate candidates than how I do.

 

[hedge]

But I do think he understands how to perform authenticity

Interesting phrase, that.. "Perform authenticity"...

 

[superrific]

You keep saying you’re not the only one reacting this way, but let’s be honest: nobody else in the thread has told me to “go fuck myself” or launched into multi-post rants about my tone. Every other poster, aside from Centerpiece for some reason, has engaged with my points respectfully and vice-versa.

As for the green energy credits line, it wasn’t a straw man. It was a rhetorical shorthand to highlight the contrast in political instincts. You even admitted you agreed with the broader point when stated differently. So maybe take the win instead of demanding that everyone speak in a style that flatters your sensibilities.

I’m not here to debate the finer points of Renaissance merchant law. Go back to the other thread if you really want to continue that discussion.

I’m here to talk about how voters, especially disaffected ones, respond to candidates. You keep reaching for your resume and theories of finance while ignoring the basic emotional pitch of politics, which was my whole point from the start.

If we’re going to talk about what actually wins elections, then yes, we’re going to have to talk about emotional connection, projection of authenticity, and, yes, how candidates come off to people outside elite circles. That’s not mockery; it’s reality. And if you really want to beat Vance or whoever’s coming next, maybe we should be talking more about that and less about your frustrations with my tone.

So I'm in a bad mood. In part because of things outlined on my ask a lawyer thread. In part because I find your posting style insulting. But my mood isn't all that relevant.

1. This isn't about taking the win. I was responding to your post about how weird it was for Centerpiece to be frustrated with you. It's a community-focused point that sneaked into a thread, as often happens when thread volume exceeds thread content. The fact is that the way you talk pisses people off. It might piss me off more than anyone, but then again, I get exasperated by this shit very easily.

2. Anyway, the frustrating part is your unwillingness to listen to our experiences, which are ample and worthwhile. For instance, we mentioned Nader yesterday and he has come up again. What you don't remember was that the lefties WERE ROOTING FOR BUSH. They thought that if they would withhold their votes, they could force the Dems to the left. Yeah, that's not the way it works. We got John Kerry in 04; the Green Party fell on its face; and the radical revolution they hoped for didn't happen. Just like it didn't happen in 1968.

So it's especially aggravating to us when this exact same dynamic was replicated in 2016. Leftists taking shots at the Dem candidate. I don't know if they were openly rooting for Trump (some of them were, like Greenwald), but they didn't really support HRC either. IIRC more than 10% of Bernie voters voted for Trump. Women in America lost their right to choose because of this. Had the leftists done the antifa thing BEFORE the election, it would have gone differently.

Now it's 2025, and we just watched the Left AGAIN hand an election to Trump, or at least contribute to it, with the moronic uncommitted bullshit. Again, they were trying to make Biden lose. They said as much. They got a scalp. We got stuck with fascism. AGAIN. For the fourth time in the past 55 years, the left decided to sit out an election or even vote the wrong way because they were angry at Dems. How did this work out for them?

3. Well, now you're here and you're ridiculing a potential presidential candidate. You're pushing this idea that somehow the Dems need a populist leftist candidate, all the while ignoring that the left in America is a pariah group. Veering left hurts Dems. That's just how it is. And we know, because we've lived through it for years. Why Americans are more comfortable with the shit sandwich the right advertises rather than trying something new with the left -- like Trump said, what have you got to lose? It's fucking frustrating. But it's reality and running that left candidate into a slaughterhouse is not a great idea.

You diss on Elissa Slotkin. Fine. I didn't like her centrist roundtable thing either, where she basically said that Dems have to give up most of our principles in order to compete. That's a huge overreaction. But it's also true that Elissa Slotkin won in a state that went to Trump. You can't say that Elissa Slotkin doesn't know how to win in Michigan. So maybe, you know, we ought to defer a little bit to her judgment? We don't have to agree with her; but we can avoid calling her names and ragging on her as you were doing yesterday.

 

[Carolina Fever]

 

[superrific]

The idea that I like Beshear because he “looks like a good ole boy” doesn’t hold up under five seconds of scrutiny. it’s their ability to connect with working people in emotionally resonant ways and speak plainly about material issues. That’s what I care about. If you reduce that to optics, maybe that says more about how you evaluate candidates than how I do.

I wasn't being serious in my allegation. It was to illustrate that almost everything you say about Gavin applies to Beshear as well.

If you like the way that Beshear connects with working class people, then say that. You don't have to attack other Dems to praise the ones you especially like.

This is precisely the reason why the Dems didn't want to have a contested primary in 2024. It wasn't Biden's reason, but it was the reason so many Dems went along with that idea. And it was certainly the reason why we didn't go with any sort of primary after Biden dropped out. Our team so often gets hurt by primaries because our ostensible friends on the left can't keep from pissing in the garden.

Maybe it's just communication style. You've written several things on this thread that wouldn't be objectionable -- indeed, might even be good points -- if you could frame it in a way that doesn't come across as ingratitude.

 

[rodoheel]

I am not a fan of Newsom as a national candidate. Like CalHeel, I find him to be an utterly fake political opportunist. However, I don't really have any criticism to make of his efforts to stand up to Trump over the last week or so, and I think he is generally exhibiting solid leadership in the process.

