In 2018 I was at CPAC with my sons when the younger seeing that I was, as usual, driving myself to a ridiculous point suggested doing something different, so we went on a little trip to a pinball place in Bethesda where I found what I thought was the most significant interview of the trip.
and wrote why this interview was so significant
Now a person like my self who has covered angry mobs last year, and is constantly bathed in the political fight, not to mention the media narrative of absolute Trump / GOP hatred and constantly in the company of activists both at home and at CPAC, might expect a Democrat woman of color living in a blue state to give answers fitting the us vs them narrative, particularly if filmed and in the presence of her friends.
She did not.
She gave the President mixed marks, complemented him on keeping campaign promises that he made to his people, noted that as a Democrat she’d like to see some more moderate moves. Her answers had none of the rancor or the division that the media has pushed on us for the year or that I’ve seen from angry activists. They were completely reasonable answers that would not have been out of place several decades ago in a saner time when I remembered people could disagree and get along. In other words they reflected who she is, a normal American trying to get by whose primary focus is real life instead of manufactured outrage.
Remember this was 2018, Mueller was still out there, plenty of people thought there was lot of “there” there. Stormy Daniels was still out there as was the creepy porn lawyer. In fact we were still in the pre-Kavanaugh era. In other words the entire spectacle had not yet blown up on the left.
This interview, given in public on film in front of friends made me draw two conclusions, the second being the most significant
- Despite what our media friends are trying to sell us, Regular Democrats, even democrats in a blue place like Maryland are not wedded to the Peloxi/CNN/MSNBC line and are seeing this president for what he is rather than what they are being told he is.
- People like Lea are winnable and the media narrative is all about convincing us she is not.
When we got back to CPAC I couldn’t wait to upload the video and rushed to tell every person I ran into that this was incredibly important and tremendously significant. Nobody seemed to care, we were in the CPAC bubble which meant all eyes were on the pols and the activists there, not to mention the President’s upcoming speech. The idea that this might be a signal of an opening to the black community for the President and the opposition of blacks to the president might be softer than other think was something totally off everyone’s radar.
Not anymore:
From David Bernstein at Instapundit
BUT MUH NARRATIVE: 32% of African American men would vote for Donald Trump over a generic Democratic nominee.130
Well what do you know, I guess this info is out of the bubble now, and if it’s true then the danger to the Democrats goes well beyond this election.
But there is more to this poll story than meets the eye that doesn’t bode well for the left, but that’s a story for tomorrow’s post.