After a bad debate Biden's campaign enters a critical moment.
July 5, 2024 2:03 PM Subscribe

Following a bad performance in last week's Presidential Debate, Joe Biden finds his re-election campaign in serious trouble. Polls suggest that voters have serious doubts about his ability to do the job. A growing number of democratic officials and donors are pushing for him to exit the race, and possibly resign the Presidency including Senator Mark Warner and Abagail Disney (a Disney heir and democratic megadonor) . The Biden campaign has responded saying he is not dropping out and the President has attempted damage control with a series of public events including a radio interview on The Earl Ingram Show, a massive rally in Wisconsin, and a sit down interview with George Stephanopolis on ABC News that will air at 8 pm Eastern (the official ABC news site in this link is supposed to have a live stream). ABC news was originally going to air the interview in two parts, but has decided to air it unedited, in its entirety in Prime Time. With the convention weeks away and no way to hold a primary, Democrats seems to be focusing on VP Kamala Harris as Biden's possible replacement.
posted by interogative mood (232 comments total) 15 users marked this as a favorite

Hopefully this can serve as a peril sensitive filter for those who are too anxious to watch tonight's interview live.
posted by interogative mood at 2:04 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

Not a fan of the guy and not a fan of the people who put us in this position but I do not see any way in hell he gets replaced in a way that is not, essentially, conceding the election, to be brutally honest. I am pretty sure most of the media types and pols driving the narrative know this too.
posted by Artw at 2:07 PM on July 5 [25 favorites]

I am pretty sure most of the media types and pols driving the narrative know this too.

c'mon. let's not do this bad faith reading AGAIN. We went around this dozens of times in the previous thread.
posted by lalochezia at 2:17 PM on July 5 [21 favorites]

When John McCain kept saying "steady hand at the tiller" during his debate and it made him seem ridiculously old he was actually ten years younger than Joe Biden is now. And a lot younger than Trump is now. Trump is totally too old and senile to be president. All we need is a candidate that makes him look that way, like Obama did with McCain.
posted by snofoam at 2:19 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

I think that if Biden resigns and Kamala Harris runs as the incumbent she beats Trump easily. She would get a bounce out of a rally around the new President effect, then potentially a democratic convention bounce and all the questions voters had about Biden's age, would suddenly be about Trump.
posted by interogative mood at 2:20 PM on July 5 [25 favorites]

For once, I think voters would be excited about Kamala. That only has to last until the 6th of November, man!
posted by kittens for breakfast at 2:24 PM on July 5 [15 favorites]

One thing I remember about the 80s was how refreshing it was to see President Bush competently hold weekly press conferences vs the previous occupant’s bumblefuckery over his 2nd term…
posted by torokunai at 2:26 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

When you're running against a career criminal, maybe being a cop isn't all bad.
posted by box at 2:26 PM on July 5 [25 favorites]

A massive rally? It was in a middle school…how big could it have been? I would have gone just for the story, but it was full already.

I’m transfixed by this story in the same way I was transfixed by the Princess Kate tempest, and with rather the same reservations about what it says about my own character. I really thought Trump’s moaning about Biden’s age was some kinda “I know you are but what am I” nonsense with zero basis in fact, so to see tons of media orgs treating it seriously gave me kind of a shock. I don’t know. I think it is possible that both things are true — that he is declining and so leaving him on the ticket presents risks, and that removing him will unavoidably present risks also. I’ll vote D regardless, this isn’t about that for me.
posted by eirias at 2:27 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Harris is not the perfect candidate, certainly not my top pick, but at this point she is a much better candidate than Biden. She could--and would--readily beat Trump. Biden could hand the reigns over to Harris and people would love him for it. Harris is kind of an odd person, but aren't all pols pretty odd people?

The clock is ticking here. Biden needs to shit or get off the pot. And that means proving that he can handle interviews, speaking, and yes, debate, or tough questions that shows he has the mental acuity that was so so lacking in the debate. But so far he's done the opposite. Sure, there have been rallies, and he gave some ok speeches, but he has to do more.

It's a job interview, Joe. You can't just say "trust me" and fold your arms.
posted by zardoz at 2:29 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

Please God replace Biden with anyone, even with Kamala whose politics I find godawful. At least she'll look like the normal one when she's side by side with Tr*mp.
posted by tovarisch at 2:30 PM on July 5 [13 favorites]

Replacing him and not replacing him could both convincingly be argued to be routes to doom. I am quite willing to admit that I don’t know what the right thing to do is - in fact the only position I definitely can’t get behind is the position that it’s somehow obvious.

Since it’s not obvious, “wait and see” is an appealing plan on the surface, except that

a.) waiting inherently skews towards non-replacement

b.) it’s much clearer what a disaster would look like than what a truly reassuring sign would look like, which leaves the possibility of another disaster hanging over everything
posted by atoxyl at 2:30 PM on July 5 [21 favorites]

An alternative view, that I strongly support - Step outside the bubble, by Robert B. Hubbell (sorry, Substack):

It is unanimous: the political press wants Biden to step down. Here’s the thing: The press has no role in selecting the Democratic nominee or the president, despite their belief otherwise.

I estimate that no more than a thousand political journalists (and maybe only a few hundred) are telling Biden to drop out. They have created a bubble inside an echo chamber inside a computer simulation based on flawed polling.

The Constitution vests the power to elect the president in 250 million Americans. (Yeah, I know; the Electoral College yada yada.) Tens of millions of Democrats voted for Biden in the primaries despite the candidacy of a protest candidate (Dean Phillips) whose goal was to block Joe Biden from receiving the nomination. Those voters listened and cast their ballots. Those millions of votes are now meaningless according to most journalists—who refuse to even acknowledge the existence or weight of those votes in this decision.

I DO like the guy. I am an enthusiastic Biden supporter. I am absolutely appalled by some (not all) of his administration's actions and statements related to Palestine, but he has been a phenomenally successful, progressive president, and I can't wait to vote for him again.

Seriously, the number of voters in this country who don't even care about the debates and are barely tuned in to the election at all yet may be unfathomable to most of us here on Metafilter, but it's a great big number, and when they vote in November, they will be way, way more focused on abortion rights, climate change, and LGBTQ+ rights, than a debate.

We have the candidates we're going to have. One has done a lot for progressive causes and will do more, the other will destroy the country and possibly the world. One has beaten the other once already, and whatever the extremely inaccurate polls* are saying these days, the former president has not done anything in the past four years to gain followers.

I'm staying out of the rest of this thread, just like I've stopped reading ALL the ridiculous press, because for me, it's all distraction from the essential task at hand, which is keeping the former president out of power. There's one candidate who can do that, and I'm going to do what I can to make sure that happens.

* If you want to see all the problems with polling this year, take a look at my comment history.
posted by kristi at 2:31 PM on July 5 [55 favorites]

Hopefully, Stephanopolis realises the gravity of the situation and leaves the kid gloves at home. Biden is not a fit candidate, and the sooner everyone admits it, the sooner he can step aside and be replaced with someone who will have a chance of beating Trump.
posted by Optamystic at 2:34 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics? I don't know much about her political career, and would like to be enlightened.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 2:36 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

I said something similar at the tail end of the previous thread, but the campaign is not even attempting anything that will undo the debate performance, change public opinion, or reverse the polls. What are they hoping for? To stick it out until the next major public debacle? He can't catch up and win the race just by limping a little less visibly around the track.

People, mostly because they have to, are publicly saying it's Biden's choice, but he's going to be forced out, hopefully behind closed doors. It's not actually his choice. Does anyone really believe the entirety of the party would willingly lose this election and just shrug their shoulders and say, "Grandpa Joe said he could do it, what could we do?"
posted by snofoam at 2:38 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

I suppose if Harris is the first-line replacement anyway, you could let Biden stay on the ticket but play up Harris’ role as his successor, or the idea of them as a package deal. But that only conceivably works if you are willing to sideline Joe and boost Kamala. Has anybody ever campaigned like that?
posted by atoxyl at 2:39 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

I find Stephanie Jones persuasive on this. If the candidate isn't Harris, they would hemorrhage black voters, and where exactly would they get their funding from? They might not even get on the ballot in every state. This discussion is disingenuous and not serious.
posted by idb at 2:42 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

How can he be forced out? Realistically?
posted by kittens for breakfast at 2:42 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

Kamala must be under immense pressure right now. If there ever was a time that history said "We need a hero", this is it. I don't know enough about her to guess if that's even a possibility, but my powerful narrative bias really, really wants it.
posted by The otter lady at 2:45 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Replacing him and not replacing him could both convincingly be argued to be routes to doom.

Yeah the fuckup wasn't last week, it was at least four years ago.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 2:45 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

Everyone knows that when the media declares you washed up, you 'Rocky Balboa' it. Run in the street, do the presidential equivalent of punching some meat. I mean come on. Get out there. Change some minds.
posted by The_Vegetables at 2:47 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

How can he be forced out? Realistically?

I'm sure there are some mechanics for literally doing this, but the way I am imagining is that basically everyone in the party gives him a deadline to resign with dignity and if he doesn't, they tell the truth about him and paint him (fairly!) as a traitor to his party, unwilling to do what his country needs him to do.
posted by snofoam at 2:47 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

escape from the potato planet: the TL:DR is her record as San Francisco DA and as Attorney General of California. The Intercept reported on this during the last primaries. Especially damning was her truancy program (NPR link) that in some case locked up parents of children with poor attendance records. But, my sense is that most progressives right now (myself included) would be much, much, happier to vote for her compared to Biden.
posted by coffeecat at 2:48 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Run in the street, do the presidential equivalent of punching some meat.

The Nathan's Coney Island hot dog eating contest was RIGHT THERE and Biden's weak-ass campaign staff fumbled the opportunity.
posted by snofoam at 2:49 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

Biden could hand the reigns over to Harris

I was about to object to this misuse of "reigns", but then it occurred to me that the Supreme Court has decided the President is a monarch now, so I guess I have to let it slide.
posted by flabdablet at 2:50 PM on July 5 [26 favorites]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics?

She described herself as top cop (and failed to support independent investigations into police murders/crimes, and prosecuted thousands of petty marijuana cases), which rankles many people. We also dislike her in the same ways we dislike every pol who lacks a convincing vision for closing (or at least narrowing) the income and wealth inequality gap.

I do find Box's comment persuasive that a cop vs. career criminal narrative could be a good look, though.
posted by tovarisch at 2:50 PM on July 5 [13 favorites]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics? I don't know much about her political career, and would like to be enlightened.

TL;DR she’s a former prosecutor with - as I understand it - a bit of cruelty against us little people in her record. She’s seen as very pro-cop in a party which is highly sympathetic to the abolish-the-police ethos, if not willing to stand behind it in any meaningful sense.

For the record I would like a party that is more than “sympathetic,” but since the alternative is fully onboard with the fascism and cruelty of the Punisher I’ll take what I can get.

Elsewise, I don’t care who the candidate is as long as they can beat Trump. It might be best for the country if someone extorted Jon Stewart into running (since he won’t do it willingly, and would definitely win). The only politician I actively want to vote into the Oval Office is AOC and she’s apparently not in consideration (possibly not interested). Bernie a decade ago, but now it’s just her.
posted by Ryvar at 2:53 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

I honestly don't know whether Biden should stick in the race or not, but I also don't see how at this stage he could be successfully replaced by anyone but Harris.
posted by tclark at 2:54 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Sonuva… I hit preview three times. Beaten, damn everything.
posted by Ryvar at 2:54 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

I mean, I'm thrilled to vote for Biden over the other guy. Not because I love him, but because I don't want to see the world in flames. I'd be even MORE thrilled-er to vote for Harris, not because I love her, I don't. But because I don't want to see the world in flames and I'd like to have a president who's always aware of her surroundings and doesn't have to go to bed by 8 pm. Lots and lots of problematic policies (as well as lots of great ones) from Biden and Harris, but if wishes were horses...
posted by rikschell at 2:54 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

There is certainly a candidate who should be exhorted to step down for the good of his country and party. It's not Biden.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 2:57 PM on July 5 [29 favorites]

Biden should bring up Epstein in tonight's interview. Like, I don't think "Donald Trump is a threat to democracy" is a compelling point to make--I mean, it's a compelling point for me, because I like democracy, but I don't think it's much of a sales pitch to the broader public. "Donald Trump committed some hard-to-describe financial crimes" suffers from the same problem. Biden needs a more visceral, cutting approach: "Your kids aren't safe around Donald Trump" might lodge itself into the public's minds, and would certainly give the media something to talk about other than Biden's age.
posted by mittens at 2:58 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

There are real pros and cons to both making Kamala the candidate -- and she is the ONLY one who could possibly be. Pros are that people might be more enthusiastic, the cop vs. criminal narrative would work in our favor, and she would be an incumbent in a way. Cons is that sexist and racist smears would be off the charts. I will enthusiastically support the Democratic ticket.
posted by ichomp at 3:05 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

IMO the narrative of 'declining Joe, too old in 2020, way to old now' is SO baked into the political universe that it doesn't matter at all that its a couple thousand political hack insiders pushing it. And it has the kernel of truth, which is why the "I should sleep more" quotes are getting overexposed while Trumps rants about electric sharks and windmills go nowhere.

