For the past few weeks, JD Vance has been mightily trying to paint Tim Walz as having somehow claimed some "stolen valor" for his 24 years of honorable service in the National Guard. This required him to completely ignore the fact that Donald Trump got a deferment for non-existent "bone spurs" to avoid going to Vietnam, as well as Trump's naked contempt for those who do serve in the military. But hey, all that was a long time ago, and people have mostly forgotten how Trump denigrated an authentic war hero (John McCain) in 2015, so Vance just kept trying.

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Two more states -- Missouri and Arizona -- have now certified the signatures required to place abortion rights on their ballots in November. This brings the total for this election cycle up to eight states, although the possibility of the ballot measures having a meaningful impact on the other races on the ballot realistically only exists in three of them. So far, abortion rights have an unbroken 7-0 record of winning, even in some very red states, so it will be interesting to see if that continues or not. But beyond electoral geekiness, if any of them win it will be a victory for women's rights and freedom over government interference in the most personal of medical decisions.

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We will admit, right here up front, that we did not think up today's headline ourselves. It came from an extra-snarky press release from the Harris/Walz team. Following Donald Trump's bizarre appearance before the news cameras yesterday, the Harris camp put out a press release titled: "Donald Trump's Very Good, Very Normal Press Conference." The subtitle was: "Split Screen: Joy and Freedom vs. Whatever the Hell That Was."

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You may not have seen Minnesota Governor Tim Walz in action yet. This is understandable, since it was only yesterday that he was named to the Democratic ticket as the vice-presidential nominee. But even if you haven't seen any clips of him yet or watched that blowout Philadelphia rally yesterday, don't worry -- you already know him.

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In a little over two weeks, the Democratic Party has gone from "Biden/Harris" to "Harris/Walz," as their ticket has now been completed with Vice President Kamala Harris's selection of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz to be her running mate. But what's more astonishing than the lightning-fast schedule for all this unfolding is how utterly seamless it has all been. The party quickly unified behind Harris after President Joe Biden announced he was dropping his campaign, and from all indications today it looks like the party will further unify around the choice of Walz to round the ticket out. There are no simmering "Hillary Clinton supporters versus Bernie Bros" bad feelings tearing the party apart; instead, all the various factions seem content with the way things have worked out. That is an incredible accomplishment, for Democrats. Both progressives and centrists lined up to endorse Walz after this morning's announcement, with no hesitation.

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Democrats, rather astonishingly, seem to have JD Vance on the ropes already. He's been getting horrible coverage for over a week now, mostly about his rather unique ideas on how childless Americans should be treated as second-class citizens. What seems to be in order right now is a knockout punch. And I've got a doozy of an idea to suggest.

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President Joe Biden wrote a piece for the Washington Post today where he lays out three reforms he now supports: a strong code of ethics for the Supreme Court, term limits for Supreme Court justices, and a constitutional amendment that clearly states that presidents are not above the law. All are good ideas and having the president get behind them is even better. But forgive me if there's also the feeling that Biden's move comes way too late to change anything any time soon. It feels like nothing more than political posturing, at this point.

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Last week, we wrote our third Friday Talking Points column in a row that dispensed with our usual format and was solely devoted to angst and calling on President Joe Biden to drop out of the race. This week, we are happy to say, things have changed for the better. And that's putting it mildly!

Vice President Kamala Harris is now the presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee. Joe Biden is now officially (through his own decision) a lame duck. And Democrats by the millions have been astounded that they are now feeling genuine hope and actual enthusiasm about an election that was shaping up to be pretty grim indeed.

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What a week it has been....

Last Thursday night, America watched Donald Trump accept his party's presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention. Republicans had owned the news cycle all week long as they put on their quadrennial extravaganza, topped off with a full hour and a half of Trump rambling on about this, that, and the other. Traditionally, presidential candidates get a "convention bump" from all the free media, so perhaps Team Trump was looking forward to skating for the upcoming week, and just riding out the wave that the convention brought.

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Vice President Kamala Harris is now the presumptive presidential nominee of the Democratic Party. She clinched this status yesterday, only a little more than 24 hours after President Joe Biden announced he would be ending his re-election bid. Convention delegates in state after state quickly met and then proudly announced they were unanimously behind Harris. This completely precluded the idea of a "mini-primary" (which many pundits had been hoping for), since no other viable Democrat even came forward to challenge Harris. So with remarkable speed, the Democratic Party has now unified behind Harris as their standard-bearer. Within the same 24-hour period, a jaw-dropping $81 million was donated to her campaign (the total is now well over $100 million). People are already volunteering to work for the campaign by the tens of thousands. Numbers aside, though, Harris has already achieved a remarkable feat -- she has excited voters.

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