For some time, I've been watching videos of Joe Biden to see for myself if he was showing signs of cognitive decline. Time after time, the answer was no. He had obvious physical limitations, but mentally he had no problems. What's more, all indications suggested he was carrying out the duties of the presidency just fine.
That makes his performance last Thursday genuinely puzzling. Nevertheless, it was what it was: the performance of a man who was halting, confused, lost, and sometimes just plain incoherent. The evidence of cognitive decay was so obvious that even Biden partisans couldn't spin it away.
Sadly, this 90-minute look into Biden's mental state—temporary or not—makes it clear that he shouldn't be president any longer. It's too risky. He should resign the office immediately and turn the reins over to Kamala Harris.
And what then should Harris do? This is purely a question of politics. I can hardly believe I'm about to say this, but my suggestion would be to talk a moderate Republican—a Rob Portman type—into becoming her vice president and running mate and creating a bipartisan front against Donald Trump. This would shake things up enough to give her a chance of beating Trump in November.
This kind of suggestion is a horrible cliche, but it has possibilities. It's not the most important thing, though. What's important is that the president can't be a person who's obviously not all there—even if that's true only occasionally. Biden needs to leave office with dignity while he still can.
Oh, I know!
I know where this whole conversation is coming from!
Wouldn't Bernie be a great President??
I love the man and he is sharper than Biden is now but he is definitely too old.
Newly crowned president-king Joe Biden needs to order Seal Team 6 to rendition six Supreme Court justices. The remaining 3 can adjudicate whether his actions are "official" ones sometime in 2025.
How did the choice to have a VP from the opposition party work out for Lincoln?
Or anyone?
Well, for the former confederate states it was certainly convenient.
Actually if the key objective is to beat Trump then you need to go one better.
Harris appoints one of the serious Republican presidential candidates VP and then resigns. The Democrats nominate him for the presidency. He wins the election with votes from Democrats and from Republicans uncomfortable with Trump.
“serious Republican presidential candidates”
Thanks for the laugh!
So the Democratic Party, as such, should dissolve itself in favor of becoming a right wing party. Run by a Republican who’s undoubtedly going to be very submissive towards Trump. This in order to block the right wing from taking power.
Joe Biden’s own words over the weekend:
“Folks, I give you my word as a Biden — I would not be running again if I didn’t believe with all my heart and soul [that] I can do this job,”
Fine with me.
Also, Kevin’s recommendation that Kamala Harris pick a Republican VP is genuinely odd.
First of all,Biden clearly isn’t resigning or dropping out.
But let’s say for argument’s sake that he does:
Why suggest that Harris pick a Republican running mate when that will never happen? And why posit without evidence that a Republican VP pick would help her win (when in fact it would infuriate her base)?
And that’s ultimately the main problem I have with so much post-debate analysis: it just ignores reality.
And the reality is that if Joe Biden resigns or withdraws, Trump wins. Hence, Biden should stay in. I just don’t see it as being more complicated than that.
What happened after President Johnson declined to run for reelection? His party lost.
What happens most of the time (barring economic calamities) in modern history when incumbent presidents seek reelection? They win.
So Kevin has essentially written a manual with step by step instructions for the Democrats to hand the election to Trump.
Now, I get it that some people would prefer if Martin Sheen from the West Wing would suddenly step in and give a speech and instantly attract 90% support from the electorate and then defeat Trump and then raise taxes on the rich to universal acclimation and then kick all of the Conservatives off the Supreme Court because they’re meanies and then and then and then …
But here’s the shocker: none of that is happening.
What is happening instead is incredibly simple: we have to go through the election with the incumbent candidate we have because any other option is, at this point in time, political suicide. That’s the way it is. I’m genuinely shocked at the number of adults (and I think they’re mostly males to be honest) who are determined to respond to a problem by promoting absolute fantasies. Grow up.
Thank you for this reality-based answer.
Plenty of people can't appreciate their own decline. It's pretty clear Biden doesn't have what it takes but Trump has even less of what it takes and Biden is not dropping out so it's pointless to go on about it.
Trump has absolutely none of what it takes. In fact, considering the multiple occasions on which he has attempted or done actual harm to the American people (trying to repeal ACA without any replacement, gutting environmental regs) and to national security (divulging secrets to foreign officials, threatening allies), he is well into negative territory. (The list could be much longer).
