Did you know that there were only 32 days before the election as of yesterday? And that Magic Johnson wore 32 on his jersey with the Lakers? Trippy, man.

Speaking of trippy, Kamala Harris made this cosmic connection during an appearance in Michigan, after talking about Magic's endorsement of her campaign. As clumsy a segue as that might be, it paled in comparison to what happened when Harris reportedly had a teleprompter malfunction. Suddenly, Harris appeared lost and had her mental needle stuck on "32," and began a blessedly brief reinterpretation of the Beatles' Revolution No. 9:

Kamala's teleprompter briefly went out at the beginning of her speech — you can tell the exact moment it happened.

She had absolutely no idea what to do or say.

Humiliating. pic.twitter.com/287bSswwgS

— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) October 4, 2024

Newsweek picked up the story, although they couldn't confirm the assumption of a teleprompter malfunction:

Midway through her speech, Harris appeared to pause, before repeating the phrase "32 days" multiple times. The vice president was referring to the number of days left until Election Day on November 5.

"Remember this number. 32. Today we got 32 days until the election," she said.

After a short pause, she added: "So 32 days... 32 days... OK."

"We got some business to do," she continued, as she attempted to regain her footing, but her speech didn't quite make it back on track as she repeated, again, "32 days."

Was it a teleprompter malfunction? Possibly; it's tough to explain it any other way. However, it might also have been a result of Harris ad-libbing all of the nonsense about "32" and then getting lost herself. Whatever the cause, the result was a weird lacuna in her presentation in which she looked lost and unable to collect her thoughts extemporaneously.

Newsweek then equated this to a recent J.D. Vance gaffe that also has a connection to the Beatles. It's not at all the same thing, but it'll do as both-sides cover, I suppose:

"Ma'am I don't need a teleprompter, I actually got thoughts in my head, unlike Kamala Harris," he said at a rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, in August.

Later during the rally, he was heard confusing Abbey Gate at Kabul airport in Afghanistan, where 13 American soldiers were killed in a bombing in 2021, with Abbey Road in London.

That is a legit gaffe and a demonstration of mild hubris, but one is not akin to the other. Vance mixed up the names; Harris got mentally derailed while reading a prepared speech. 

What does the latter signify? Not everyone can speak well in an extemporaneous manner. Some people really need a fully written script, while others can riff all day long. There's a big difference between a virtuoso concert pianist and an Art Tatum. Both have great talent, but only one of them has the ability to improvise on the fly. 

Harris' problem is that she's no virtuoso in either sense. And to be successful at this level of politics, you have to have talent enough to do both at least competently -- stick to a script and improvise. Politicians who get lost when the teleprompter malfunctions do not instill confidence in their audiences; they look like wind-up dolls suffering a sudden spring malfunction. There's a good reason why the Biden White House kept her under wraps after a series of disastrous media interviews in the first six months of the administration, ending with the Lester Holt interview on NBC in June 2021. 

Put more simply: Harris does not look intelligent enough to explain herself. And her lack of engagement with the media since getting anointed with the nomination makes it look as though her campaign thinks she's not intelligent enough to do so, either. Having the needle stick at "32 ... 32" only makes that impression stronger.

Or as my pal Scott Johnson writes at Power Line this morning, Kamala Harris looks like "a deepfake":

Those of us who obsess about politics have a good handle on who Kamala Harris is. The team of old Obama hands running her for president means to keep the rest of the country in the dark. They confine her to tightly scripted appearances. They do not trust her to speak extemporaneously. She might be exposed for who she is. In unscripted events she is not to stray from memorized lines. As a candidate, she is a deepfake.

In conclusion, allow me to remind everyone: 31 ... 31 ... 31 ... 31 ...