I was on board with Biden (despite reprehensible behavior on Gaza) but there is NO way that narrative is getting pushed off the front pages. He could've won the Nathans Coney Island contest and the Badwater marathon and the vile mandarins of the national media-politico complex would STILL not give up the Joe is old and feeble narrative. How many stories about Biden's old have there been when the Supreme Court just freaking cleared the decks for a Trumpist dictatorship. That story is gone and 14 stories on Biden's age above the fold.

Re: Harris, holy crap is the NYT and all the garbage right wing media going to come after her with all they've got.

Joe say youre not running, and finish out your term (and do some shit!). Harris is it, I'm mostly ok with that for all the reasons above - put Whitmer in as VP, make the entire election about abortion, ending IVF, Katie Britts national pregnancy registry etc. Oh and fire that useless sycophant Merrick Garland - you had ONE job you spineless worm and you got destroyed by Trumpist 3rd tied lawyers.

I think Harris wins the popular vote easy. But I think the men with guns grind up the election mechanism so badly in AZ, Georgia and other swing states that some POS maga Judge (and then the 5th appeals) is going find for the Trumps and throw the election to the House of Reps. (Supreme Court moves heaven and earth to certify that ruling) - and there's more red states than blue states.
posted by WatTylerJr at 3:11 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

If Biden truly, absolutely cannot be prevailed upon to step aside, then the party's only real choice is to rally around him. If they tried to publicly force him out and essentially go to war with their own nominee, it would 100% guarantee an electoral evisceration in November that would hit not just the White House but Congress, gubernatorial races, state houses, etc. It's just not a realistic answer. If Biden is going to step aside, then he himself needs to choose to do so. He may not want to, but it would have to be his choice. It's a choice I could see him making, if certain trusted figures-- Jim Clyburn, Pelosi, Chris Coons, and above all Jill Biden and his family-- told him he needs to step aside for the good of his country, party, and legacy.

Honestly, I understand why he wants to stay in. He got publicly humiliated by someone he deeply hates, someone he sees as a fundamental threat to the country, and now the media is, once again, counting him out. He wants to do what (at least in his worldview, and I think there's something to it) he has done many times before: come from behind, proven the naysayers wrong, and won against all odds. But if he were to stay in and lose, none of that would matter. All anyone would remember was that he didn't know when to quit and the country paid the price. If he stepped aside, put the full weight of his base and machine behind Harris, and Harris won, he'd probably go down in history as one of the most successful single-term presidents and as someone who really did keep going when everybody counted him out, proved them wrong by winning, and then knew when to bow out with grace.

I don't know if that's the right answer. As many, many people have said, there are massive pros and cons whether he runs or whether he steps aside. But with the stakes as high as they are, especially given the narrative that has exploded around this question, it's a conversation that needs to happen.
posted by Method Man at 3:11 PM on July 5 [23 favorites]

The biggest con is the huge likelihood that ant replacement just isn’t going to be allowed on the ballot - and if that’s true for just one swing state it’s over.
posted by Artw at 3:12 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

At this point, there isn't any realistic thought that anyone who still supports trump will ever change their mind, so where does that leave the rest of the voters? Is it purely a question of trying to get the disenfranchised votors to actually vote instead of stay at home?

I feel like many voters are basically voting for or
against trump and the rest are saying it doesn't matter because all of the candidates are poor choices.
posted by mightshould at 3:13 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

There are perhaps a dozen different common but serious medical and psychological conditions that could explain his debate performance. Most of these are easily diagnosable. Some of these are also easily treatable.

If I were the campaign, I would be looking as hard as possible for one of those easily treatable explanations, and being public about how it has been fixed.
posted by soylent00FF00 at 3:17 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics? I don't know much about her political career, and would like to be enlightened.

Fought very hard to deny a trans woman gender affirming medical treatment in prison, despite the prisoner's increasing suicidality. Fought against releasing prisoners from California's overcrowded prisons because - and she actually claimed this - their labor was necessary to the state. This when the Supreme Court agreed that low-level prisoners should be released. She's done some genuinely despicable things off her own bat, but then the only non-despicable major party presidential candidates we've had in my lifetime were Bernie Sanders and the sainted Senator Simon of Illinois, so I don't expect much anyway.

Fuck a bunch of all of them, and fuck the democratic party for putting us all in this fix.

~~
The worst possible scenario is that there's media attention from now til November on Biden's age and infirmity and he makes a series of gaffes/sundowning moments and it only becomes really impossible to imagine him as president when it's too late to replace him. I'm in favor of replacing him, with Harris or whoever seems most likely to win, because we just can't keep rolling the fucking dice until he has some kind of terrible blank-eyed moment or stroke or something on November 1.
posted by Frowner at 3:19 PM on July 5 [27 favorites]

If Biden truly, absolutely cannot be prevailed upon to step aside, then the party's only real choice is to rally around him.
posted by Method Man

So we must Prop Joe up? I'm not sure the Cheese would agree.
posted by snofoam at 3:20 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Somebody brought up AOC and while she’s been too young to legally become president for a while, it turns out that this October she’ll be 35. Hmmm.

Anyways, Harris and the cop vs criminal narrative gets my vote. Joe looked like he had escaped from a nursing home during the debate. I watched it with my own eyes. Nobody is ever going to convince me that he’s the right man for the brutal job of president after that. “I need to get more sleep” almost sounds like a coded “get me out of here” message in context. Blink twice if you’re OK, Joe. Then turn it over to Kamala Harris like you said you would.
posted by apathy at 3:22 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

Biden can probably be forced out if the Cabinet invokes the 25th Amendment. It would be such a massive vote of no-confidence in his ability to be President that his campaign would be effectively over. Even if he tried to stay on as President it would provide the political cover to the convention to be able to replace him as nominee. That road is pretty ugly though.
posted by interogative mood at 3:23 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

The actual strongest position we could be in to win the election is for Biden to step down from both the campaign and the presidency and have Harris run as the sitting president.
posted by snofoam at 3:24 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

I've got a lot of respect for Biden, but I hope he steps aside.

However well he performs between now and November, no-one can unsee that catastrophic debate performance. The reality is that those images alone, seen by so many people and sure to be ruthlessly exploited by the Republicans, are enough to doom him.

If Trump gets in as a result, that's all Biden will be remembered for - a selfish refusal to face facts which spelt the beginning of the end for American democracy. I hope he grasps that.

I can also see an upside to a new Democrat candidate young enough to turn all the age and dementia fears on Trump instead. Whether through a messy convention or a behind the scenes delegation of senior Dems quietly persuading him it's the right thing to do, I think Biden handing the job over to younger hands is America and the world's best hope.

The Biden family's loyalty to Joe is admirable in its way, but right now they're clearly part of the problem.I hope his withdrawal can be handled in a gentle, kindly way - ideally with his own acceptance that the time has come. But it needs to get done anyway.
posted by Paul Slade at 3:25 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

This feels like a crisis made up by the beltway press and the nyt who love the eyeball of a terrified populace. Honestly I find it very hard to believe that anyone uncertain on who they will vote for or whether they will even vote is consuming any political coverage 4 months before the election. Bad debates happen. Biden is old and has been old for years.

If it is true that he needs to step down then the only people that can really make that decision are in the white house and cabinet and like others have said the window for that choice is closing.
posted by being_quiet at 3:29 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

The candidate has to be Biden imo. In talking to midwestern republicans who don't like Trump, they would vote for Biden the old white man who went through the primaries and has accomplishments and have the debate written off as a "bad day." But they would not vote for someone who did not go through the primary system and was gifted the candidancy, esp if that someone is a black woman, gay man, Californian, or the "woman who ruined Michigan." While there are Democrats they'd rather see than Biden, there is no consensus candidate that would bring in votes rather than have voters stay at home. And if voters stay home, Trump wins imo.

The press needs to stop this tear down of Biden and refocus on tear down of Trump. T
posted by beaning at 3:32 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics? I don't know much about her political career, and would like to be enlightened.

History of being fundamentally shitty as a prosecutor and California AG, things like denial of medical treatment to transgender inmates, aggressive prosecution of cannabis possession, and being a two-faced hypocrite on both issues when her past actions are brought up.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 3:37 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

The thing is, I have this terrible sinking feeling that the mere fact that there's been press coverage in major outlets and calls from Democrats for Biden to step down on grounds of infirmity is pretty much the knell of doom. Between now and November, the message will always be "people from your own party and major media outlets think you are too decrepit to serve" and that just can't be lived down. If it were 2023 and this were in fact just a particularly bad public appearance, Biden would have the time to regroup and for people to forget, but it's four months ahead of the election and there really isn't time to disprove/live down this kind of coverage. If he continues to run after all this has been said, it is going to be a huge disadvantage to the campaign. The whole thing makes the Democrats look terrible, frankly, and if this weren't an existential-threat level election, I'd say that nothing could save the party's reputation regardless.

We really, really, really just cannot expect to get anywhere politically when the big names are all pushing eighty. Major political jobs are really fatiguing. I've known a lot of very sharp eighty year olds who had years of good life ahead of them, and they were, one and all, too fatigued to do the challenging full-time work that had been their previous careers. For the most part, they went down to part-time and light contracting so that they could work when they were on and take it easy when they were tired, and you can't do that with the presidency.
posted by Frowner at 3:38 PM on July 5 [13 favorites]

So what's the progressive / leftist complaint against Harris' politics? I don't know much about her political career, and would like to be enlightened.

She isn’t perfect.

Honestly, is there anyone who could be both a viable (i.e. can actually win) candidate and live up to the ever-raising purity bar?

Biden is the candidate we have to keep Trump out of the most fucking powerful office on earth. He isn’t dropping out. That’s reality. Yes, reality often sucks.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:40 PM on July 5 [9 favorites]

How can he be forced out? Realistically?

As of right now, he can't. Biden has to step down voluntarily. As badly as he's fumbled, he's still the top Democrat in the country. And the replacement has to be Harris, if for no other reason than the fact that the millions in Biden's campaign could go to her, but not to anyone else, not without a lot of red tape that we don't have time for.

As of today, Biden wants to hold onto power. I don't know which is the better plan stick with Biden or go to Harris. It ALL depends on Biden's mental acuity over the next few weeks and months, or at least the perception of it. He can't fuck up like he did with that debate. If it happens again, if he fumbles really badly again on live tv, it would be a fucking disaster, and at that point I think the top Dems would actually force him out.

There's another debate in September, after the Democrats have officially nominated their candidate, so if it's Biden and he screws up that debate again...if we're panicking now, it'll be orders of magnitude worse if that happens.
posted by zardoz at 3:41 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Honestly I find it very hard to believe that anyone uncertain on who they will vote for or whether they will even vote is consuming any political coverage 4 months before the election.

Good point except this will be the ONLY coverage for the next 4 months. It will not stop.

(well, I guess the Joe is feeble stories will be superseded for a few days by the media frenzy over the big time protests at the DNC convention - there will also be massive protests at the RNC convention but as always it is only 'Dems in Disarray' in politico-media complex time).
posted by WatTylerJr at 3:44 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Fought against releasing prisoners from California's overcrowded prisons because - and she actually claimed this - their labor was necessary to the state.

Frowner, could you point to some info about this? So far as I can find, she didn’t “actually claim this” at all. Her record’s got issues, to be sure, but now doesn’t really seem the time for paraphrasing done quite as sloppily/dishonestly as your claim seems to be.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 3:46 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

What I don’t get is why there is so much coverage of Biden’s decline and so little of Trump’s.

In cynical moments, I believe that many large media outlets actually want Trump to win. Presumably this is because they are owned by rancid billionaires who don’t like democracy.
posted by tallmiddleagedgeek at 3:47 PM on July 5 [27 favorites]

The fact that press outlets are basically like “we will air the unedited interview” and it’s a credible threat…just fucking step down already man.
posted by corb at 3:47 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

there really isn't time to disprove/live down this kind of coverage.

Also, in the last week he hasn’t done anything to show his debate performance was a fluke and he doesn’t have anything upcoming that would do so as far as I know. He can’t disprove it via a series of ten minute scripted campaign speeches.

(Is it too late for someone to do a list of things that Biden could do to show he is competent as a McSweeney’s article?)

Also, if someone says you are too old to be president, “Malarkey!” is just not an effective answer.
posted by snofoam at 3:50 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

Biden / Harris '24 --> Harris / Biden '24. Could work.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 3:52 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

What I don’t get is why there is so much coverage of Biden’s decline and so little of Trump’s.

Seconded. People have been complaining about Trump's ramblings (what was that about sharks, again, and planes can't fly out of daylight?) all year and as usual, literally nothing he does that's bad matters compared to Biden doing anything. If you think Biden's incompetent to run, Trump's also incompetent to run. Unfortunately now if people think Trump is the candidate more on the ball ... *cry*

No Democrat is going to be pure enough to everybody. Democrats keep taking bites out of each other, the Republicans act in lockstep, and then we wonder why we can't top them. (Also, once again, evil will always triumph because good is dumb.)
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:55 PM on July 5 [17 favorites]

Kamala Harris followed the well established political career path of law school, prosecutors office, DA, AG, Senator. For part of the Democratic Party and the left this is not the resume they want in a candidate. Her record on criminal justice issues is mixed and full of contradictions as pointed out in this Vox article. I think it is not unreasonable to wonder if these contradictions don’t just reflect Americas criminal justice system and its many contradictions.
posted by interogative mood at 3:57 PM on July 5 [9 favorites]

Frowner, could you point to some info about this? So far as I can find, she didn’t “actually claim this” at all. Her record’s got issues, to be sure, but now doesn’t really seem the time for paraphrasing done quite as sloppily/dishonestly as your claim seems to be.

