A good analysis.

I might quibble with some things as far as what the future should be for the Democratic Party. But that is only because of my own inclinations and biases (i.e. that I am sympathetic to some liberal populist economic notions but not all). I remain registered as an Independent because both parties piss me off and always have, but I count myself something of a de facto Democrat (and always vote for Democrats and probably always will for the remainder of my life looking at the dumpster fire the GOP has become) and that is because of social issues (abortion rights, LGBTQ rights, ... basically just damn rights dammit and stay the hell out of my personal life Big Brother!).

One thing though about what you said about the initial positions of Harris and her shifting to the right... This all presupposes people were actually paying close attention. Politics/news has become information overload. I am a regular and intense and thorough consumer of news and political information... but even I couldn't keep up with it all. I even missed some of the shifts she made that you described. Thus, I suspect many voters (most voters?) barely bothered to absorb any details from her in policy terms. And if she shifted, many hardly noticed. That would be my guess.

They voted on emotion... the emotion of "things suck right now and I want a change." So, I do disagree with criticizing Harris for shifts or even criticizing her for hooking up for a Kumbaya tour with Liz Cheney and ex MAGA women. I think that was smart, actually, but it would take too long for me to explain why.

I think Harris is the kind of leader/personality/politician that once upon a time would have and could have run away with a landslide (leaving aside for a moment racism/misogyny). But alas she was running in the looney tunes wild wild west of infotainment/podcast/post-truth America. She is not built for that but Trump is like a creature engineered in a lab to be "bigly" perfect for our post-truth society. *sigh*