Charles M. Blow: Liberals needed a Beyoncé moment. Kamala Harris is delivering one.

When Vice President Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance Monday night at the Democratic National Convention, she walked onstage to the sound of Beyoncé’s “Freedom,” a 2016 song that The Independent said “roars like thunder, and threatens to topple governments in its wake.”

The poetry and stirring melody of the track – which has become the theme song of Harris’ campaign, a revolutionary anthem for marshaling a revolutionary response from her supporters – were overshadowed only by the parallels between the artist and the politician themselves.

On one level, these are two Black women at the top of their fields performing at the top of their game at a time when their gifts are aligned with the public’s appetite.

On a more strategic level, Harris is deploying some of the same tactics around image and access that Beyoncé has insisted upon, and they are paying the same dividends.

Harris has allowed her campaign to transcend the minutiae of public policy. Instead, she has allowed herself to be what liberals, and many moderates, needed: a beacon of hope, above the tedium of bureaucracy, existing as an applaudable symbol.

And one way she has achieved this is by drawing massive crowds to her rallies, which is a self-reinforcing phenomenon. The more that her crowds swell, the more that others will want to be part of them. There is a concert vibe to these rallies, exactly the kind of collective exhaling and positive energy that many people needed.

Harris is giving many Democratic voters what they want: precepts over policies, an opportunity to feel something more than contemplate something, ebullience over dread. She isn’t necessarily offering an organizing principle for the well of pent-up liberal energy, but is instead, herself, the principle around which that energy is coalescing.

Another way that she has achieved this is by holding off on major sit-down interviews in much the same way that Beyoncé does.

Part of this may be a realization within her campaign that Harris’ road to the White House doesn’t go directly through the mainstream press. Her team has made a bet – a successful one, at least so far – about which forms of exposure benefit her and which don’t.

About a decade ago, Beyoncé all but stopped giving in-person interviews, and I would say that it was one of the smartest things she could have done. As Margo Jefferson told the Times in 2015: “She has to be studying how effective her interviews have been so far. She may have decided that they do not contribute as dazzlingly to the portrait of Beyoncé as the other stuff. It’s a perfectly reasonable decision.”

The Harris campaign seems to be making the same calculation: The risk is higher than the reward. One odd answer to a question from, say, a network anchor would overshadow 10 perfect answers.

The journalist in me believes that Harris needs to sit for interviews because the public has a right to hear and read her answers to tough questions in forums that aren’t stage-managed.

But the survivalist in me – someone who believes that Donald Trump represents a grave threat to the country and therefore must be defeated – believes that Harris’ press avoidance has been so effective that she should keep it going as long as possible.

To be clear, none of this is a disavowal of her formidable career and record; nor is it a disguise for a lack of policy knowledge or debating dexterity. As former first lady Michelle Obama said Tuesday, Harris is “one of the most qualified people ever to seek the office of the presidency.”

This is Harris keenly reading the room. This is recognizing the moment. This is about hearing the Democratic electorate and being a conduit for its angst.

The reality is that if Harris is elected, her policies probably won’t diverge from President Joe Biden’s in any substantial way, and lingering on the thorniest issues, like the war in the Gaza Strip that were threatening to tear the Democratic coalition apart, would pay few electoral dividends.

Last week, on the verge of the convention, Harris delivered her first major policy speech, focused on the economy. But that speech and the corresponding policies are not what has carried her forward. Her proposals are in line with what one might expect from most Democratic candidates, a best-case-scenario wish list, a declaration of principles, the details of which are not likely to make their way through Congress and become law anytime soon.

More important for her and her platform was whether they passed Hippocrates’ test as applied to politics: First, do no harm.

She did no harm.

And as a bonus, Harris’ ability to avoid interviews and still dominate news coverage has disoriented Trump, who sees himself as a savant when it comes to getting media attention. He insists she’s not doing interviews because “She’s not smart,” but her approach may turn out to be not just smart but brilliant.

No, she isn’t a rock star. Yes, in the end, what will matter for Americans is her ability to be an effective leader. But first she has to win. And her strategy has led her to this week’s convention in Chicago, where her fandom is convulsing with enthusiasm. Kamala Harris is experiencing her “Renaissance.”