It gives me less joy than you would probably believe to say that googling "Kamala Harris prison labor" pulls up a lot of documentation. The first detailed one is actually just a Daily Beast story here - and to be fair, it was lawyers working for the Harris office. After the furor, Harris claimed to be "shocked" that her very own lawyers would ever say such an awful thing, but I find that pretty weird. Even if true, which I do not personally believe, I do not find it appealing in a presidential candidate that her lawyers can literally advance the "keep people in jail to do cheap labor for the state" argument and she doesn't even know about it. That seems kind of important.

But whatever, if I can choke down the vomit long enough to vote for a genocidaire, I can vote for her as well. If she's no better, she's certainly no worse. This all mattered much more back in the day when it seemed that there were alternatives.
posted by Frowner at 3:58 PM on July 5 [13 favorites]

What I don’t get is why there is so much coverage of Biden’s decline and so little of Trump’s.

Simple. It's because the idea of the republican candidate losing doesn't scare the shit out of us.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 4:00 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Look. The main reason Biden needs to go is because we desperately need a campaigner young and brave enough to stand up and shout variations on: "PROJECT 2025 WANTS TO OUTLAW PORNOGRAPHY! A VOTE FOR TRUMP IS A VOTE AGAINST PORN!! THE REPUBLICANS WANT TO TAKE AWAY YOUR ADULT CONTENT!! TRUMP BANS PORN!!!" over and over again.

I genuinely believe that this is a blindingly obvious winning strategy and the only reason no one is doing it already is because they are too prudish.

(Don't believe me? It's here on page 5. "Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned.")
posted by EllaEm at 4:00 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

I can’t even begin to gesture wildly how fucked we have to be to get me to vote for a fucking prosecutor but apparently here we are now.
posted by corb at 4:03 PM on July 5 [20 favorites]

Biden could be pushed out with the 25th Amendment, but it would take Harris and a majority of the cabinet working together, and Biden would have to accept that he was cooked at that point and not fight it. It would be a huge risk, and Harris (not to mention the rest of the cabinet) is probably too loyal for that. In politics, being loyal is valued much, much more than being smart or honest or clever or talented or even popular. (Trump of course is the exception that proves the rule. He can get away with being disloyal because there's no one above him he would ever have to be loyal to. Well, except Putin.)

Honestly, if Harris were up for pushing it, that would be a great sign for me. That she was more ambitious, that she was willing to break shit in order to preserve democracy. It would mark her as someone with energy and the ability to act. But she's shown no reason to expect this of her.
posted by rikschell at 4:08 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

In cynical moments, I believe that many large media outlets actually want Trump to win. Presumably this is because they are owned by rancid billionaires who don’t like democracy.

On the Fourth of July, The Fucking New York Times op-ed page ran an op-ed against voting by a right-wing graduate of Hillsdale College who blatantly lied about his own voting history in the piece, and when caught out on said lie proceeded to "massage" the lede so it wasn't blatantly false.
posted by NoxAeternum at 4:08 PM on July 5 [9 favorites]

ABC is previewing clips of the interview online and it's pretty ugh.

"I don't think I did [watch the debate]"?

Not quite as bad as the debate, but he still sounds raspy and weak, still mumbly and hesitant, still doing the slack-jawed thing when waiting to answer. Not just way different from 2019/20, but different even from the Wisconsin rally earlier today. Either doing that event wiped him out all over again or the reporting of him visibly winding down later in the afternoon is correct. I don't see this helping him much.
posted by Rhaomi at 4:10 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

Even if true, which I do not personally believe, I do not find it appealing in a presidential candidate that her lawyers can literally advance the "keep people in jail to do cheap labor for the state" argument and she doesn't even know about it. That seems kind of important.

Totally important, but also nearly completely orthogonal? I guess the only real ask behind my question was “hey, if people didn’t actually say something, could we not emphatically claim that they did?”. Like, this is a rapidly evolving situation and none of the folks that are forming new opinions are going to be well served by being told that things “literally” happened when they didn’t happen at all.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:10 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

The current press coverage of Biden is eerily reminding me of the way they went for Jeremy Corbyn in the UK, the press can and will end political careers.
posted by Lanark at 4:13 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

"Don't you think he looks tired?"
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:14 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

The conventional wisdom has been that Biden is the best shot at beating Trump and dropping him would be more damaging. Conventional wisdom in Washington is a powerful force and it was propping up Biden’s candidacy for a long time. It is fracturing now, anything can happen.
posted by mai at 4:20 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

he still sounds raspy and weak

He sounds like he can't get a full breath into his lungs. I even wondered if the applause at the rallies gave him enough time to catch his breath between statements, in a way real-time conversation or debate might not.
posted by mittens at 4:22 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

Metafilter gets awful doom-y in these threads so I’m trying to just let that flow by.

I don’t understand the viewpoint that a president who has a reduced capacity to bring energy, communication, and persuasion is not reduced in their capacity to be president. I can admire the work someone has done while also noting that something has changed in a way they can no longer do it.

Biden has my vote if it’s him, but my support is for stepping aside.

If this is how we get our first black female president, I’m there for it. I’ve long been worried that it would have to come from the Republican side and I’d rather have Harris than Haley.
posted by meinvt at 4:22 PM on July 5 [22 favorites]

rants about electric sharks

Do randroids dream of electric sharks?
posted by flabdablet at 4:29 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

I assume Biden and his team have already seen the interview and his statement earlier today about staying in is based on their confidence this interview will help

The Dems can't have four months of these news stories every day, so Biden has to lead here now. If he ends up dropping out, it's going to ensure Trump gets back in
posted by lescour at 4:31 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

I can't make a positive argument for Biden as president. I think that's a problem. "The alternative is Donald Trump" is a negative argument. You're not selling Biden, you're nega-selling Trump. This has been the issue all along. In 2020, when Trump was president, we could have, and apparently we did, run Bernie from Weekend at Bernie's, and still won; but we survived Trump and turns out that Four Years at Bernie's was no great shakes either. "Let's make it Eight Years at Bernie's!" doesn't talk to people. He's not going to win.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:35 PM on July 5 [9 favorites]

If only it were eight years at Bernie's!
posted by rikschell at 4:37 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Harris replaces Biden via 25th Amendment. She invokes her Supreme Court-appointed monarchical powers to put Trump in jail.

I don't care if Harris or Biden put Trump in a prison cell, but Trump has broken numerous laws, is a threat to national security, and he has said over and over again that he will make the US a dictatorship.

He must be stopped at all costs, if this country and planet are to survive another generation.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:39 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

It is deeply unclear to me whether Biden is actually unfit for office or just an aging man with a stutter, but it seems very clear that this entire scandal is a bad faith tempest whipped up primarily by the NYT using a turbocharged version of the Claudine Gay playbook. If Biden can weather it I remain optimistic he can hammer Trump on Project 2025 and Dobbs, and highlight Trump's heightening cognitive issues, and win the election.

If he does step aside it can only be Harris, both for the structural reasons others have pointed out and also because an open convention would be chaos and red meat for Republican attacks. But Biden cannot and should not step aside as president. There is no way the House of Representatives would allow her to put a VP in place, which means that in this scenario Mike Johnson would both be one heartbeat away from the presidency and also probably preside over the election in the role of the VP.

The time for Biden to step aside was long before now. He's a flawed candidate but he's the one we've got, and I tend to think that even if he stepped aside in favor of Harris that would just open him up to bad faith arguments that he's unfit to serve that would bog down his administration and Harris's candidacy. Maybe he'll be unable to shut up the press and will have to, but I'm not convinced that replacing him with Harris would make it easier to beat Trump, to say nothing of the fantasies that have been floated in op-ed pages of late.
posted by lhputtgrass at 4:40 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

If you think Biden’s bad, you should see the other guy. Your mind will be fucking blown.
posted by chasing at 4:41 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

Oh, and Biden puts liberal justices on the Supreme Court. And he’ll put more on during his next term. If that’s all he does, I’m fine. Nothing progressives want will happen with a Judiciary full of corrupt right-wing shitbags.
posted by chasing at 4:43 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

If you think Biden’s bad, you should see the other guy. Your mind will be fucking blown.

For the love of God, this isn't clever! People are worried about Biden's competence because they think he won't be able to beat Trump. Nobody here is suggesting Trump is the better choice.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:44 PM on July 5 [46 favorites]

If Biden were to step aside or be forced out by the 25th Amendment, show of hands - who thinks the Republican house majority would confirm a new VP so that there is still a heartbeat between Kamala Harris and Mike Johnson in the line of succession?
posted by the primroses were over at 4:48 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

To not abuse the edit window - I meant resign as president, not step aside for the next election, but I worded it poorly.
posted by the primroses were over at 4:49 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

> For the love of God, this isn't clever! People are worried about Biden's competence because they think he won't be able to beat Trump. Nobody here is suggesting Trump is the better choice.

You’re suggesting other people *will* use his competence and decide to vote for Trump instead of Biden. Which is basically the same thing. And maybe my point is: People interested in Trump are not interested in Trump because Biden mumbled at a debate. They’re into a deranged candidate who caters to their sense of aggrievement and says he’ll hurt the people they don’t like: LGBTQ+, minorities, intellectuals, etc. I think swapping out the candidate will do basically nothing to the polls. I honestly think it’s a poor use of time to go down this fucking rabbit hole right now. Biden’s by far the better candidate.
posted by chasing at 4:53 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

If you think Biden’s bad, you should see the other guy. Your mind will be fucking blown.

Yeah, but see, I've also seen the other woman, his VP, and she did a hell of a better job making his case than he did after the debate.
posted by coffeecat at 4:54 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

One removed. Don’t share your wish for any candidate to pass away.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 4:56 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Anyway, in my opinion if there is genuine reason for concern about Biden's mental acuity, there should be serious pressure on him to step aside only for the next election behind the scenes.

If not, everyone in the Democratic party should get on message and talk about how Donald Trump is a felon, a rapist and a wannabe dictator in response to every question about anything from now until November 5th.
posted by the primroses were over at 4:57 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Did Biden watch the debate afterwards? "I don't think I did, no."
posted by paper chromatographologist at 4:59 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

You’re suggesting other people will use his competence and decide to vote for Trump instead of Biden.

Some will, because, believe it or not, a lot of the American electorate are uninformed and simply do not really get how deranged Trump is.

But even more will simply not bother to vote at all. They may not swap to Trump, but they aren't going to care enough to deal with all the hassle of getting out and voting for the Democrats with Biden at the top of the ticket.

If you think fielding a weak candidate doesn't matter and most Americans will respond to Trump's awfulness by making a rational vote, I invite you to look at 2016.

I think swapping out the candidate will do basically nothing to the polls.

The polls seem to disagree.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:59 PM on July 5 [14 favorites]

> If not, everyone in the Democratic party should get on message and talk about how Donald Trump is a felon, a rapist and a wannabe dictator in response to every question about anything from now until November 5th.

Yeah, I publicly call for the unhinged rapist felon to step down from the race. Where’s the coverage on that?
posted by chasing at 4:59 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

I went back and listened again to that snippet Rhaomi posted above. Biden begins a sentence, loses his place, and wanders into an entirely separate point (one about numbers, that clearly he has memorized). And this was to a very basic softball question--basically, "what happened to you out there?" which you would assume his team has been prepping him for, for days. And he couldn't do it, he couldn't get the point out. It's so troubling, and I don't know how anyone could listen to that and make an excuse for it.
posted by mittens at 5:01 PM on July 5 [21 favorites]

> The polls seem to disagree.

Hypothetical polls are not the same as an actual election. As has been famously proven.
posted by chasing at 5:02 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

Yeah, I publicly call for the unhinged rapist felon to step down from the race. Where’s the coverage on that?
The Democrats have pointed out Trump is unfit for office over and over. They pointed it out in 2016. It wasn't enough.

It was barely enough in 2020 when we had a six figure bodycount attributable to Trump and he was telling people to shoot up bleach.

The Democrats have to face their deepest, darkest fear; actually offering something besides not being Republicans.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:02 PM on July 5 [18 favorites]

Hypothetical polls are not the same as an actual election. As has been famously proven.

Assuming Biden will outperform the polling is not how I would bet.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:02 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

The main issue is that it’s very apparent that Bidens brain is deteriorating rapidly, we can see it, the democratic establishment knows it, and the fact that Biden won’t do a press conference or town hall tells you all you need to know.
Where is the proof of this? He's clearly an octogenarian and not as sharp as he was a decade ago, but that's not news. Is one bad debate somehow proof? He's been prone to gaffes and misspeaking his entire career, yet somehow every single slip is now proof that he's toast. All I've seen is one bad debate and what seems like a concerted bad faith push from an outlet that has had an axe to grind his entire administration. He's been doing interviews and appearances since the debate and has a big event next week. I have no particular love for Biden, but all I've seen is one bad debate, a bad faith attack, and a circular firing squad from Dems freaked out about losing to Trump suggesting mostly unfeasible solutions.

