Some of the smartest people I've ever met were terrible leaders. And some of the most credentialed institutions are remarkably good at accomplishing absolutely nothing.
Failure isn't the enemy. Stagnation is.
My latest, on what it actually means to be "iconic." davidocamb.substack.com/p/ic…
David Ocamb retweeted
Matt Walsh calls this the most honest assessment he has read. You should all read it. And then maybe you will see what honesty requires and that both of these men refuse to do it.
Start with Vance's method. A team of data analysts obsessing over electorate composition, pollsters asked to explain the loss after it happens, a survey handed to defecting voters asking what would bring them back. This is the technique of a pragmatist. A man of principle could not care less about polls. He cares about ideas and whether they are right or wrong, and he would rather lose every election in his lifetime doing the right thing than win a single one doing the wrong thing. He holds a standard, measures his actions against it, and knows before the returns come in whether he governed by it. Victory means nothing to him if the price is his principles, because a victory won by abandoning what is right is a defeat in everything that matters. That is not what is happening here. These men are asking the crowd what it feels because they have no idea what is true, then adjusting their convictions to match the answer. Ayn Rand named this method decades ago. When men abandon reason as their guide, the opinion survey becomes their substitute for thought.
Observe what the assessment leaves out entirely. Not one word about tariffs, a tax on Americans that the Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional and the administration reimposed under a different statute, running through two years of roughly 6% cumulative inflation. Not one word about roughly 30 government equity stakes in private companies, which is socialism practiced by the party that claims to oppose it. Not one word about a brand new universal entitlement, two trillion dollar deficits, or a 40 trillion dollar debt. "Focus on cost of living" appears as a polling answer with no causal analysis attached, because the causal analysis indicts their own record. The most honest assessment somehow misses every policy the voters threw them out over.
Then Vance's 4 conclusions which are out of context slogans which are meaningless as such. The reason we lost is the war. Half true and twisted. Hitting the regime that has waged war on us for 47 years was right and four decades overdue. What voters watched afterward was the goal line surrender, a so called deal championed by the appeaser Vance, who stood at Lake Lucerne praising the framework as the foundation for a final agreement while it waived Iran's oil sanctions and released $12 billion in frozen assets to a regime left standing, with our forces still taking fire in the strait. The failure is not that we fought. The failure is that we paid the enemy and called it peace while they still shoot at us to this day. And buried at answer four is the actual agenda, change our relationship to Israel. This disgusting faction of the Republican party that cannot define socialism while its administration practices it has one firm conviction, pushing away the only free nation in the region, our one reliable ally against the theocracy we are trying to buy off, just as Obama did. At least Obama dropped the pallets of cash for all to see.
This is why Republicans and Democrats keep winning in alternating cycles while freedom loving Americans lose a little more freedom each time. Both parties govern by the same premises, spending, controls, entitlements, state stakes in industry. Neither offers an alternative, so voters punish whoever stands closest to the wreckage while the wreckage keeps growing.
The pollsters then measure the anger and recommend sharper messaging, and Walsh pronounces the measurement honest.
Honesty is the refusal to fake reality. An assessment that evades tariffs, socialism, and a bought off theocracy while blaming the one thing done partly right is not honest. It is a crowd reading performed by men who long ago stopped checking their premises against anything but each other.
David Ocamb retweeted
Bad policy, bad character make bad politics: erratic tariffs, impulsive Iran war, blanket pardons, apparent corruption, weaponized justice, ICE brutality, mountainous deficits, hiding Epstein, abandoning allies and coddling enemies. Hoping for a course correction, for the country and for my party.
This is the Republican voice moving forward. Full stop.
A political party that is morally and intellectually bankrupt deserves the rebuke of the American people.
It is now time to make America good again.
That is an endeavor to which all Americans can contribute, for we are not Democrats, Republicans or Independents. We are humans, and the things that unite us far exceed the things that divide us.
We are the caretakers of the American experiment, and the experiment has been rejuvenated tonight.
David Ocamb retweeted
My Twitter handle comes from the Whig Party that went extinct in 1856—a reminder that nothing in politics is permanent. In 1860 Abraham Lincoln, former Whig, was elected under a new political party banner.
Tonight feels like we just witnessed the death of a political party.
David Ocamb retweeted
Absolutely wild numbers among young voters tonight. Worse than anything I ever wrote about in The Selfie Vote.
I was trying to sound the alarm when young voters broke 2-to-1 for Dems in 2006/2008.
76D to 21R among 18-24? Goodness gracious.
To those saying the Big 12 is dead or ACC is better umm. No. Facts don’t lie.
Replying to @slmandel
My story on CFB's TV ratings dip this season. Read for free.
nytimes.com/athletic/7745932…
David Ocamb retweeted
Abdul El-Sayed should have condemned the antisemitic ad run on his behalf. @RepHaleyStevens was right to break with her party over his refusal to do so, and his many troubling connections he has with anti-American and antisemitic figures, and we stand with her.
David Ocamb retweeted
Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA): “Abdul El-Sayed is a communist who hates America. He is in a spiritual union with Hasan Piker, who believes America deserved 9/11.”
David Ocamb retweeted
Hot take: (with the election on everybody’s mind)
If you’re a conservative (R).. and don’t have ONE liberal friend. You’re doing it wrong
If you’re a liberal (D).. and don’t have ONE conservative friend. You’re doing it wrong
And of course as ALL of our mamas have told us.. 2 wrongs don’t make a right
David Ocamb retweeted
Haley Stevens is being called a traitor, but by reversing her endorsement of Abdul El-Sayed, she is showing exactly the kind of courage moderate Democrats once cheered, writes James Kirchick. thefp.com/p/haley-stevens-ab…
Apparently I’ve now published 100 essays on Say the Quiet Part.
Ironically, #100—about being a theater kid—was one of my least-read posts.
And one of my favorites.
Because people actually reached out to TALK about it.
So for #101: a thank you. And a request.
If you like what I write, send it to someone who might too. And please keep arguing with me—especially when you think I’m wrong.
100 down. Let’s keep going.
davidocamb.substack.com/p/a-…
David Ocamb retweeted
Haley Stevens made the gutsiest move I’ve seen in my political life today. Nothing but respect.
David Ocamb retweeted
Lots of fancy Texas early vote analyses out there, but here's a simple fact: in the 23 counties that voted for any statewide federal Dem this decade, early votes cast are at 91% of '24 levels.
In the other 231 all-GOP counties, early votes cast are at just 79% of '24 levels.
David Ocamb retweeted
Political courage. That’s what this is. And courage in the political world is something folks just aren’t used to seeing. Bravo @HaleyforMI.
























