Terry Prone: Kamala Harris' campaign has floundered, now will it fail?

Originally published in the Irish Examiner.

Just over a week ago, at the Rolling Sun literary festival in Westport, the two-person panel was asked to identify who they thought would win the US Presidential election. My cowardice outweighed my sense of contextual duty, and I refused. Professor Diarmaid Ferriter, however, had more courage, naming Donald Trump as the likely winner.

What was fascinating about the audience reaction was how muted it was. More of a shrug than a shocked collective indrawn breath. Yup, that shrug said. It’s over. Kamala’s done.

Until the last ballots are counted, we cannot know if Ferriter was correct. Democrat supporters can continue to hope. But what we do know is that the Harris campaign, so filled with joy and possibility at the outset, has reduced and wrinkled like an abandoned balloon, and – it can be argued - largely because of Democrat inability to follow public emotion. Instead of registering the public positivity generated by the combination of Harris and Walz in every venue, led by her amazing smile, instead of keeping going on their media-avoidance, which was working a treat, the campaign yielded. It yielded to the voices (led by Trump) bellowing that Harris wasn’t able for rigorous questioning by media.

There’s a word for what happened. Perseveration. No, not perseverance. 

"Perseveration. It’s a thing pilots in trouble do. They repeat the actions that have failed to work. It’s a function of panic and pressure."

You can train a pilot away from that lethal behaviour. A presidential campaign, with its inevitable scared group-think in the face of incoming poll and other data, is much more difficult to manage.

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