Also polling number have been consistently ridiculous for this race because no one answers their phone if they don't recognize the number. If you're suggesting Biden step down over polling I'm not sure what to tell you, because the polls have been drastically undercounting Dem support since Dobbs.
posted by lhputtgrass at 5:05 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Also if you haven't go look at the article the NYT posted about Harris today. They're already trying to tie an anchor around her neck, so if you think replacing Biden with her gets the Dems a clear path without this kind of shenanigans I think you're fooling yourself. It may be that he should step down and that's the best path to beating Trump, but all I've seen so far is panic, nothing resembling a strong case that it's true.
posted by lhputtgrass at 5:07 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

lhputtgrass your points are valid, but do you think the agenda setters will move off of this issue for ANYTHING trump does or says? This is it, this is the race. Is Biden too old or not. Many seem to think so. What if he freezes up at debate 2?

Obv. a lot of people here and elsewhere think he's still the guy, but the media will be crushing him every single day and more than all the bullshit stories about his competency, it will be democratic 'insiders' and funder trying to get him out.

This is ALL the media will talk about. And he's not vigorous enough to counter it.
posted by WatTylerJr at 5:10 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

They’re into a deranged candidate who caters to their sense of aggrievment and says he’ll hurt the people they don’t like: queers, minorities, intellectuals, etc.

Every Trump voter? No. I do think a major blindspot of many Democrats is the inability to see Trump voters as anything other than the worst of the worst. That they all love bigotry, sexism, and racism. And yes, some of them do. But that doesn't describe every Trump voter. It's helpful to remember that however you decide who to vote for in an election, there are 100s of other methods people use to make up their mind. And there is a category of voter who (selfishly, one might argue) focus really on themselves- which candidate will make their life better? Some of these people do find Trump abhorrent, but they also think he'll be better for the economy - and they're worried Biden is too weak/old. A lot of these people are undecided or leaning Trump, but could be convinced by a more cogent Democrat. And that's not even getting into the fact that Kamala could excite people/get out the base better, as already stated up-thread.
posted by coffeecat at 5:10 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

Anosognosia?
posted by zaixfeep at 5:11 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

Also if you haven't go look at the article the NYT posted about Harris today

Or, we could stop buying into NYT's cynical ratfucking campaigns? Can we consider that option as well?

Is it really necessary to let NYT dictate this conversation?
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:11 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

Also if you haven't go look at the article the NYT posted about Harris today. They're already trying to tie an anchor around her neck..

Huh? Did we read the same article? It was pretty glowing. As was Ezra Klein's recent podcast on her, called "Is Kamala Harris Underrated?" Spoiler: Yes. I'd say the NYTimes is laying out the red carpet for her.
posted by coffeecat at 5:13 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

This is ALL the media will talk about. And he's not vigorous enough to counter it.

It does seem to be the realization of the Monkey's Paw wish that the media stop focusing on Trump. I haven't heard a word about him all week.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:13 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

Dems make concrete differences and whenever possible, are the only ones actually legislating: Inflation Reduction Act, child tax credit, work in the Appalachia and regarding climate, assistance for disabled and elderly Americans via Medicaid and Social Security.

That a rapist and felon has a chance at winning an election in America says more about Americans than it does about Joseph Biden. I'm lamenting that fact.
posted by ichomp at 5:13 PM on July 5 [13 favorites]

Also polling number have been consistently ridiculous for this race because no one answers their phone if they don't recognize the number.

This isn’t true anymore. It hasn’t been true for a while.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:17 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

lhputtgrass your points are valid, but do you think the agenda setters will move off of this issue for ANYTHING trump does or says?
I think we are all prisoners of the moment here, the media can't keep banging this gong for four months until the election if Biden stonewalls them and doesn't provide further proof his brain is cooked. I think the Dems need to circle their wagons and get disciplined with messages about how terrible Trump is and we'll all move on.
posted by lhputtgrass at 5:17 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

Yeah, don’t let the electorate off the hook. None of this would be a problem if so many of them weren’t awful people.
posted by The Card Cheat at 5:18 PM on July 5 [10 favorites]

How can he be forced out? Realistically?

Without doing so much internal damage to the Democratic party that Harris still wins? He can't.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 5:19 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Orange Man Bad isn't landing anymore because people burned out on the Mueller/Jack Smith/Merrick Garland hopium. It's just another fundraising tool with little actual results.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 5:20 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

This isn’t true anymore. It hasn’t been true for a while.
As a data point, the Siena polls the media has been shouting about have African American voters moving forty points to Trump compared to the last election. Until the polls show anything like what happens in elections, which hasn't happened in some time, I will continue to be deeply skeptical of their predictive value.
posted by lhputtgrass at 5:21 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

Well-heeled America seems far more terrified of the damage 'the left' will do to capitalism than the very real destruction that 'the right' is doing to democracy.

Also wealthy/powerful people are unaccustomed to taking 'no' for an answer about anything no matter how profound or petty.
posted by zaixfeep at 5:21 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

This interview is brutal.
posted by glaucon at 5:21 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

Yeah, don’t let the electorate off the hook. None of this would be a problem if so many of them weren’t awful people.

I respect democracy and people's choice. The leaders we choose are a reflection of us. I have full confidence in Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and their ability to govern. What I don't have confidence in are Americans who are so spoiled they can afford to vote based on vibes and clicks and likes.
posted by ichomp at 5:23 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

if Biden stonewalls them and doesn't provide further proof his brain is cooked

If Biden stonewalls them by - not communicating with them? He’s running a campaign, and by most indications he’s behind.
posted by atoxyl at 5:25 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

My main worry is that the hard right might not let Kamala Harris serve out her full term - by fair play or foul, but mostly foul. Trump has agitated and encouraged them enough to do some just that stupid.

I don't dislike Biden, but the reich-wing of Congress is just going to go for four more years of conspiratorial obstructionism and if electing her can short-circuit that, then let's do it.

It's not like we've got anyone else who can step up to the plate right now with a serious chance of winning..
posted by JustSayNoDawg at 5:26 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

As a data point, the Siena polls the media has been shouting about have African American voters moving forty points to Trump compared to the last election.

This… didn’t happen. Can we please stick to facts??
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 5:27 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

Him bragging about putting together peace plan for the Middle East in the interview....phew.
posted by coffeecat at 5:28 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

It pains me to say this but Biden gives off the vibe of Grandpa refusing to give up the keys to the car. And his saying that he's been a great driver for sixty years and his neighbor down the street has been arrested four times on DWIs and all Gramps has is a parking violation is all true. But that doesn't mean he won't swerve and hit a school bus. Maybe he's right and he won't. But maybe he will. And he has to acknowledge that.
posted by dannyboybell at 5:28 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

At least Joe isn't screaming for steak and sex like Sumner Redstone was doing near his end.
posted by zaixfeep at 5:30 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

Biden should be worried about his legacy at this point. I would rather go out on top than losing to Trump. Look at Hillary. She laments every day that she lost to the worst candidate in history. Biden should declare victory and step aside for the good of the party and the country. I do not think anyone is comfortable with the idea that he can serve out another 4 years. Why not be a king maker, put all his resources behind Kamala and play elder statesman with his good freind Obama.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 5:32 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

My main worry is that the hard right might not let Kamala Harris serve out her full term - by fair play or foul, but mostly foul. Trump has agitated and encouraged them enough to do some just that stupid.

I don't want anyone for president the far right wouldn't want dead.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:32 PM on July 5 [18 favorites]

But the amount of questions he's dodging in this interview is the real problem...including with straight up lies. Stephanopolis is doing a good job pressing him though.
posted by coffeecat at 5:32 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

Hear me out here... what if Biden and Harris switched places on the ticket? Harris for president, Biden for VP?
posted by orange swan at 5:33 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

> What I don't have confidence in are Americans who are so spoiled they can afford to vote based on vibes and clicks and likes.

After November 8th, 2016 I don’t trust Americans in the aggregate at all.
posted by The Card Cheat at 5:34 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

My main worry is that the hard right might not let Kamala Harris serve out her full term

... the first president in history to be gummed to death by wolves. She was delicious.
posted by zaixfeep at 5:35 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

After November 8th, 2016 I don’t trust Americans in the aggregate at all

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by nearly three million.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:36 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

This interview is a train wreck.
posted by Optamystic at 5:40 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

I only tuned in to the interview briefly and no doubt people who watch the whole thing will have a more nuanced assessment, but the bit I saw was... not encouraging. This needed to be a home run to turn things around and it does not seem like a home run.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:40 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by nearly three million.

In our defense, the alternative was worse.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:40 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

I urge everyone defending Biden to watch the interview - he is often confused, straight up lying, goes off on tangents that don't answer the question, and only seems to be OK when he's saying his memorized canned lines. It's maybe not as brutal as the debate, but it's pretty brutal.
posted by coffeecat at 5:40 PM on July 5 [17 favorites]

On the plus side, Biden did just mention the next “man or woman” to be president, so hopefully he’s considering Harris.
posted by snofoam at 5:42 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

I'm watching it now. I keep looking across the room, down at the floor, down at my phone. I feel like I'm watching one of those cringe Farrelly Brothers comedies, where the humor rests in watching someone be humiliated. I don't think those movies are funny. I am sad when I watch those movies. I am sad right now.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:44 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

I think this is a good time to remember the Lesson of Clinton. And it's a lesson people don't like, want to hear, or heed.

The Lesson of Clinton is simple: sometimes someone on your side is so successfully smeared they can't recover.

The American right spent over 30 years hammering at Hillary Clinton until a huge number of Americans heard her name and felt that there MUST be something to all that noise otherwise there wouldn't be so much noise. Thus we got the stuff like people in 2016 saying that she just seemed dishonest. Some of that may have been coded misogyny, but a lot was the result of the fact that the right is REALLY good at building a media narrative (however false) and sticking with it until it drifts into the mainstream.

We can, and should, lambast Obama for keeping Republican asshole Comey around as FBI chief and thus giving the Republicans an insider in a perfect position to hurt her using the decades of preparation they had. But the deeper, harder, more painful, lesson is simply that the Republican smears worked.

She shouldn't have been the nominee. It's easy to see that in hindsight, but now that we have seen it, we need to apply that lesson going forward.

And the simple fact is, unless Biden can successfully look energetic, engaged, witty, together, and with it for hours on end at regular and frequent events where he's asked questions not merely reading a speech off a teleprompter, the Republican effort to paint him as feeble and senile will work whether or not it's actually try.

If, for the sake of argument, he really is mentally sound and just physically weak and his stutter is getting worse, it's not going to overturn the Republican smear. I'm not 100% confident that even a vigorous, loud, with it, frequently appearing in Q&A sessions, Biden can actually undo the damage, but if he can't do that then the game is already over and the smear has worked.

Now, is the smear enough to bring Trump to victory? I dunno. Maybe? I fear it is and I'm of the opinion that starting from a disadvantage is a bad idea. A few whiles back I was part of the group who had no idea who might replace him, but I've been convinced that if he is replaced Harris is the only possible choice. If nothing else picking someone who wasn't Harris would alienate the Black women who are the backbone of the Democratic Party.

His interview was better than it could have been, though someone needs to tell him to close his damn mouth and stop staring around slack jawed. By itself it isn't going to do the trick. If he can have interviews like that, unscripted, no teleprompter, taking questions, at least weekly (and ideally more often) maybe he can pull it out. Maybe.

Unfortunately it looks like they're planning on keeping to the same strategy that let them paint him so successfully as senile: hiding him. I said it earlier and I'll say it again, if Biden isn't senile then why the fuck is he hiding from the media? He hasn't had a press conference in ages.

If he's hoping that his single not awful but not fantastic interview is going to be enough he's deluding himself.

I think the most cold bloodedly pragmatic thing would be for him to realize they succeeded, that it's not fair, it's not right, but it's also the reality, and to bow out. He won't. But I think he should just because we must remember the Lesson of Clinton and recognize when we've lost someone to their smears.
posted by sotonohito at 5:44 PM on July 5 [23 favorites]

I urge everyone defending Biden to watch the interview - he is often confused, straight up lying, goes off on tangents that don't answer the question, and only seems to be OK when he's saying his memorized canned lines.

So he's a new ChatGPT avatar, then?
posted by zaixfeep at 5:45 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

George Stephanopoulos’ sit-down with Biden seems as much an intervention as an interview.
posted by New Frontier at 5:49 PM on July 5 [14 favorites]

I couldn’t campaign against Trump because I was doin’ wars.

To me, the most damning thing was his claim that he was already showing the critics they were wrong. He doesn’t have a plan to win this election, and apparently, neither does his team.
posted by snofoam at 5:54 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

we must remember the Lesson of Clinton and recognize when we've lost someone to their smears.

