President Biden, facing calls to step aside (in spite of the unlikelihood that such a move would materially improve Democrats' chances of winning in less than four months), is responding forcefully that he is in it, and in it to win it.
Biden participated in a spate of campaign events over the weekend, including an edifying visit to a Black church (Trump hasn't been out and about for some 10 days). This morning, he called in to Morning Joe. And he also just released the above letter.
This is a tricky thing, because the President IS old and DOES act it. But is that enough reason for voters to abandon an incumbent in a time when the economy has markedly improved over the past three-plus years? Do people even believe they're better off than they were under Trump? Sometimes, it feels like American voters are the ones with memory challenges — look at how positive W and even Trump are viewed today as opposed to at the ends of their time in office.
Most importantly, could Democrats more handily beat Trump if their nominee — a sitting POTUS — were to dramatically step aside? I do understand the fan-fic appeal, but that would mean a new candidate, almost certainly VP Kamala Harris (in spite of loony theories about mini-primaries), and would send a message of chaos.
Could it work? Yes, it could. But objectively speaking, I don't see how that path is obviously better than muscling Biden back into office by painting the alternative as simply unacceptable.
Neither choice is a cake walk, and again, anyone saying one choice or the other is a slam-dunk is lying or stupid. I do not know which is more likely to end in victory. It is also possible neither would. But we won't know what is going to happen until people vote. Let us hope we follow in the path of England and France, which recently rejected the far right, and let us hope we do not follow in the path of England and France, which recently voted against the incumbents.
It's time to coalesce and make a binary choice.
P.S. There is a lot of talk about Project 2025. I posted about it, only to have a white gay reader blast me for sharing “left-wing hysteria.” He wanted me to know that Trump didn't know a thing about it, and had come out against it. This is what we are up against within our own party — a gay man, with a lot to lose under another Trump Administration, is arguing with me under the belief that Trump is telling the truth, that Trump doesn't know about an elaborate plan by his own advisors and employees. Also, haven't we heard before about left-wing hysteria? Remember people pooh-poohing the idea that Roe could ever be dismantled? Project 2025 is not a bogeyman. It's real. And it's real important we defeat it.
COMMENTS