The Best of Women Against the Worst of Men

Kamala Harris's "Closing Argument" Was Great on Many Levels. One Was That She is About to Become Our First Woman President.

Perfect.

Kamala Harris’ closing argument was perfect. The setting was extraordinary. Perhaps what made it so was that while she was speaking from the same spot from which Trump launched the MAGA mob against the Congress and his own Vice President on January 6, 2021 she transcended that fact. Yes, the contrast was important. But, when you looked at her with the White House lit in golden light floating behind her in the distance and you saw the 75,000 rapturous supporters arrayed before her and she stood behind the podium looking as presidential as any many who ever held the office, there was a different feeling.

It was a foreshadowing. It was a sense that this was our next president. It was a sense that this was a very different kind of historical stage from the one on which Trump committed his most despicable act. There she was seeming entering the realm of our best leaders, those who understand, capture, and embody crucial moments in our history.

The Vice President’s speech was a ideal blend of calling out the threat posed by Trump, detailing her antithetical approach to his—to help rather than hurt, to embrace rather than threaten, to lift up rather than denigrate and divide, being specific about her proposals, underscoring her promise to be a president for all Americans and to give a seat at the table even to those who strongly disagree with her and reminding voters of who she is, the narrative of her life.

The words were stirring and strong. They were clearly spoken and when appropriate inspiring or resolute.

But there was something about her remarks that made them feel different to me, that made this night, this event feel different.

I struggled to put my finger on it. In her navy blue suit delivering a well-structured set of remarks, she evoked the best presidential communicators I’ve seen in my lifetime: Reagan and Clinton and Obama. But for all the similarities you might find in any presidential campaign speech the feeling it left viewers with, the feeling it left me with was utterly unique.

When I rewatched parts of it, I was struck by the fact that she has grown extraordinarily good at the business of campaigning. Indeed, I felt very lucky that given the immense stakes associated with this years election, that she was our standard-bearer, that this moment had conspired with all those that came before to ensure she was the one in the arena, she was the one who would face off with Trump.

But there was something else, the speech struck me in an unusual way. Part of it was related to the fact that I have been so enthusiastic about her as a candidate for so many years. It was very moving to me to see how far she has come, how close she is to being president, how good she is at this and therefore how she affirms the faith that I and many others have had in her even while the rest of the world was largely in the dark about her great qualities and gifts.

Even while acknowledging those things, though, there was something else. It had to do with the ineffable qualities of her remarks. Somehow she managed to be forceful and yet clearly compassionate. She spoke of the dignity of work and I knew she meant it. She spoke of the lessons her mother taught her and there was love and respect in her voice. She spoke with wisdom and with warmth and with a sort of strength that candidly, I have never seen before in another American president.

Then, it struck me. It is the most important unspoken aspect of this campaign. She is not strong like men are supposed to be strong. She is not a leader in the way that men have been taught to be leaders. She doesn’t lack anything that men offer. But she offers more because she is a woman. I could feel it as much in her comments about defending liberty worldwide as I could in those about restoring women’s reproductive freedom. It was subtle but it was important. She would bring something to the presidency that no man has ever been able to.

The fact that Kamala Harris will become America’s first woman president matters. And we are all fortunate to live in a time that such a development is possible.

She does not play the gender card. She is from a different generation that say, Hillary Clinton. This is not about breaking glass ceilings. Its about being the best person for the job but also being best in part because of the experiences and perspectives that only a woman can bring to the role.

No nation can call itself a democracy or even well-governed if the majority population does not have the opportunity to assume the most important leadership role. She made that clear without ever having to say it.

What is more she did it in a year—and in fact in a period in our history—when, a century after women finally got the vote, they are assuming the most important role in our society they’ve ever had.

We have an election that pits the best of women against the worst of men. Oh, I am not speaking of some hoary battle of the sexes subtext. I’m being quite literal. There is no man in our country who possesses so many profound character flaws as Trump, none who has failed so egregiously in his ever pursuit, who has displayed such bad judgment, who has debased his high office in so many ways. And there are few women who have risen to the top in our public life who have been so dedicated, so selfless, so effective, so intelligent, so winning as Kamala Harris.

But Harris is not alone when I say this election pits the best of women against the worst of men. Nor is Trump. Harris is joined and elevated by the women who have risen up in the wake of the overturning of Roe v. Wade and who have said, we are taking back our government, we will be heard, our collective action will transform the country. She is joined by the women who have stood up to Trump from within his own party. Yes, some men have done that too. But who has been more courageous or eloquent than Liz Cheney or the former Trump White House officials who have called him out, the vast majority of whom are women. (Dare I add that women like former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, previously the most accomplished senior woman official in U.S. history, played a big role in ensuring that we had the best candidate possible—Kamala Harris?)

While Trump and his bro posse like Elon Musk, JD Vance and their odious colleagues, have decided to make testosterone (or, in Trump’s case, testosterone supplements) the central motivating force in their campaign, women have said, “No you don’t. No more. We are battling back.” Already analysts are seeing this as the gender gap election to perhaps a greater degree than any presidential election in memory. Trump is likely to falter because of his dependence on the worst of men as his advisors, a band of incels and weaklings who feel that hatred and rejection is a form of strength. When he held his now infamous hate rally on Sunday night at Madison Square Garden did you notice that almost every single speaker who made headlines by being offensive and spewing fascist fantasies was a male? The MAGA movement is betting heavily that young males will lift them on election day but there is a problem. Young men are notorious for not turning out to vote.

Meanwhile, Harris is likely to be the beneficiary of much higher turnout among women than men, of more women than men voting to reject there Republican tradition, of young women, particularly young women of color, turning out as never before to take action to defend and shape their future.

Yes, this race is about a prosecutor versus a felon, someone who is “for the people” versus someone who is just in it for himself, one of the leaders of the most successful first term presidency in U.S. history versus the leader of the least successful such presidency (according to historians), some good versus someone who is profoundly corrupt and fundamentally evil.

But it is also an election whether we play it up or not, that pits a woman against a man. And more than that, as I have said, it is at its heart between the best of American women and the worst of American men. And I believe, in the end, we will all be grateful it was and we will owe a debt of gratitude to the women who rose up and saved our democracy even though when it was founded 250 years ago, there was no place for them in it.

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