I'd love to know why this doesn't work on Trump, though.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:57 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

To me, the most damning thing was his claim that he was already showing the critics they were wrong

I dunno, "no, I won't submit to an independent medical evaluation and release the results to the American people" is pretty damning?
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:57 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

It’s over. Fridge door closed. Tomorrow the people who’ve been denying it’s over start to realize that only makes them look bad. Schumer, Jefferies, Obama and Clinton will be public by Monday. The Convention rule change package — by which Biden can be involuntarily replaced - will be out by Tuesday or Wednesday. Biden drops out by Friday. Open issue is whether he can stay in office.
posted by MattD at 6:00 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

Well, I surprised myself by finding Biden in much better shape in the interview, than the prior snippet had indicated. I don't know if it was edited, I don't know if there's ten minutes of blank stares cut out, or anything like that. But what I saw was Biden, frustrated over the repetition of the same question--multiple variations of, aren't you too infirm to do this?--pushing past the question to make the case that no, he is not. I don't know how that'll play, to the undecided people who see it. But I saw someone who understood the questions he was being asked, and who didn't try to dodge them, but did try to redirect to what he thought was important. He wasn't perfect, by any means. I could've done with a little less of "here's my campaign speech"--but then again, he's on national television, it's free advertising, he may as well make the most of it. He didn't take the bait of pledging to take a neurological exam, and good for him, he shouldn't, there's no upside to that. He got Stephanopolous to admit that the polls aren't accurate, which I thought was a pretty good trick. And he pointed out that this perception that there is a growing mass of Democrat leadership turning against him, is something the media is driving.

What I didn't see was someone getting angry and ranting. He had his emotions well in control. He had a sense of humor--pained humor, maybe, but the humor was there. Since part of his argument is that this election is about character, it's essential that he portray that character in an interview like this...and I think he succeeded in that.
posted by mittens at 6:00 PM on July 5 [10 favorites]

They're repeating it now, so I guess it was a very short interview. Not 15 minutes, but maybe 25 at most?
posted by netowl at 6:02 PM on July 5

It’s not just given to Harris. I agree Michelle Obama doesn’t go for it. Hillary Clinton is possible. Newsom and Whitmer go for it - why not? Jamie Dimon talk is crazy but some billionaire putting his hat in the ring is possible. But Harris probably gets it.
posted by MattD at 6:03 PM on July 5

I'd love to know why this doesn't work on Trump, though.

It did, to the extent possible. People left the Republican party over him. Given the love of authority and power in that bunch, it was surprising it had any effect at all.

But the majority of Republicans are driven by greed or bigotry. The fitness of a candidate or welfare of other people does not matter to them. Trump also attracted both existing elements within the party and outsiders for whom his repulsiveness to decent people is part of the appeal. It is sadism. They have the power to force him on people who hate them and that is a power they crave. Every reaction of fear or disgust about Trump is further incentive to support him. That he is a sexual predator, spouse abuser, and conman is part of the thrill.

It’s over. Fridge door closed. Tomorrow the people who’ve been denying it’s over start to realize that only makes them look bad. Schumer, Jefferies, Obama and Clinton will be public by Monday. The Convention rule change package — by which Biden can be involuntarily replaced - will be out by Tuesday or Wednesday. Biden drops out by Friday. Open issue is whether he can stay in office.

I hope you are right, but I don't trust any of those people to put the welfare of the country over internal party politics. Here's hoping I am being too cynical.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:04 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

There has to be more tape from that interview. It ended abruptly and 22 minutes is just too short.
posted by glaucon at 6:07 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

The whole thing showed he was an unfit candidate living in a world of make-believe. He has no plan, he doesn’t know how poorly he is doing, he refuses to recognize he is behind and collapsing in the polls, he discounts the calls from fellow elected officials for him to step down, he refuses to answer questions about his fitness for a next term. He could have answered any of these questions honestly and acknowledged the mismanagement of his campaign and need to switch gears to come out ahead by November. But no, he lied and refused to answer most of the questions. If he just wants to talk about his first term accomplishments, he can retire today and do that all day long (or 10 to 4 with a nap after lunch).
posted by snofoam at 6:07 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

"All I want out of life is a 30 share and a 20 rating." --Faye Dunaway as Diana Christensen in Network, 1976.

It's very possible that Biden has actually slid into a deteriorating state over the last so many months. And I'm warming quickly to the idea of a Harris campaign and presidency. But I have no illusions that the political press is pushing any narrative out of a sense of decency or civic responsibility. They want a spectacle to sell, regardless of who gets hurt. They're front and center in the list of institutions that will not save us.
posted by gimonca at 6:28 PM on July 5 [15 favorites]

Somebody brought up AOC and while she’s been too young to legally become president for a while, it turns out that this October she’ll be 35. Hmmm.

AOC would lose likely by more than 150 EVs. Trump’s attacks on socialism resounded with certain voting blocs, and it would be turned to eleventy billion. In 2020 he wanted Bernie to be the nominee for a reason.
posted by azpenguin at 6:33 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Biden's answer about how he'll feel in January if Trump wins and everything he's warned about comes to pass... Oof.

Biden: I'll feel, as long as I gave it my all, and I did as good a job as I know I can do, that's what this is about.

Narrator: it was not, in fact, what this is about.
posted by Gadarene at 6:34 PM on July 5 [39 favorites]

Biden's answer about how he'll feel if Trump wins... Oof.

Biden: I'll feel, as long as I gave it my all, and I did as good a job as I know I can do, that's what this is about.

Yeah, this is fucking damning. You can't try to terrorize all your potential voters with the message that only you can Save Democracy In America, and then say shit like this.
posted by adrienneleigh at 6:36 PM on July 5 [32 favorites]

But he did!
posted by glaucon at 6:38 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

Options for managing a campaign transition:

Scenario: Party leaders have closed door meetings, come out, announce that the new person is who you're all going to support now. Might be Harris, might be someone else. Done wrong, my assumption is that this approach fails hard.

Scenario: Party messaging comes out that Biden will step aside from the campaign, and that the process will parallel what's in the Constitution: when the President steps down, the VP takes over. In this case, the VP, Harris, is the new candidate. This is an easy-to-understand concept. Harris moves forward, takes over Biden's delegates at the convention and leads the campaign into November. My take: has a decent chance of working.

Scenario: Biden withdraws from campaign, releases his delegates before the convention, it's a wide-open field. You still have a big majority of convention delegates who were elected/selected to support Biden anyway, it's likely they'd coalesce around Harris. Messaging is that these delegates were elected by the people (not all of them were, but most were), and now they'll pick a new candidate. Somewhat more risk in this scenario if someone else jumps in and gets too competitive and combative. My take: also has a chance of working.

Note that the right wing noise machine will invent a reason to shriek about any of these. They will also be loud and obnoxious if Biden stays in the race. What that chunk of the commentariat is going to say should not be a serious factor, one way or the other.

Could be other hypothetical scenarios, those are the three that come to mind.
posted by gimonca at 6:41 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

Somebody brought up AOC and while she’s been too young to legallyed become president for a while, it turns out that this October she’ll be 35.

And Jasmine Crockett is 45. She is all in on Biden but imagine her in a debate with Napoleon Bone-Aspur. Sliced, diced and cut into julienne fries in seconds. Well, a fella can dream can't he?
posted by y2karl at 6:44 PM on July 5

Biden being able to recite the accomplishments of his term while being unable to show his fitness for campaign or office just makes me want to nominate whoever has actually been running the country for the last few years.

By all regards, these are his accomplishments. The IRA, Ukraine, infrastructure, the slate of consumer rights, gun control, and pro-worker measures his administration has passed-- as far as I know, every account has it that Biden was personally deeply involved in all those aspects of his administration. The problem, of course, is that was then. Will that continue to be the case throughout a prospective four year term? That's what people want to know. That's the assurance they need to vote for him.

I watched the Stephanoupolos interview. I'm not sure what some of y'all who said he was confused or a trainwreck or whatnot were watching. He was... fine. Just fine. He didn't cartwheel into the room and then bench press Stephanopoulos for reps or anything but he firmly defended his accomplishments, pushed back somewhat effectively on some of Stephanopoulos's assertions, showed some of what I suppose many would call the "classic Biden humor." He came across at many points like the Biden a lot of people have grown fond of over time-- likable, avuncular, humorous, a bit prone to bloviation.

But, you know, he also wasn't great. He didn't really effectively address the age concern when asked directly, or at the very least acknowledge it was a valid concern. Cracking a smile and telling Stephanoupolos to try and live his daily schedule looked good, but it's not gonna leave anybody who had serious concerns about his age feeling like those concerns were heard and taken seriously. This ain't Reagan in 1984, one zinger isn't gonna fix it. And what Gadarene and adrienneleigh said as well.

The problem with the interview isn't that it was a trainwreck-- it really wasn't, it was fine-- but just that.. it was never going to do what it was intended to do. I don't think there was any way this interview was going to undo the damage caused by the debate and the media frenzy that followed. At best, it might have shown Biden taking concerns about his age and fitness seriously, telling the public he hears them and that he understands those concerns, acknowledging that he's behind but making it clear he has a plan of action to come back from it, explaining his vision for the next four years. He didn't really do the fourth thing, and very much didn't do the first three.
posted by Method Man at 6:45 PM on July 5 [9 favorites]

switching the candidates is the worst possible scenario

i thought the interview was fine but it really depends on how motiviated the ny times and other elites are to force trump on the nation and what sort of slack biden can get them to cut

(on preview most of what method man said)
posted by lescour at 6:47 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

I'm not sure what some of y'all who said he was confused or a trainwreck or whatnot were watching

I was watching Biden repeatedly not answer the question he was asked and go off on a ten-minute meandering mishmash of obviously canned talking points that didn't relate at all to the substance of the questions he was being asked; I imagine other people who saw a trainwreck were seeing the same thing.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 6:48 PM on July 5 [15 favorites]

It appears that the elite controlled mainstream media has been reporting on Trump’s series of embarrassments, if only because they are salacious and novel, but people who vote for him think it’s charming that he goes on about cannibals at rallies, called one of his show contestants slurs and got sued for sexual assault. At a certain point the public does what they want with that information.
posted by Selena777 at 6:54 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

Was it worse than that in some other way?

He looked confused, lost, kept looking off into the distance and not at the interviewer with a fixed expression, gave meandering unrelated answers to specific questions...if the point of the interview was to reassure the American people that Joe Biden has enough on the ball to bounce back and take the fight to Trump it has to be rated as a failure.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 6:59 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

I just watched the interview and... meh.

He defended his accomplishments domestic and foreign strongly. He slammed Trump repeatedly.

Yet he garbled some sentences early on (did he invent the word "preparance"?) and his voice got weaker and more hoarse. He refused to agree to an external health test - that was clear, although Steph. had to box him in.

Some of this was just typical politico behavior, like returning to talking points and dodging questions.

Right now I don't think the interview decided anything. If you thought he was failing, you got some evidence of that. If you thought Biden was in ok enough shape to win November, you could see that.
posted by doctornemo at 7:01 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

I'd love to know why this doesn't work on Trump, though.

The media is a paid organ of propaganda for the oligarchy

Also, the only alternative is Harris

There's not going to be some darkhorse coming swinging out of a contested convention

This is not the West Wing
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:02 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

“Take a Deep Breath and Think About What You Need to Do,” Kelly Hayes, Organizing My Thoughts, 03 July 2024

“Strongman, Weak State,” Don Moynihan, Can We Still Govern?, 04 July 2024

“‘A Republic If You Can Keep It,’” Daniel W. Drezner, Drezner’s World, 04July 2024

“This is War,” Matt Bors, Bors Comics, 05 July 2024

“A Fool's Hope,” , The Reframe, 05 July 2024

“To Stay in the Fight, We Must Navigate Trauma and Find the Healing We Need,” Kelly Hayes, Truthout, 05 July 2024

P.S. One. Way Out.
posted by ob1quixote at 7:03 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

go off on a ten-minute meandering mishmash of obviously canned talking points

To be fair, each one of these meandering non-answers was maybe a minute long, but just seemed much longer.

makes me think of an average competent politician

He is such a weak candidate he literally had to rush out an interview to prove that he can say a full sentence in a last ditch attempt to keep his political allies from forcing him out of the race. And it didn’t work.
posted by snofoam at 7:05 PM on July 5 [10 favorites]

I was watching Biden repeatedly not answer the question he was asked and go off on a ten-minute meandering mishmash of obviously canned talking points that didn't relate at all to the substance of the questions he was being asked; I imagine other people who saw a trainwreck were seeing the same thing.

He looked confused, lost, kept looking off into the distance and not at the interviewer with a fixed expression, gave meandering unrelated answers to specific questions...if the point of the interview was to reassure the American people that Joe Biden has enough on the ball to bounce back and take the fight to Trump it has to be rated as a failure.

