How often do you hear about mental health, emotional exhaustion, anxiety, and other negative psychological conditions? How many times have you yourself felt like the world was just so dark, and you needed to walk away for a bit? The amount of news coming at us at all times is overwhelming. The moment you think you've got your head wrapped around one thing, two things pop up that begin moving the news cycle in a completely different direction. 

Don't you wish there was more... joy?

A lot of people do, and the candidate who can sell the idea that they're a joyful person who can bring a ton of joy back to your life is going to attract a lot more support than they rightfully deserve. 

This is the Kamala Harris campaign strategy. The Democrats know they don't exactly have a lot of accomplishments to run on. Under the Biden-Harris administration, America's quality has gone to pot. High inflation, rising costs, open borders, rising crime, economic stagnation, joblessness, and a host of other maladies plague the American people, and a lot of this is thanks to Kamala Harris. The Democrats are well aware of this, and so they have to approach the election from a different angle. 

They have to sell you happiness. 

This seems stupid on paper. They're going to convince you that the last four years of the Biden-Harris administration was an old regime and that the new way forward is the... Harris-Walz administration? The same people in charge, but this time, it'll be different. Never mind that there aren't really any policy positions to speak of — that's a feature, not a bug — the important thing is that in this dark time, we're willing to bring forth joy and happiness, or as it was previously known, "hope and change."

The Democrats are the happy party! The other guys, they're all angry and hateful. They're bigoted, racist, sexist, and homophobic. They want division. Not the Democrats. They have joy. 

A person has to have one of two qualities in order for this to sell. Either they have to ignore the fact that Donald Trump is actually the one uniting people from across the aisle, as was seen by Tulsi Gabbard, Elon Musk, and RFK Jr., or you have to be ignorant of all that's happening in the political world right now. The Democrats have both of those cases in abundance at their disposal. 

Over at Newsweek, Gad Saad wrote an incredible piece detailing this phenomenon: 

It's this peripheral, emotive route of persuasion that the Harris campaign has embraced with the "positive vibes" campaign rooted in joy, excitement, and fun. Her managers are willfully hijacking your decision-making process by ensuring that you focus only on your affective, peripheral system.

It's deeply cynical, for the obvious reason that when selecting the leader of the free world, you should be engaging your cognitive system. A rational voter should evaluate the respective positions of the two candidates on fiscal policy, immigration policy, border security, foreign policy, criminal justice policy, commitment to the First and Second Amendments, the tension between the rights of biological women versus trans women (biological males), and their stance on meritocracy versus diversity, inclusion, and equity.

And yet, the great majority of voters are utterly oblivious about these issues, and prefer to love or hate a given candidate based on irrelevant affective processing.

Emotions are evolutionarily important, but only when properly deployed on the right target at the appropriate situation. It's crucial not to let your emotions hijack your thinking, whether you are a voter or a policy maker. As American voters, you have the sacred task of choosing the person who will impact not just your country but the entire globe for the next four years.

The Harris campaign doesn't want you thinking too hard about it. Don't explore the issues and really think about the solutions. Just feel the vibes, man. Just let the joy in and take it easy. Let it take you away. 

The Harris campaign is a lot more like a drug pusher in this regard, much like many a psychologist and back alley dealers are today. Feeling anxious? Take this pill. Feeling depressed? This prescription medication will give you the sensation of a normal life back. It's all just too much? Smoke this. Inject this right into your veins, and you'll feel like you're flying. 

It gives you the idea that you're happy and that it's all going to be okay, but it doesn't make reality go away. 

The reality is that Kamala Harris caused a lot of these problems we're having now, and she has no solutions for them. She doesn't have anything to come at Trump with because he actually has accomplishments, whereas her greatest talent is the ability to fail upward. If she actually had something to run on, her campaign wouldn't be focusing so much on emotional concepts. 

It's a dangerous thing to believe a politician who talks more about smiling than about policy. As the late great George Carlin once said: 

"When fascism comes to America, it will not be in brown and black shirts. It will not be with jackboots. It will be Nike sneakers and smiley shirts. Smiley. Smiley."

The truth isn't always pleasant, but the truth is necessary for a pleasant life. Embracing reality allows you to see the problem and solve the issues. At RedState, we always try to bring you the truth, no matter how inconvenient or brutal. This has made more than a few of the overlords in tech angry and with the election drifting closer and closer, censorship attempts become more frequent. That's why we'd love for you to join our VIP Program, a super cheap way to help us stay in the game when the left tightens the screws. 

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