Harris resorts to name-calling

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Kamala Harris came out strong Wednesday night in her CNN town hall with Anderson Cooper and an audience of undecided voters in Pennsylvania’s Delaware County. She began by citing the testimony of Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, John Kelly, along with his national security advisers, his secretaries of defense, his chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and his vice president — all of whom have spoken of his unfitness to serve as president.

It was persuasive stuff, compellingly delivered — an example of the power of the old journalistic rule about showing rather than telling. Then, in answer to a question from Cooper as to whether she considered Trump to be a “fascist,” she replied, “Yes, yes I do.”

Uh oh.

This was bound to be the headline of the evening, which otherwise featured a very familiar Harris repeating lines we’ve heard before. And while the F-word no doubt provided moral comfort for her supporters, it struck me as politically ill judged, for three reasons.

First, like “racist” or “sexist,” the fascist epithet has lost much of its moral force over the years by dint of overuse. George W. Bush, along with most other past Republican presidents, was also often called a fascist; even Keith Olbermann later apologized to Bush for the overheated language. To use the word now feels both tired and meaningless.

Second, by adopting the term as her own, Harris descended from truth-telling — that is, just noting what Trump’s own people said about him — to being a name-caller. It’s the wrong look for a candidate casting herself as a uniter and seeking to win over undecided voters, including prior Trump voters. And though the accusation was aimed at Trump alone, there’s an implication that his supporters must, to some degree, be fascists themselves. It will turn off some portion of an undecided electorate that’s tired of moral hectoring from liberal elites.

Third, while Trump can rightly be described as demagogic, mean-spirited, authoritarian-minded — even a plain old jerk — most people think of fascist regimes as places where secret police terrorize ordinary citizens, free media doesn’t exist and protest is forbidden. That’s probably not what most Americans remember of their experience of the Trump years, when the New York Times was more than doubled its circulation and Trump’s loudest critics could be heard from the minute Joe Scarborough woke them up to the hour Rachel Maddow put them to sleep.

Things could surely be different in a second Trump term, when he will probably surround himself with less-scrupulous advisers than those he employed in the first term. His illiberal instincts, his self-pitying narcissism, his affinity for strongmen and the unforgivable stain of Jan. 6 are reason enough to deny him a second term. Calling him a name only sets that aim back.