This seems like hyperbole to me and I even agree with you that the interview failed to accomplish what it was intended to. Yeah, he evaded some of the questions-- most politicians learn pretty quickly that when you get a tough question to which you don't have a good answer, you deflect. He deflected, not in the most elegant fashion. I think the real problem is not that he deflected but that he didn't have a good answer to the questions where he deflected, because without those answers, this interview was never going to do much good.
posted by Method Man at 7:05 PM on July 5

Biden needed to show that the debate was an aberration, a freakishly poorly timed sick day that wasn't indicative of where he's at. This Biden was essentially the same Biden we saw at the debate last week.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:15 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

This seems like hyperbole to me

Biden needed to look competent, alert, focused, and decisive after his debate performance; he looked querulous, feeble, and unfocused. That interview isn't going to move the needle any.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 7:15 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

well, if trump can get away with avoiding questions, and we all know he did, it's hardly fair to condemn biden for it

my impression is that he's mentally there, but just as his doctor said, he's exhausted - or more accurately, he was exhausted then and he's just plain tired now

he needs to let it go - he's not going to make it through the next 4 years - at some point a person has to say, i've fought my fight, i've done what i could and now it's time to retire and rest

he is at that point - the stress of that job is going to get him

i don't think trump's going to make it through the next 4 years either

and i honestly feel that the most senile, mentally challenged participants in this election are the american electorate for actually putting up with this without howls of protest that neither party is giving us a good candidate

god, we'll swallow anything, won't we, as long as we're not taxed or personally inconvenienced
posted by pyramid termite at 7:16 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

okay so biden needs to go and harris is the only possible replacement. but it turns out that that’s pretty fortunate actually. the only way to win at this point is to say the word “pedophile” as often as possible as loudly as possible, and harris can run campaign ads about child molesters locked up while she was in office that end with a promise (implicit? nah, explicit!) to put the pedophile donald trump in prison.

in a debate she could keep saying things like “americans, don’t trust your little girls with this man! don’t trust your little boys with this man!” over and over again, because if she says it enough and if she says it just right she’ll be able to bait him into shouting “i don’t molest boys!” and then it’s game over for pedo donny.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 7:18 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

I am having the sudden realization that there are many people out there who have as much disdain for Biden as they do for Trump.

Hearing the whole "I don't know what he's even done for the past four years schtick" is getting real old, too. At some point it's on you to not only read the clickbait. I can't handle following politics that deeply anymore, but even just from headlines I see around the Internet I've got a decent idea about good stuff that has happened thanks to Biden and his administration.

And personally, I don't actually give a shit if he's got a year left in him or four years left. The Constitution has a succession plan. I'm fine with Harris finishing out his term if something should happen.

TBH, I kinda feel like all this shit about replacing Biden is coming from the same place, if not the exact same assholes, who were angry that the Democratic Party didn't ignore the results of the primary vote and anoint Bernie the winner anyway and ceaselessly attacked Clinton as a result. With friends like these, who needs enemies?
posted by wierdo at 7:18 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

I am having the sudden realization that there are many people out there who have as much disdain for Biden as they do for Trump.

He's more than earned it.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:20 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

here are many people out there who have as much disdain for Biden as they do for Trump

Biden is a war criminal who belongs in the dock in the Hague along with his old friend Netanyahu. His active support of genocide has earned every bit of that disdain and more besides (along with his previous support of the Iraq War, quite honestly; I did the pragmatic thing in 2020 and voted for him, and voted for Clinton in 2016, but I sincerely loathe both of them and would have liked a better option).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 7:25 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

jenfullmoon I think it's entirely possible it might work on Republicans, including Trump. Problem is it would have to be smearing him with something they care about and think is bad.

They like that Trump is a racist.

They like that Trump is a rapist.

They like that Trump is a misogynist.

They like that Trump is stupid.

They like that Trump is a criminal.

They like that Trump wants to be a dictator.

They know he's not really a Christian and they don't care.

Any of those, except the last perhaps, would tank a Democrat but what will hurt a Democrat is not what will hurt a Republican. And the things that will hurt Trump are not the things that will hurt Biden. They might not like that Trump is senile, but as long as he can keep shouting at rallies they can pretend he isn't and more important it just doesn't matter much to them if he is or not.

What would hurt Trump?

Convincing them that he's not manly, AS THEY DEFINE MANLY. Emphasis because their definition won't match how most people here would define it.

Convincing them that he's in league with a foreign power they think is bad (China or Iran perhaps), they are in favor of him being in league with Russia [1].

Convincing them that he wants to take their guns.

The problem is all of that takes years of work and a media machine that will amplify fringe positions and loons until the mainstream media has to talk about it if just to cover the "controversy" and thus the lies work into the general discourse for people who don't much care about politics.

For Biden, they've been pushing the senile and unable to perform his duties idea more or less since he was first nominated in 2020. And at first it sounded silly and made them seem foolish. But over time it wormed into the narrative. And, of course, the fact that Biden was hiding from the media instead of being out there visibly not being feeble and senile made their job a lot easier. Then came the debate which seemed to validate their smears and it got a lot more firmly embedded in people's minds.

Even if we could magic an entire liberal spin machine into existence, complete with a dedicated cable channel, dozens of websites, podcasts, a host of editorialists, a massive presence on every talking heads show, etc I'm not at all sure there'd be time to smear Trump with something that would really turn Republicans against him. And it would probably have to be completely fictitious which many Democratic leaning people object to on philosophic grounds.

TL;DR: it would work against Republicans but only if they are attacked and smeared on things that matter to Republican voters and only if there's an entire media apparatus working to spread the smear.

Ray Walston, Luck Dragon The West Wing comment is spot on. West Wing was basically political porn for liberals. It took place in a world where explaining things to people, being condescending and putting Republicans in their place, actually WORKED and really did shame them into silence.

This particular clip is the near platonic ideal of what I'm talking about https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSXJzybEeJM&t=70s. He traps her with his witty explanation, he forces her to look silly, stupid, and shames her into silence showing the world just how stupid and primitive those Republicans really are. All the "ZOMG President totally OWNS right wing twit!" tweets and so on practically write themselves.

We, because I'm into that sort of fantasy too, absolutely LOVE the idea of putting them down and winning by the sheer power of explaining why they're wrong.

And it's 100% fantasy because in the real world it never works out.

If we want to successfully smear and tear down Republicans we have to do it in their cultural language and by their standards, not ours. And explaining at them, no matter how much we want it to, will never work.

[1] Which seems odd at first but actually makes a lot of sense. Russians are white. Russians are Christian. During the Cold War they built up the image of Russians as powerful, smart, worthy foes. So as soon as they dropped Communism and leaned into misogyny, homophobia, and Christofascism in general the myth of the Strong Worthy Warrior Russian meant that Conservatives would almost inevitably fall in love with Russia.
posted by sotonohito at 7:27 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

Good news about the Supreme Court turning the President into a King then. He's actually got the authority to do what you want him to do now Well, not the authority so much as the ability to ignore federal law requiring him to do certain things without fear of prosecution.

Three cheers for John Roberts and the seditionist 6 (or maybe 5, ACB's concurrence wouldn't have made Presidents into kings) then!
posted by wierdo at 7:27 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

Good news about the Supreme Court turning the President into a King then. He's actually got the authority to do what you want him to do now

Sorry, but what is this in reference to? (To clarify, what who wants him to do?)
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:30 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

However Biden performed in the "debate" is in the past.

What should be frightening is the post-debate media flex that someone orchestrated where almost every single outlet of political news went on the attack. I mean, I saw it, it was gigantic, almost instantaneous and it's still going. Biden's debate performance is somehow a bigger story than the ex-president getting convicted on a boatload of felonies.
posted by Sphinx at 7:41 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

If we want to successfully smear and tear down Republicans we have to do it in their cultural language and by their standards, not ours. And explaining at them, no matter how much we want it to, will never work.

It's like reading a book to a dog. The truth is, they want to do what they want to do, and any argument against that is invalid. You or I can be successfully persuaded that a course of action can be abandoned, even if that knowledge disappoints us. These are emotional toddlers who live for sensations that make them happy. You will never convince them they are wrong, because they feel right. There's no point in talking about it.

Ironically, this is why I expect more from democrats, because -- possibly incorrectly -- I believe they are capable of making adult decisions.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:41 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

It might be best for the country if someone extorted Jon Stewart into running (since he won’t do it willingly, and would definitely win).

Hard pass on this both-siding jerk.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:42 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Good news about the Supreme Court turning the President into a King then. He's actually got the authority to do what you want him to do now

Biden is not going to order SEAL Team 6 to assassinate Trump, and even if he did as an official act, he'd be put in The Hague for it because laws aren't real. They're just a bunch of Calvinball that keep the ruling class in power.
posted by AlSweigart at 7:43 PM on July 5 [10 favorites]

Which seems odd at first but actually makes a lot of sense. Russians are white. Russians are Christian.

It's not even about that, it's that Putin took in the Christofascists when they were on the outs after Obama's election, Obergefell, and all that. Not only did he literally give many of them a home as they left the country in disgust, he took on their cause and promoted it within Russia. They therefore feel a deep debt of gratitude and very much think of him as one of them in a way they don't even think of Trump.

This is why Trump absolutely will not say anything bad about Russia. He knows damn well they'd pick Putin over him any day of the week and twice on Sunday. It helps that he gives zero shits about Project 2025 or any of their other plans. It's all jolly to him as long as they don't get in the way of his grifting.
posted by wierdo at 7:44 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

wierdo We've been explicitly saying we utterly hate him at least since 2020, it's hardly a secret.

He's awful.

But Trump has somehow managed to actually be worse so I voted for Biden in 2020 (for all the good it did, I'm Texan so my vote doesn't count), and if he's on the ballot in 2024 I'll vote for him again (for all the good it will do because I'm still in Texas where my vote means jack shit).

And the truth is, I feel about that level of disdain for any mainstream Democrat you care to name.

I didn't vote for them because I liked them, I voted for them because as horrible as they were they were still better than the Republicans.

I don't think my current belief that he's tanking the possibility of a Democratic victory in November is rooted in that loathing of him. I hated him as much back in 2020 as I do now and I thought he had a pretty good shot at winning then.

Nor, I should mention, is my dislike of him due to any Sanders love. I'm not all that fond of Sanders and I damn sure don't buy into conspiracy shit about him being shut out. I've long accepted that most people are bootlickers at heart and as a result leftism will never be anything but a fringe belief. I hate it, but you don't get anywhere by denying reality.

On not previewing: Yes, definitely that too re: Russia and Republicans.
posted by sotonohito at 7:45 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Kudos to Biden for beating Trump last time. He has accomplished many more good things than I would have thought possible in this political climate. Overall a successful term and he is a million times better than Trump and a good person.

It’s also clear that he can’t run this campaign and he can’t win this race. I don’t know why he can’t see that. I can only imagine that trusted colleagues are being more direct with him about his need to step aside than they are in their public comments. It is sad to see, and the longer this goes on the worse it is for the campaign, and by extension the future of the whole earth.
posted by snofoam at 7:47 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

What should be frightening is the post-debate media flex that someone orchestrated where almost every single outlet of political news went on the attack.

The sitting president of the US being borderline incoherent during a massively viewed, televised debate is newsworthy. It is important and it is frightening and it is exciting depending on who your audience is.

Maybe someone did somehow have a massive media machine in every news network, just waiting for the word 'go' if Biden showed any weakness. It certainly isn't impossible. But it also isn't necessary. The media reaction wasn't too far different from the reactions of ordinary people watching the debate.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:47 PM on July 5 [16 favorites]

My unsolicited advice for Grandpa Joe: Lean into that shit.

Pick five or so issues to campaign on, just to keep it simple. Then get together with five or so up and coming Democrats, aka, the future, and have them decide if they want to headline a particular issue or work together as a team to deal with said issues. This is your very public braintrust to head up these major issues, be in singularly or as a team.

The issues would be probably be Roe v Wade, rising housing prices, immigration, foreign policy, health care, and the US space program. The last one is a personal thing for me, just pat me (not Joe) on the head about it and let me prattle on about rockets at times.

Then, grandpa Joe, say this: "Yeah, I'm old and don't walk and talk as well as I once did. So what, I'm still on the right side of these issues and i know the american public wants these issues to be worked out, so that's what I'm gonna focus on and that's where I'm gonna need your help. Vote for candidates, Democrat or Republican, who are solidly behind these issues and vote out anyone who isn't. That's the only way we'll get bills through Congress to support this stuff." There's better ways to say this, get the speech writers together, my caffeine reserves are slow.

Then just hammer that shit home for the next four months. Repeatedly and completely. Ask the Democrats to start proposing bills related to this stuff and when they're shot down because of Republicans, point it out the American public. Remind them that we could be getting all of these if it wasn't for the Republicans and Donald Trump (especially on immigration).

Also, at the next debate, ignore the rules and ask Trump this question the first chance you get to speak: "Do you believe you lost the 2020 election" Then just pick at him about that. "But what about the 60+ court cases that said there was no cheating, some of those cases decided by judges you appointed, how do you explain that?" Push that button repeatedly. Ignore what the moderators say, you're the goddamn President of these United States, quit fucking around and letting people shape you.

When you're elected, appoint me head of NASA with a 30 billion a year budget. We'll put a statue of you on Europa, I promise.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:49 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

"This is happening again and a lot of you are falling for it again."

(Link is a screenshot of various 2016 headlines questioning Hillary Clinton's health and asking questions about her replacement.)
posted by AlSweigart at 7:50 PM on July 5 [10 favorites]

Come on.
posted by Gadarene at 7:52 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

but even just from headlines I see around the Internet I've got a decent idea about good stuff that has happened thanks to Biden and his administration.

Omg wait till you hear about the bad stuff!!!!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:54 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

(Link is a screenshot of various 2016 headlines questioning Hillary Clinton's health and asking questions about her replacement.)

