MAGA's Hell On Earth: Women's Rights, Child Care, Free School Lunch and Cat Hair

With the arrival of affable teacher, football coach and midwestern nice guy Tim Walz, the contrasts between the Prosecutor/Coach vs. the Predator/Sycophant are made ever more thunderously clear. Walz has a sterling progressive record of abortion protections, gun control, gay rights, paid leave, carbon-free power; he also named a highway for Prince, works on his car, has a dog and cat, and "wants people to have what they need when they need it." His governing mantra: "Look out for your neighbors, stop being weird."

By now there's broad consensus Harris' VP pick of, not a centrist, coastal, elite lawyer but the relatively unknown, down-home, deeply decent Walz was a brilliant move, both macro - atypically for a party that often pivots right to attract swing voters, she chose a "Heartland Democrat" who's been stunningly adept in achieving progressive goals - to micro, in her folksy way of calling him "Coach Walz." She's said she chose him in part for his focus on middle-class families; it's clear, in their first buoyant rallies, they also share a sense of joy and good cheer that's wildly contagious, probably because - see national orange affliction - it's so long overdue. Together, they've inspired the most exuberant memes, signs and t-shirts since Bernie's mittens took center stage: "White Dudes for Harris," "Put us in, Coach," "Cats For Kamala," "You can't go wrong with a Social Studies teacher," "Madame ('Vice' crossed out) President," "We're Neighbors and We're Not Weird." Comedian Vinny Thomas likely spoke for many: "I am overjoyed. I have been a longtime supporter of Tim Walz ever since I learned about him like last week."

Walz, 60, was born and grew up in small Nebraska towns - West Point, Valentine - spending summers working on his family’s farm. His father died of cancer when he was young, and his family relied on Social Security survivor benefits to get by. At 17, he joined the Army National Guard; unlike Private Bone Spurs, he served over 20 years, rose to command sergeant major, and later became the highest-ranking soldier to serve in Congress. He used the GI Bill to go to college and became a teacher, eventually getting a master's degree; for a year he also taught English in China through a Harvard-affiliated program, and speaks some Mandarin. Teaching in Nebraska, he met and married colleague Gwen Whipple, who also teaches in the Bard Prison Initiative; they later moved to Minnesota, where they continued teaching and had two children, Hope and Gus, after seven years of IVF treatment. During his 20- year tenure at Mankato High School, he was voted “Most Inspiring" teacher after signing up as faculty adviser for its first gay -straight alliance; he wisely felt it was vital the job go to "the football coach who was the soldier, and straight, and married."

Walz entered politics late, in his 40s, after he and some of his students were kicked out of a rally for George W. Bush because one of them had a John Kerry sticker. After training at Camp Wellstone, a Dem political boot camp named for progressive icon Sen. Paul Wellstone - his trainer was his now-Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan - he ran for Congress in 2005, ousting a GOP incumbent to win a House seat in the rural, conservative 1st District; one of his key issues was support for marriage equality. Re-elected five times, he was known as a centrist - top Dem on the Veterans’ Affairs committee, he supported the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - but he voted for Obamacare and against restrictions on federal funding for abortion. When he left Congress in 2018 to run for governor, he shifted noticeably left. Utilizing a $17.6 billion surplus from good tax revenues and spending cuts, he and Dem lawmakers enacted a sweeping progressive agenda, funding education, expanded child care, lower taxes for working families, paid family and medical leave, free school breakfast and lunch, tuition-free public college and health insurance regardless of immigration status.

