Talk Talk: Coconut-Kamala | nd-aktuell.de

Howdy from Texas, dear readers,

Do you think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of everything that surrounds you and everything that came before you. No, I haven’t gone crazy, that’s a more or less direct and now legendary quote from Kamala Harris, who quoted her Indian mother in a speech at the White House last year. A techno track was quickly made from this quote on Tiktok. Harris just wanted to point out the importance of cultural cohesion in minority communities. A year later, when Joe Biden announced that he would not run for president again and proclaimed Harris as his successor, the recording of this speech inadvertently healed the masses, thank the Internet: Kamala, like Kim Kardashian once, flooded the Internet, not only with her coconut tree metaphor, but also with her crazy laugh. The Republicans laughed at her, the Democrats laughed with her, as loudly as they had last time watching Obama and Biden’s bromance memes.

American politics, like any country, is more or less about actions, but the American people also need internet phenomena – memes, GIFs, remixes and stitches. If you can’t keep up with the network terms: it’s okay. I find examples you can relate to: Do ​​you remember the media hoopla surrounding Bill Clinton’s fellatio? No other sexual act has ever been so exploited by the media – and very few after it – the German counterpart to this was probably the broom closet (what a crazy story that was and why I received technical knowledge from the media as a child in 2000 about seed robbery?).

Monica, the head of state’s ex-lover, is typically American. After the scandal, she wrote a book, promoted a weight-loss program, appeared on TV and designed handbags: she monetized her fame like every US influencer today (it’s also fitting that she celebrated a comeback this year as the advertising face of the Reformation blogger brand). And in the past, the scandals of US politicians were no better: President Kennedy’s affairs caused a sensation during his lifetime and even today, decades later, more and more intimate details about his superhuman virility coupled with enormous physical frailty are coming to light.

But even apart from sex, American presidents dominate global scandals. George W. Bush exposed non-existent weapons of mass destruction, Richard Nixon, under whose administration many mentally ill people were released from institutions and thus pushed into homelessness (a problem that has only gotten worse over the years), also gave us Watergate A made-up and colored Ronald Reagan was responsible for Irangate (gun smuggling, strengthening the counter-revolutionaries – the usual), and a century earlier there was Ulysses S. Grant with his “Whiskey Ring” in which his cronies embezzled millions of dollars from the liquor tax. Not even all vice presidents can behave: Dick Cheney shot a lawyer while quail hunting in Texas. Donald Trump fits perfectly into this bad boy image with his affairs, criminal activities and all the make-up.

But now a large proportion of US citizens seem to be longing for normality. Kamala’s “running mate”, i.e. the potential future deputy Tim Walz, could be a German politician (and partly genetically is): He has no style, is for gun control – and is so modest that he doesn’t even own stocks or real estate. Kamala Harris also seems down-to-earth: she hasn’t shot anyone yet and at most has a strange laugh. Trump’s running mate JD Vance accused her of political incompetence because she is not a mother. She doesn’t need to be: Actress Drew Barrymore recently declared Kamala “Momala” on her talk show. As a German (and Merkel fan) I can only say: more techno, more coconut philosophy and definitely more mom, please!