Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, running mate to Vice President Kamala Harris, is a castle made of sand. All it took was a little digging to knock it over.

Walz did not fight or serve in war. We can tip our cap at Walz’s 24 years in the Minnesota National Guard while noting he is not what he has claimed for two decades to be, a retired Command Sergeant Major. When it came time to actually lead men into battle, Walz turned in his retirement papers. 

But that didn’t stop him from claiming otherwise over the last two decades. It’s not just that he said it, and kept saying it. That’s bad enough. Why he said it is even worse. 

Walz used the unearned credibility as a warfighter to argue for more gun control. He used his fake credentials to argue that you really shouldn’t be able to defend your family and your home. 

​​“We can research the impacts of gun violence. We can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war,” Walz said, in a speech that has resurfaced. It’s only one of the many stolen valor claims Walz has made to advance his career.

In politics, character is who you are when everybody’s watching. 

This is a man who would say anything to gain an advantage. He won’t do anything—he wouldn’t actually fight in the war he signed up to lead men into. Because actual warfighting carries actual risks, and Tim Walz was unwilling to assume those risks. 

This is the man who would be a heartbeat away from the presidency? His lackluster character makes me ponder what might have been and what it means if Tim Walz is the best the Democrats have.

In a parallel universe, our governor, Gretchen Whitmer, would be running No. 2 with Kamala Harris. 

Picture it. You’re Gretchen Whitmer. You’re in your early 50s. You could ride to Washington and get the only experience in politics you are lacking. 

If it was a sure thing, would you go? Probably. 

Why wouldn’t you go? Only if it wasn’t a sure thing.

In saying no to Harris, Whitmer was betting that Harris won’t win. Because if Harris wins in 2024, she will be the Democratic nominee again in 2028. 

If Whitmer expected Harris to win in November, where would she rather find herself in 2032? VP for eight years or out of politics for six? She leaves the governor’s office in 2026. 

Some think the Democrats are playing 4D chess, but their every action says they’re losing. If Kamala Harris can’t get a better running mate than Tim Walz, she’s losing. 

This—the afterglow of the late replacement and the certainty of a complete ticket—is as good as it gets for Harris. 

Time Magazine had her on the cover this week, with the theme “Reintroducing Kamala Harris.” 

Harris didn’t bother to sit for an interview. She got the cover anyway. The very next day, the Associated Press ran a story about how to apostrophize Tim Walz’s and Kamala Harris’s names. Damn, gravity is ill.

That story was the media waving the white flag on its ability to tilt the 2024 election. Harris hasn’t given them anything to work with.

She has billions in in-kind donations from the media available to her. They’re awaiting her call. Publicity that no campaign could ever afford if it had to pay for it. 

Team Harris is telling you it fears the light. 

The Time cover was not a testament of the media’s power. It was proof that 2024 is an uphill battle. The only Kamala Harris they believe palatable to America is not bold and beautiful. She’s gray and reserved. You’d think she was a British prime minister of Indian extraction. Not history in the making. Not the embodiment of black girl joy.

Time was afraid to let Kamala Harris smile. Because then you’d think of her laughing, and then you’d hear the cackling. You’d hear it in your head. You hear it right now.

It plays well on the couch with Jimmy Kimmel. Less so across the table from Xi Jinping or Vladimir Putin.

FDR said we have nothing to fear but fear itself. Kamala Harris is afraid of her own shadow.

All the Yasss Queen’s horses and all the Yasss Queen’s men can’t put the Kamala Harris candidacy back together again. The gatekeepers are failing. 

They will mount one last stand, and they might even win. 

But right now they’re losing, and they know it. 

James David Dickson is host of the Enjoyer Podcast. Follow him on X @downi75.