Dem chair of the National Governor's Association, Walz also legalized cannabis, invested in tech and infrastructure, banned LGBTQ conversion therapy, signed a law requiring phase-out by 2040 of fossil fuels to carbon-free sources, restored voting rights to former inmates and, after the overthrow of Roe v Wade, made his state the first to provide constitutional abortion protections. An ardent turkey and pheasant hunter - he introduced a "Governor's Opener" to kick off each season - he expanded background checks for gun purchases, turning his once-fab NRA rating into "straight F's." He also used his new-found fame to taunt fake hillbilly Vance - "I guarantee he can’t shoot pheasants like I can" - and the campaign now features a Harris/Walz camo cap. He supports access to IVF, not least because "I wouldn't have my kids without it," he doesn't drink after being pulled over for speeding in 1995 and failing a sobriety test - Gwen: "You have obligations to people. You can’t make dumb choices" - and he cheerfully calls himself a "Minnesota Lutheran": "If you do something good and talk about it, it no longer counts - you have to get someone else to talk about you."

In what he boasted was "the coolest bill-signing we’ll ever do," he giddily renamed part of a highway the "Prince Rogers Nelson Memorial Highway," with purple ink, in purple shirt and tie. He signed a bill providing free breakfast and lunch to all schoolchildren, regardless of income to remove any stigma for kids of poor families; in a now-viral video, a small grinning mob cheer and bounce around him. When Repubs opposed it, he posited that beliefs against feeding hungry kids "are ideas that only animate people of troubling character." He also signed a bill mandating free menstrual products be available in all Grade 4-to-12 restrooms, which made GOP heads explode. On CNN, Jake Tapper asked if all these suspect acts of humanity made him "vulnerable." Walz, dryly: "Kids are eating, women are making their own health care decisions, we're a top 5 business state, in the top 3 for happiness...What a monster." In further crimes, videos online show him cuddling small critters, chowing down at the fair, giving carburetor advice. A final blow to "the most anti-pet ticket in American history": He has a dog and cat, and  posts hilarious videos of them.

Of course the GOP response to all this good will and good work has been gracious, reasonable and respectful. LOL. Kidding. With the sudden, gleeful rise of Democratic fortunes - AOC: "Dems in disconcerting levels of array" - a sullen right-wing has been caught flat-footed (again), flailing and sniping at a party that seems to be attracting and actually helping a middle class, albeit in commie ways, they've clearly never met but only read about, like they've long claimed they were doing with fat-cat tax cuts, book banning, migrant demonizing and alleged trickle-down everything that didn't. In this case, the real-live candidates aren't helping much to maintain their fictional common man cred: It's tough to pose as champions of we the people when your guys are a scuzzy, loud-mouthed racist, felon and robber baron with gold toilets who got handed and lost millions and an unctuous, billionaire-funded venture capitalist with the charisma of damp cardboard facing off against America's steely, smiling, I'm-speaking-now prosecutor and a folksy, beloved, gun-owning, animal-cuddling schoolteacher, football coach, veteran and Santa Claus look-alike.

Still, lacking options and insight, they've tried. A Trump Super Pac calls Walz "Tampon Tim" and an "incompetent liberal," charging - both Walz and Harris are "far-left radicals that (sic) don't know how to govern" - pot/kettle - and will "give your taxpayer dollars to the rest of the world." Oh no: free lunch in Sudan. That paled before the apocalyptic response of their decrepit, incoherent "Liberace clone" leader. Walz will "unleash HELL ON EARTH and open our borders to the worst criminals imaginable," he shrieked in bold yellow highlights. He'll also "rubber stamp Kamla's (sic) GREEN NEW SCAM" and "light TRILLIONS of dollars on fire" - that would be him - and "he's already pulled in MILLIONS in dirty cash to buy the White House" (ditto). Yeah, he's fine, no deranged decline here, let's have him run the country. Implausibly, per Noah Berlatsky, Vance, who he "decided is just the kind of repulsive sycophant he wants sycophanting for him," who made it big writing "a sustained ode to self-satisfied loathing of the less fortunate," has been worse. "They've decided to go as dark and ugly as possible," said one pundit, "with the dollop of cringe Vance always brings."