Yeah, the media loves that sort of thing. There is no need for a conspiracy. But even if there were, there is a reason replacing Clinton was not taken seriously in 2016, but replacing Biden is getting traction from people with actual influence in 2024.

The right were claiming Biden was senile pretty much from day one. They tried to use the documents case against him to claim he was losing it. And it got basically no traction, despite their being several notable gaffes to point to as evidence. That changed when a large chunk of the country watched him barely function for an hour on live television. The repeated refrain that this is all media manipulation isn't going to work.

This is the Democrats go to reply now. Criticise Biden's record, you're a Russian bot. People oppose Biden's Israel policy, they are brainwashed by the Chinese App. People think a visibly unfit man is unfit, they've fallen for the trickery of the right wing cabal that runs the media. At some point you have to accept that people can just think your candidate sucks.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:58 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

Meh, a feeble Biden is still a helluva lot better than Trump. That's needs to be hammered home also. Have Kamala step up and be more active so that people know if Biden does get terrible, there's a qualified person to step in, the Constitution already thought of that. You remember that document don't you (general you, not a specific you), the one the Republicans have been trying to dismantle?

Be that ornery grandpa that has the right ideas, but is past their prime. Lean into it grandpa. 'Cause you're never gonna win trying to prove to people that everything is fine, so don't even go that route.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:05 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Meh, a feeble Biden is still a helluva lot better than Trump.

Ask Hillary Clinton how far that gets you.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:06 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

a feeble Biden is still a helluva lot better than Trump.

Sure, but a feeble Biden is not going to be elected. That’s the reason why people are worried about this.
posted by snofoam at 8:13 PM on July 5 [20 favorites]

I hate to keep bringing it back to this, but why is this feeble old man the best thing the democratic party has to offer? Doesn't that sound strange to anybody else?
posted by kittens for breakfast at 8:24 PM on July 5 [12 favorites]

If you didn't watch the debate, you probably saw almost every media organisation in existence immediately devote wall to wall coverage of (how Biden might drop out / is about to drop out / needs to drop out / why hasn't he dropped out yet, it has been a week) and thought what the fuck this has to be a coordinated attack or conspiracy.

Please go back and actually watch the whole debate, not just clips. It's the worst debate performance I've ever seen. It's a performance so bad that it would bar someone from being Miss USA, let alone president.
posted by zymil at 8:30 PM on July 5 [7 favorites]

Overall a successful term and he is a million times better than Trump and a good person.

(From the previous Biden thread: Is he old? Yes. Is he frail? Perhaps. Is he a liar, a cheat, a racist, a fascist, a felon? No.)

When I reacted to the second comment in the previous thread, I wasn’t saying don’t vote for Biden or whoever the Democratic candidate is. I wasn’t arguing that Biden has done nothing good for Americans. And I wasn’t arguing that Trump would be better for Palestinians.

I was trying to point out the utter erasure of Palestinians as human beings that is inherent in claiming that Biden is a “good person” or “not a racist.” He is helping Israel to exterminate Palestinians by continuing to provide that country with weapons. In that context, you can’t claim he is a “good person” or “not a racist” unless you believe Palestinians don’t count as human beings with the same universal human rights as we do (or you keep forgetting that Palestinians exist and are currently being exterminated, which amounts to the same thing).

Saying “I am aware of what Biden is responsible for in Gaza but I have decided to vote for him anyway for xx reasons” is fundamentally different because it doesn’t utterly erase Palestinian humanity.
posted by mydonkeybenjamin at 8:33 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

The thing that makes it feel like a media conspiracy is how little it seems to me that it actually matters for the governance of the country whether Biden steps down or not. Even well before the debate, I expected Harris would very likely end up taking over a lot of the duties of president. Because he's in fact old.

Like, I'm guessing the reason he hasn't handed the torch off to her is because the polls say America's still too racist and sexist to vote for a competent black woman over an aging white guy.

I hate to keep bringing it back to this, but why is this feeble old man the best thing the democratic party has to offer? Doesn't that sound strange to anybody else?

Why is he the best thing the entire political establishment has to offer?
posted by Zalzidrax at 8:40 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

>duties of president

these, actually, approach nil.
posted by torokunai at 8:46 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

>Why is he the best thing the entire political establishment has to offer?

Democracy does not, and can not, select for competence. I consider myself a liberal republican in exile, like Elizabeth Warren I guess. She got my primary vote in 2016, but of course could not get the votes to be the party nominee.
posted by torokunai at 8:48 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

(^2020)
posted by torokunai at 9:08 PM on July 5

Someone on Twitter regarding Biden's "as long as I try my best" answer:

either democracy is on the ballot or this is a little league baseball game but it cannot be both

.
posted by Gadarene at 9:17 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

"If nothing else works, then a total pig-headed unwillingness to look facts in the face will see us through" -- senior Biden adviser Ron Melchett
posted by zaixfeep at 9:28 PM on July 5

David Roberts (@drvolts):

Just gonna make my one point, which is this: the idea that that the process of jettisoning Biden & choosing someone else will go well -- will be *allowed* to go well -- is a deeply deranged fantasy.

The idea that Dems will do this & will end up feeling unified, that Harris will come out popular, that "the dynamics of the race will shift," all of that ... fucking deranged. Deranged in such a perfectly characteristic Dem way.

[...]

Anyway, my point is just: none of this will change if Harris replaces Biden at the top of the ticket. The idea that the media -- with these soulless careerist court gossips in charge -- will allow it is just fantasy. They *need* Dems in disarray & so they will engineer it.

The US is right on the precipice of falling into bona fide fascism & *the vast majority of the voting public doesn't even know it*. That speaks to a deeply diseased information environment. Until Dems do something about that, all their self-flagellation will buy them nothing.

posted by tonycpsu at 9:32 PM on July 5 [11 favorites]

Logged onto Twitter and the first post was someone I follow addressing that precise argument:

Then the election is just lost and we should hand Trump back the WH right now. If you believe campaigns matter, then it matters if you have the candidate best able to combat the media and its nonsense.

.
posted by Gadarene at 9:36 PM on July 5

either democracy is on the ballot or this is a little league baseball game but it cannot be both

So much for not putting ego above the good of the country, I guess. Wasn't that long ago that people were laughing at the egotism of Trump's "I alone can fix it", and here's Biden doing the exact same thing. One way or another, it looks like America may end up being destroyed because of one man's ego, ambition, and pride; it'd be almost bleakly funny if it weren't tragic if that turns out to be the guy everyone thought was a saviour, at first.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 9:43 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Sorry I didn't read all of this thread but my question has been: why the hell did the campaign have him participate in the debate? What value did they think that could possibly add for team Biden?
posted by latkes at 9:45 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

> Then the election is just lost and we should hand Trump back the WH right now. If you believe campaigns matter, then it matters if you have the candidate best able to combat the media and its nonsense.

Except this isn't a D&D character generator or a fantasy sports draft. We can't wish away the existence of a political process that would do a massive amount of damage to whoever emerges from the process of getting from Biden to your favorite alternative, and despite the nearly infinite capacity of the Internet and the large amount of thinking going into finding a plausible story of how we get there, nobody's managed to do it without yadda-yadda-ing the part where whoever comes out of that process takes a ton of arrows from within the party, and then from the same diseased media and GOP hitmen.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:47 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

Except this isn't a D&D character generator or a fantasy sports draft. We can't wish away the existence of a political process that would do a massive amount of damage to whoever emerges from the process of getting from Biden to your favorite alternative, and despite the nearly infinite capacity of the Internet and the large amount of thinking going into finding a plausible story of how we get there, nobody's managed to do it without yadda-yadda-ing the part where whoever comes out of that process takes a ton of arrows from within the party, and then from the same diseased media and GOP hitmen.

Harris. Next.

Process is already underway and would be more than straightforward if Biden would just gracefully bow out rather than caring more about proving people wrong than about his legacy as the person who let democracy die, but there you go.

Biden's prospects for reelection have been fatally damaged, whether he recognizes it or not. Harris polls ahead of Biden vs Trump and is the natural successor. The Trump campaign would LOVE for Biden to stay in. Whatever slings and arrows they might throw at Harris won't make her campaign as dead as Biden's already is. Full stop.
posted by Gadarene at 9:54 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

(and I really, really, REALLY dislike Harris's politics. But I need to see Trump defeated, and Biden has become a terrible person to do that)
posted by Gadarene at 9:55 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

Biden's not a genocidal egotist.

He's a boring, work-within-the-system centrist who thought he chum up with the Israelis. could soft power Netanyahu into not being genocidal and whose decision on whether to step aside is almost certainly based on polling as to whether he or Harris has a better chance of winning.

If the polling continues to suggest Harris, I expect he will step down.
posted by Zalzidrax at 9:58 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

the process of getting from Biden to your favorite alternative

Pretty much everyone commenting here who thinks Biden's candidacy is non-viable would be vote for pretty much any alternative who can demonstrate competence, active engagement, and a capacity to govern. We have credible reports of his rapid senescence and increasing disengagement that should honestly be triggering discussions of the 25th Amendment, not merely replacing him on the ticket. I think if anyone has a "favorite alternative", it's "someone who isn't going to lose to Trump".
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 10:01 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

I don't care that Biden did the politician thing of dodging questions so much as what questions he dodged - a lot of pretty simple questions that voters deserve answers to - like, will you undergo neurological testing?

The thing that makes it feel like a media conspiracy is how little it seems to me that it actually matters for the governance of the country whether Biden steps down or not.

Again, in the last week it's been reported that a wide range of elites (donors, politicians, journalists, etc.) have witnessed Biden be mentally unwell, similar to the debate, with increasing frequency, especially in the last six months. Recent reporting also suggests that he is increasingly isolated in the White House, to the degree that it's not even clear who is making a lot of decisions - him or his staff. So yeah, I actually would say this matters to the governance of the country.

Like, I'm guessing the reason he hasn't handed the torch off to her is because the polls say America's still too racist and sexist to vote for a competent black woman over an aging white guy.

Except the polls don't say that. I don't feel like Googling them, but you can find them mentioned in the previous thread.

Why is he the best thing the entire political establishment has to offer?

Here, we can only speculate. Look, I have seen people in the early stages of cognitive decline. It's always a really sad time and often the person gets angry and has a hard time facing the possibility.* What's more, politics is kinda like the mafia - there is intense hierarchy. There is a reason all of the candidates in the 2020 primary dropped out all at once - it's not a conspiracy to suggest the DNC encouraged it, promising it would be held against them if they didn't, and they might be rewarded if they did. (This episode of the Run Up covered this well) And so we got Biden at the top, and while it may be easier to topple a president than a king, I think this is all revealing that it's still pretty hard to topple a president that doesn't want to give up power. The DNC set up the primaries to be favorable to Biden and squashed any chance there would be a completive primary. Given that the Republicans have been making fun of "Sleepy Joe" since 2019, I can imagine a lot of people were nervous about seeming like they were endorsing alt-right talking points. And so a lot of people have just been collectively holding in their breath, at least until the debate. The only person who orchestrated the media fallout was Biden with his disastrous performance.

What bothered me about the interview was how much Biden lied about the position he's currently in. Here are just a few of the lies I can remember right now:

1. That all of the governors support him. This is a lie. At least the governor of Colorado and MA have come out with their concerns.

2. That the NYTimes poll had him down 10 points before the debate (lie) and 9 points after the debate (double lie, given that it implies he did better post-debate)

3. He claimed the polls showed him losing in 2020 (they did not) and therefore we can ignore them this time.

4. He claimed that Mark Warner (the Senator currently making moves against him) tried to get the presidential nomination in 2020 (sorta implying this is out of bitterness/spite). I haven't been able to find any evidence of that - perhaps this is less a lie than him mixing up Warner for another Senator?

5. He leaned into the conspiracy theory (which obviously some people here believe too) that this is all #FakeNews.

In short, Biden (and his supporters) is increasingly resembling Trump (and his supporters). Really depressing.

*I am not a doctor, but a few neurologists specializing in Parkinson's have gone on record recently saying that if he was a patient, based on his symptoms (trouble walking, raspy voice, slurred speech, confusion, etc.) they would feel negligent not recommending a full neurological exam to rule it out - again, they aren't diagnosing him - they are just saying that he meets a certain threshold where they would feel compelled to test.
posted by coffeecat at 10:04 PM on July 5 [8 favorites]

> Harris. Next.

I'd love to live in a country and media environment that would give Harris the fair shot you seem to think she'd get given that she has most of Biden's negatives, including being part of his administration that everyone will say could have or should have pressured him to (end support of Israel's destruction of Gaza, cancel student loans, pack the court to save Roe, etc.), plus some negatives of her own, including also not being a great public speaker or a charismatic campaigner. On the "pro" side of the ledger, she'd presumably get the campaign war chest and she's not showing signs of cognitive decline. How that nets out to a better chance at a win does not come across as obvious as you seem to think it is.
posted by tonycpsu at 10:05 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

why the hell did the campaign have him participate in the debate?

