ArcaMax

WASHINGTON -- "Summer's lease hath all too short a date," wrote Shakespeare, but the Bard didn't know what the summer of '24 had in store.

The cicadas are still singing, but they won't be for long. The days are getting shorter, the nights fall faster. And the garden knows it; the last batch of zinnias displayed its colors, and the gold black-eyed Susans have only their black eyes left. The cosmos are taking their last bow in September.

But this was no ordinary summer. America burned from coast to coast, north to south, in July, the hottest month ever on Earth. The mercury had no mercy on us as we all wilted in 100-degree heat under the sun.

Hand in hand with the weather, the political climate raged and burned like never before. The churn is not nearly over yet.

At the time of this writing, the summer calendar still holds the only presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican nominee Donald Trump. The woman who would be our first female president and the man who desperately means to regain the White House.

The atmosphere is charged with more partisan sparks and nerves, hopes and fears, than in living memory. The 1860 election, which Abraham Lincoln won, set off the Civil War. Temperatures are so high that we're now feeling history rhyme across the ages.

Our national fate may turn on this debate, center stage of a scorching election, much like mid-July burning.

Everyone knows how high the stakes are in 2024, whatever side you're on in this extraordinary contest -- with race, gender and generation clearly separating the candidates.

That is about all everyone agrees on in our polarized world.

To review: on June 27, when President Joe Biden and Trump met in a debate, which utterly changed everything on the political landscape, like a summer squall. It was hard for his party to believe how badly the president, 81, performed. His voice was weak, and his face looked lost as he stumbled through his answers.

Democrats in Congress were confounded and glum about their own political careers fading out with Biden on the ballot. Trump was virtually licking his chops, sure he had the election in the bag.

Then a second shock landed on July 13, the date Trump was shot in an assassination attempt at an outdoor rally in a battleground state, Pennsylvania. That shook up our senses for a while, and Trump went to the Republican convention shortly after with a bandage on his ear.

The Republican convention was all about triumphalism -- or, should I say, Trumphalism. Hulk Hogan captured the fighting spirit, with Trump seeming sure of victory -- and vindication after his violent dethroning.

On July 21, after resisting party pleas and pressure, Biden gave up his place in the race, in a nonviolent takeover of power. (See, Donald?) Literally in 24 hours, Harris secured her support to ascend to the Democratic nominee. No one challenged her, in an impressive show of party unity.

On Aug. 6, Harris named Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate. His down-to-earth sincerity was balm to the sunburn of insults streaming from the other side, Trump and his younger running mate, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance. Every single day, their caustic and cocky tongues wag counter to the adage that Americans like optimism and Reagan-style politics, sunny side up.

In mid-August, the Democratic convention met in Chicago, elated to embrace Harris and Walz, to honor Biden, and celebrate the Clintons and Obamas, party warhorses.

The city brimmed with delegates and the arena filled with people having the time of their life, a total sea change from the month before. Chicago cops smiled and flowers were in high bloom. Millennium Park's public art beckoned all the visitors. They weren't dancing in the streets, but almost. They too seemed sure of victory.

I have news: summer goes on, officially, until Sept. 22. Brace yourself, America. And then the fall.

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The author may be reached at JamieStiehm.com. To find out more about Jamie Stiehm and other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, please visit creators.com.

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