With "weird" Vance's approval ratings under water, he keeps bringing that rookie, nasty, puerile "J.V." cringe to everything he touches. Asked what makes him smile, he says he's angry. Creepily stalking Harris on a tarmac, he says he's checking out "my plane" and leaves racist dog-whistles behind. Willing to "do things that would be beneath the dignity of most politicians," he tried swiftboating Walz on his 24-year military record (Vance spent four as a military media hack) and got savaged. He blasted Walz as a "San Francisco-style liberal," side-stepping (in vain) the fact he lived in San Francisco for years making it big as a capitalist whereas Mr. Midwestern justvisited the city for the first time last month. He raved Dems "want this country to go communist immediately if not sooner"; America snarked back, "Imagine going after a guy for - *checks notes* - being a good neighbor." Fox ran a supposedly indignant gotcha video of Walz doing good, which crashed and burned: "How dare he do things to bring all people to the table? A politician taking care of people while also taking responsibility for any issues during his leadership? Oh, the horror..."

In his first 24 hours on the ticket, Dems raised $36 million from over 450,000 donors, many first time donors. And for what it's worth, the Internet loves him and his Normal Dad energy. Killer contrasts were drawn: "Harris/Waltz will give 4th graders free lunch, Trump/Vance will force them to give birth," "Walz coached football. That's cute - Trump destroyed a football league." Fellow Minnesotan Al Franken cited his record - reproductive freedom, paid leave, school meals - adding, "And he's not weird!" John Cleese, having noticed MAGA's "vast well of stupidity," wondered why they don't want felons to vote but do want them as president. Some posted a Walz family photo - mom, dad, beaming kids each holding fidgety dog and cat - to note, "Wait, those aren't assault rifles. What's wrong with these people?" A montage offered "five minutes of Walz being awesome" - marching at a Pride parade, transferring land back to the Upper Sioux community, signing a proclamation for Philando Castile Remembrance Days and movingly embracing his tearful wife after signing the country's first constitutional abortion protections into law.

Thanks to Trump's ill-considered hysteria about Dems ushering in a dystopian nightmare, there's also been many hellish sightings of Walz, usually in t-shirt and baseball cap, with small animals - sweetly stopping to pet a random cat, smilingly giving his dog ice cream, grinning while holding a goofy, runty, snoozing pig: "Trump saying Walz will unleash hell on earth is legit hilarious. This guy? Yeah, looks terrifying." One stickler opined, "I believe the Vice President does not have the constitutional authority to unleash hell on Earth. He'd just be standing by in case President Harris (is) unable to carry out her hell-unleashing duties." Many have noted the welcome disparity of Walz' wholesome, benevolent, unapologetically empathetic male persona juxtaposed with the glowering Trump's rapey, bullying boorishness and the misogynistic creepiness of his sidekick, who wants to monitor your daughter's menstrual cycle. Walz is "a living rebuke to the incessant, droning insistence there's no model of masculinity for young men that doesn't seem to entitle them to dominate and humiliate women," wrote one. "Yes, there is. He's holding a piglet."

At Dems' raucous rally in Philadelphia, Walz nailed his opponent: "Like all people I grew up with in the heartland, JD studied at Yale, had his career funded by Silicon Valley billionaires, and then wrote a bestseller trashing that community...I can't wait to debate the guy, if he's willing to get off the couch." Also, "(I) remember when Republicans were the ones talking about freedom. It turns out (they) meant the government should be free to invade your doctor’s office. In Minnesota, we respect our neighbors and the personal choices they make. A golden rule: Mind your own damn business." As the tide turns, the Dems troll - the half-empty arenas, the puerile "Kamabla," the rabid rants on sharks, coups, bacon - and the old man crumbles. After a fact- check of his last gibbering meltdown, titled "Donald Trump’s Very Good, Very Normal Press Conference (or) Whatever the Hell That Was," the consensus: "He is one egg short of an omelette." Meanwhile, Walz, whose fave aphorisms include "One man's socialism is another man's neighborliness" and "We'll sleep when we're dead," surges. From one glad patriot, "The blue wave is coming, and it is covered in cat hair."