 

[superrific]

To be clear I am not sure that Newsome projected that way previously but life and history are made up of pivotal moments and this stand against Trump’s first attempt to cause and use civil unrest as a pretext for declaring Marshall law may have given Newsome the moment that he needed to redefine himself to the American public as precisely the law and order candidate for President that will uphold the morals and virtues enshrined by the founding fathers in our Constitution. Trump clearly does not care about such things and the juxtaposition between the two was striking.

Add in that Newsome is a younger, better looking, and taller white male (which clearly matters to most of the voting public) and I definitely think that Trump has cause to be afraid.

Whether Newsom is the best candidate that some on the left prefer is almost beside the point if this plays out as Newsome leading the fight at the turning of the tide against a facist dictatorship.

Exactly.

Almost exactly: it's martial law. I know, autocorrect. Or maybe you just spelled it wrong. It doesn't matter . . . except that Marshall is how MTG and Boebert and Loomer spell it so it's an eyesore.

 

[Paine]

Interesting phrase, that.. "Perform authenticity"...

It is an interesting phrase, and I chose it deliberately.

In today’s politics, authenticity isn’t just about biography; it’s about how a candidate communicates their story.

Vance is repugnant to me, but he knows how to lean into a narrative of hardship, cultural grievance, and redemption that resonates with a lot of disaffected voters.

Newsom, on the other hand, talks like a TED Talk and a DNC press release had a love child. It doesn’t connect emotionally. That doesn’t mean I think Vance is “authentic” in any meaningful sense. It means he knows how to perform it. And that performance matters to voters who feel like no one in power understands what they’re going through.

 

[superrific]

I am not a fan of Newsom as a national candidate. Like CalHeel, I find him to be an utterly fake political opportunist. However, I don't really have any criticism to make of his efforts to stand up to Trump over the last week or so, and I think he is generally exhibiting solid leadership in the process.

Yeah, it's weird to see the thought processes in some quarters:

In May: Dems aren't doing anything to stop Trump. Won't one of them stand up? Where's the resistance?
In June: Newsom says that Trump will have to arrest him to stop his resistance. So obviously, the left is saying, "what a fake, just a made for TV phony."

 

[superrific]

Newsom, on the other hand, talks like a TED Talk and a DNC press release had a love child. It doesn’t connect emotionally. That doesn’t mean I think Vance is “authentic” in any meaningful sense. It means he knows how to perform it.

1. You just can't stop yourself, can you? Why throw in the shot at the DNC? You could make the same point by saying Newsom looks like a walked TED talk without AGAIN taking a shot at Dems. I think you're doing it on purpose now.

2. Vance hasn't connected with anyone emotionally ever. Nobody likes that dude. Not Ohioan voters, that's for sure -- he won the state because it's red, but he won no friends along the way. Also, he doesn't talk like a populist. He talks down to people like he's a fucking Yale Law grad, except that I think he must have skipped all his law classes because he seems to know very little.

 

[Calheel]

Yeah, it's weird to see the thought processes in some quarters:

In May: Dems aren't doing anything to stop Trump. Won't one of them stand up? Where's the resistance?
In June: Newsom says that Trump will have to arrest him to stop his resistance. So obviously, the left is saying, "what a fake, just a made for TV phony."

The left isn’t saying it. I am saying it. The left has been pretty willing to jump on the Newsom bandwagon today after abandoning him after his bro turn the last four months.

 

[rodoheel]

Yeah, it's weird to see the thought processes in some quarters:

In May: Dems aren't doing anything to stop Trump. Won't one of them stand up? Where's the resistance?
In June: Newsom says that Trump will have to arrest him to stop his resistance. So obviously, the left is saying, "what a fake, just a made for TV phony."

I mean, I'm not just saying now that Newsom is a made for TV phony. I've long thought that. His whole "centrist turn" after the election just exacerbated those issues. But I explicitly said I think he's doing a good job now. I'm glad he's standing up to Trump. That doesn't override my larger impression of him.

 

[superrific]

The left isn’t saying it. I am saying it.

So what's your view on the Dem resistance? People are responding to Newsom -- like they are responding to some members of the House -- being willing to stand up to Trump despite Trump's threats. He's willing to be arrested even. That's leadership. It might be phony, but in the moment it seems like Newsom is doing what we would want any Dem governor to do.

And in the process, Newsom is going to expose Trump's weakness yet again. Who is going to win this fight? The answer is obvious: either Gavin will win and show that Trump is all hat and no cattle, or Trump is going to have to go full authoritarian and it's anyone's guess where that will end but I can't see him gaining much support with anyone but the most committed haters if there are military troops walking the streets.

 

[superrific]

I mean, I'm not just saying now that Newsom is a made for TV phony. I've long thought that. His whole "centrist turn" after the election just exacerbated those issues. But I explicitly said I think he's doing a good job now. I'm glad he's standing up to Trump. That doesn't override my larger impression of him.

I wasn't aiming that comment at you. I was agreeing with you. I don't have any love for Gavin either. I mean, we all know what that hair style signifies. But we really, really need to stop harshing on our friends.

And I really don't have any issue with Gavin floating balloons about connecting with male voters. Nor do I see any issue at all with being on the politically correct side of trans women in sports. It can be simultaneously true that a) the objections are mostly bad faith and b) we could very well get killed if we are seen as bending over for trans people.