It's a good question! At this point, given his apparent delusions and stubbornness, I'm starting to wonder if he was encouraged not to do it and he just ignored them (much like he's ignored advice to involve Hunter less).
posted by coffeecat at 10:06 PM on July 5

I think that if Biden resigns and Kamala Harris runs as the incumbent... ...all the questions voters had about Biden's age, would suddenly be about Trump.
posted by interogative mood

It would be the big plus in that scenario, by neutralising Trump's most effective campaign line against Biden, however unjustified and shamelessly hypocritical it may be, and throwing the spotlight firmly back on his obvious age and mental infirmity.

Though no doubt he has others he could use against Harris.

Beyond that I have no idea what the best option is in the current circumstances, if for no other reason than I have no idea of the real story and general machinations behind the scenes, and no crystal ball. All paths from here are clearly fraught with serious danger. Changing horses now is not going to be easy or obviously offer a clear advantage. That can only be known post-change.

The fact that the second debate is not until September is a major concern, because if Biden fails to deliver there then it is too late to replace him. Any new leader will need some time to stamp themselves on the job and there is already little of that left. If there is going to be a change at the top it will have to be soon, maybe two weeks max.

I don't know the mechanics of it, but there is one serious particular concern with that path, which is how the new VP is chosen for the interim and the opportunity that might offer the Repubs to indulge in some real bastardry over it. It may well be why there is such a hard push for it to happen by, um, certain forces not necessarily friendly to the Dems. It gives them a chance to rat fuck on steroids before the election is even held.

The track record of actual elections, as opposed to polls, in recent times strongly favours the Dems, including critically in previously strong Repub polities. I remain unconvinced of the reliability of polling of late, and am fairly sure that Dem voters already intending to turn out under Biden will still do so, regardless of who the Dem leader is, because they are not turning out for Biden so much as turning out to stop Trump and the descent into degenerate kleptocratic tyranny that is all he is offering.

In the meantime, the one thing I am sure of is that the Dems and their leadership, should ruthlessly exploit the fucking bejeebus out of the the Epstein related accusations against Trump. That could be the last straw for any waverers about Trump, or those feeling unmotivated about making the effort to turn out for the Dems. Hit them where it really hurts, a parent's worst possible nightmare about their children.
posted by Pouteria at 10:23 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

She’s seen as very pro-cop in a party which is highly sympathetic to the abolish-the-police ethos

Multiple Gallup polls suggest the opposite. Support to abolish remains consistent at 27% for Democrats and 15% nationwide.

Support for major reform is much, much higher. Harris can win over a large majority with that message.
posted by CynicalKnight at 10:43 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

Man I’m soooo excited about the prospect of a new candidate - as long as they’re under 70 and reasonably coherent I’ll be thrilled. Everyone I know is absolutely hungry for some representation by the younger generation.

I’m still pretty bitter about RBG and Diane Feinstein. It’s such arrogance to think that holding public office is something anyone is entitled to - it is a privilege and the people who get to run the country should be at the absolute top of their game.

Anyway, fingers crossed that the dam breaks soon!
posted by catcafe at 10:46 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

Ones argument in favor of Harris is that a lot of younger voters are turned off by another old, white men election. Having a fresh(er) face might get some people to vote who would stay home in the current race.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:17 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

Ones argument in favor of Harris is that a lot of younger voters are turned off by another old, white men election. Having a fresh(er) face might get some people to vote who would stay home in the current race.

Also someone who is apparently to Biden's left on Palestine.

Which isn't hard.
posted by Gadarene at 11:21 PM on July 5 [2 favorites]

"In our top story tonight, Democrats don't support their own incumbent, and they just noticed this five months out from the election. Do you trust Democrats to govern when they can't even run their own party? Let's see what our poll respondents said. This just in--the Democrats have picked their candidate, and she's a woke woman of color. Can woke win? Democrats went woke, but does America want woke? Let's have some more polls--are you tired of radical leftists shoving woke down your throat? Kamala Harris wants to defund the police! Will Kamala Harris defend our borders?..."

The major news outlets are all trying to find anything to talk about besides the news that Trump is a pedophile. And Christmas is coming early for them, because we're going to help them distract everybody with this clown show. They won't have to say one word about Trump between now and November; this is what will be in the news instead, every hour of every day.

I don't know if you guys have noticed this, but America is not a progressive utopia. Racism and misogyny are extremely powerful forces here. Engagement with politics is almost nonexistent, and anything that smacks of leftism is regarded with such deep-seated suspicion and hostility that you can't even get poor people to support programs to help poor people. If you think people even know who Kamala Harris is, you need to take a minute to reflect on the difference between our little internet kaffeeklatsch, and the general public.

I vividly remember what it was like in here the night that Hillary lost. You guys are gonna get all jazzed up again, and I have no doubt that Kamala Harris will win the Metafilter vote in a huge landslide. And then there'll be that dead feeling inside as everybody gets a refresher course in all the ways that America is unlike Metafilter.

I really hope I'm wrong.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 11:41 PM on July 5 [4 favorites]

America is not a progressive utopia.

Good, because Kamala Harris is not a progressive candidate.
posted by Gadarene at 11:46 PM on July 5 [5 favorites]

The head-in-the-sand-ism here is creepy. Frankly I consider it gaslighting.

The man is in serious decline — just compare his recent performance to his 2020 debate. He's too frail to do the job: to do press conferences, to handle long hours of travel and diplomacy, to forcefully communicate his message, to stay sharp through a long-running crisis, to answer the 3am phone call Hillary ran on. It's irresponsible to elect this man to four more years. It's not right. That should be enough but running him is a losing strategy to boot.

This isn't a media conspiracy. Hundreds of millions of people have seen it with their own eyes. Democratic governors and senators are troubled by what they see first-hand. The reports from every corner of Washington are consistent. It is literally a conspiracy theory to say this is a media-invented story. Shame on all of you trying to wish this away.
posted by daveliepmann at 11:47 PM on July 5 [6 favorites]

> 4. He claimed that Mark Warner (the Senator currently making moves against him) tried to get the presidential nomination in 2020 (sorta implying this is out of bitterness/spite). I haven't been able to find any evidence of that - perhaps this is less a lie than him mixing up Warner for another Senator?

Warner was widely rumoured to be looking to run for President in 2008, although he didn't. Biden might be remembering the 2008 election instead of 2020, or maybe Warner was talking about running in 2020 but again decided not to, although if he did he didn't talk about it publicly as far as I can tell. So either Biden is misremembering 2008 for 2020 or he suspects Warner is spreading the idea that Biden should drop out because Warner wants to run himself.
posted by dis_integration at 11:53 PM on July 5 [1 favorite]

--only way to win at this point is to say the word “pedophile” as often as possible as loudly as possible, and harris can run campaign ads about child molesters locked up while she was in office that end with a promise (implicit? nah, explicit!) to put the pedophile donald trump in prison.

in a debate she could keep saying things like “americans, don’t trust your little girls with this man! don’t trust your little boys with this man!” over and over again--

kdot's free, I think, if the team is looking for advice - he's just filmed and dropped the MV for Not Like Us and everything.
posted by cendawanita at 11:59 PM on July 5 [3 favorites]

>America is not a progressive utopia.

>>Good, because Kamala Harris is not a progressive candidate.

In America she is. In America she's a Radical Leftist. Yes, I know that's ridiculous. But most Americans don't. The fact that people in here seem not to realize this is what worries me.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:06 AM on July 6 [3 favorites]

In the America you describe, Joe Biden is a Radical Leftist.

Really.
posted by Gadarene at 12:07 AM on July 6 [1 favorite]

in a debate she could keep saying things like “americans, don’t trust your little girls with this man! don’t trust your little boys with this man!” over and over again

Little hands, little pants
posted by flabdablet at 12:08 AM on July 6 [3 favorites]

>This isn't a media conspiracy. Hundreds of millions of people have seen it with their own eyes.

Donald Trump is also old and suffering from cognitive decline. And he's neither smart nor studied to begin with, he lives for the abuse of power, he's an admirer of dictators, etc., etc. I surely don't need to go through the whole litany. There is absolutely nothing about Biden that is one ten-thousandth as alarming as anything you care to pick about Trump. The fact that the sirens are sounding about Biden's decline ABSOLUTELY IS a media conspiracy. The question isn't whether Biden is declining; the question is why that's being treated as the differentiating factor, when it's not.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:10 AM on July 6 [7 favorites]

>In the America you describe, Joe Biden is a Radical Leftist.

You're right, and there are people who won't vote for him for that reason. But he's also an old white guy. In the America I describe--in actual America as I suspect it exists outside of Metafilter--that's an advantage.

I'm gonna step out now, folks. I don't want to get heated about this; I hope you're all right and I'm wrong, and in a few short months Donald Trump will be defeated by Kamala Harris, because what America really wants is a youngish woman of color in the White House. The America that seems poised to decide that you shouldn't even be allowed to get divorced... I don't know, the idea that Kamala can beat Trump just doesn't correspond to anything I see happening in reality. If she's the candidate, I'll happily vote for her; I would also pull the lever for Bernie, John Stewart, Taylor Swift, Tom Lehrer, Robin Williams even though he's dead, the guy who lives across the street from me and plays 'Crazy Train' too loud sometimes, and... frankly, anybody you got, I'll vote for them, and I hope it goes well for all of us.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:24 AM on July 6 [5 favorites]

Donald Trump is also old and suffering from cognitive decline.

No, not to nearly the same extent, he's not. This is trivially demonstrated by watching the debate clip I posted. Biden was sharp in 2020. Since then he has experienced a sharp decline. Trump is still the same blowhard.

I surely don't need to go through the whole litany.

No, you don't, because it's pure cope and whataboutism to talk about the opponent in a discussion about fielding your best team. Trump being Trump is out of our control. I can't believe I have to say this but Democrats nominate Democrats and Republicans nominate Republicans — what the other team does is not something we decide.

The fact that the sirens are sounding about Biden's decline ABSOLUTELY IS a media conspiracy.

If you think the press should ignore the emperor's lack of clothes, you're part of the problem. Should they also stay mum about the swell of prominent Democrats pushing for him to step aside?
posted by daveliepmann at 12:30 AM on July 6 [4 favorites]

I hate to keep bringing it back to this, but why is this feeble old man the best thing the democratic party has to offer? Doesn't that sound strange to anybody else?

Because any other kind of person is too radical for America. Even milquetoast Joe Biden himself was accused of being a communist in 2020. There IS no single
person that can appeal to Cubans in Florida, college students in cities across America, suburban moms, Black and Latino men, and on and on and on. That shouldn't be how democracy works anyway. It should not be about the personality or even the person.

I am pro-democracy and 100% against fascism. But the bigger question we need to wrestle with, beyond Biden-Harris and Trump, is how does democracy work with a misinformed and civically uneducated electorate?
posted by ichomp at 12:46 AM on July 6 [2 favorites]

The question isn't whether Biden is declining; the question is why that's being treated as the differentiating factor, when it's not.

This question is making the wrong comparison. The differentiation is between Biden and all possible Democrat candidates, over who is best fit to defeat the evil candidate. The differentiation when it comes time to vote in November will be the Democrat candidate versus the evil candidate.

There are two differential comparisons being made and a lot of internet people are making a very simple error that needs to be corrected. There is no double standard going on, there are two different comparisons both of which will be made, by two different audiences (Democrat base vs. American voters), at two different times (this week vs. November).
posted by polymodus at 12:48 AM on July 6 [2 favorites]

Because any other kind of person is too radical for America.

literally every biden alternative outpolls him in every battleground state. the whole lot of 'em.
posted by daveliepmann at 12:48 AM on July 6 [3 favorites]

The question isn't whether Biden is declining; the question is why that's being treated as the differentiating factor, when it's not.

My question is why we weren't seeing credible rumors of this decline before the debate. Also why my eyes saw something entirely different in the interview than seems to be consensus here.

And personally, comparing Biden to Trump in terms of ability to maintain a coherent train of thought, there's little competition. Watch a Trump rally sometime. Most days the man can't finish a sentence without wandering off to another topic.

Even Obama had off debates, I remember well the gnashing of teeth here and elsewhere. It happens. But of course the narrative that Biden is old turns it into an existential crisis rather than just a bad day. It's fucking bizarre. I expect that kind of muckraking shit of the media and even from some of the scared-of-their-own-shadow Democratic backbenchers, but I don't expect it from the folks here. The level of certainty some of you are displaying seems more like the result of an anxiety spiral than anything else.
posted by wierdo at 2:09 AM on July 6

"When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, that is news."

If there ever was a textbook example of this, it's news organizations talking about Biden's ability to be president and less so about Trump's ability. It's news because it's news.

Is there a reader of any big east coast newspaper who's not informed of all the many Trump failings and crimes, most of which have been covered daily for years? Dog bites man, sure. I don't see why it's a media conspiracy to talk about what went wrong at an election debate.
posted by UN at 2:14 AM on July 6

« Older Generations, Explained | ASMR shoes. Newer »

You are not currently logged in. Log in or create a new account to post comments.

MetaFilter

After a bad debate Biden's campaign enters a critical moment.
July 5, 2024 2:03 PM Subscribe

Tags

Share

After a bad debate Biden's campaign enters a critical moment. July 5, 2024 2:03 PM Subscribe

Tags

Share

After a bad debate Biden's campaign enters a critical moment.
July 5, 2024 2:03 PM Subscribe