It's highly unlikely that any Republican would agree to be a Harris running mate. In the event one did, it would be guaranteed to make millions of Democrats stay home in November, and millions of progressives vote for Kennedy or West. Kevin, like so many other media pundits, seems to be under the misapprehension the election will be decided by millions of Very Reasonable Voters yearning for candidates willing to "reach across the aisle". Even the president got cured of that nonsense early in his term.
You are 100% correct that "we have to go through the election with the incumbent candidate we have because any other option is, at this point in time, political suicide." And I say that as someone who consistently opposed Biden's nomination back in 2020, because it was so easy to predict the re-election fiasco we are currently witnessing.
I contributed to Biden's 2020 campaign and I have already contributed small amounts to his 2024 campaign. I supported him fully up until last week. The stakes are too high to have some undecided voter say I can't vote for him he is too old. We can all sit around and optimistically claim it was just a bad night (which it was) but we are being delusional if we think he won't have any other bad nights. As Kevin's transcript the other day illustrated even on several of his supposedly good answers he wandered off into incoherence. He is a good and decent man and he has been a good President but he isn't the person to get us past the Trump crisis.
His whole rationale seems to be that I beat Trump the last time so I will again. This isn't exactly comforting. His approval rating (yes unfairly) can't break 40%. He should endorse Harris and then get the entire Democratic Party apparatus to engage in an anti Trump blitz. There are a lot of good choices for her to name as a VP. The number of people in polls who express some version of anybody but these two is extremely high. Let's get some energy and relative youthfulness into the race. No it isn't without risks. Does anyone really want to claim that sticking with Biden is without risks?
Kevin, this is just straight up wrong and insulting to anyone with a speech impediment.
One man on that stage got better as the ninety minutes ticked past. The other man on that stage did not,
Fuck this 'throw the party into chaos' bullshit that was advocated by the same people it's always advocated by.
biden's performance initiated this chaos; i was in the 'stick with biden' camp until i watched him implode in front of 50 million viewers
i was never in favor of him stepping aside until that happened
you can say he recovered somewhat at the end; fine, but that's not good enough
people are stupid, fearful, twitchy herd animals with a strong sense of social hierarchy and they need to have absolute confidence in the guy sitting in the big chair
i'm absolutely positively dead certain that biden knows this, yet he failed in his assigned task
if he's as competent as you think he is, he needs to focus on a smooth transfer of power to stronger hands
that would be an enormous gift to this country, to his supporters, and to the ideals that he has championed unfailingly throughout his life
Okay. Let’s say you’re right. Who is this wonderful consensus candidate who is ready to become president? Harris is less popular than Biden (in part because Fox News has spent the past three years demonizing her) and would likely lose to Trump. But, assuming she also steps aside, who would be anointed by the pundits without the slightest opposition from anyone?
'without the slightest opposition from anyone' has never existed in any election ever; by that standard biden certainly fails
was obama met with universal acclaim? bill clinton? reagan? fdr?
hell, washington had his share of doubters
i've read your stuff here, you're not stupid, and you know this is true
a more helpful question would be 'how do we construct a process that might identify a candidate with significantly less opposition?'
or, otoh, devise a process to demonstrate to people that biden is truly the best candidate to defeat trump in the fall
"'how do we construct a process that might identify a candidate with significantly less opposition?'"
Who do you think that would be? Name him or her. Name someone else we all agree would have "significantly less opposition." Sure we'd all like to know.
remember that part about 'find a process to identify a candidate'?
you seemed to skip right over that and pretend that i said 'i know the perfect candidate'
which is not what i said at all
just out of curiosity, why would you do that?
And long will all this take? A month? Two? Don't say you don't know again; you're just wasting everybody's time when you do so.
A conference call of TikTok influencers next week followed by a Zoom meeting of convention delegates the week after should see absolute consensus emerge about the mystery new nominee. Piece of cake.
6 debates between now and the dem nominating convention in august
Debates between whom?
Sigh. How long would it take to find a 'process'? I'm not in the habit of using ornate sentence constructions and I find it difficult to believe that you didn't know what I meant.
And what would that process be? How would it be agreed upon? And would it be in place before Biden announced that he was no longer a candidate?
i think it's a given that biden has to agree first
he doesn't even have to withdraw; he could put his hat in the ring with everyone else if he wants
There's no process that could do it. All we've got to go on is that the Biden administration, however frustratingly along the way, did do way more than most of us expected. Drum wasn't especially surprised, over the years, by Biden's success. And you look at Biden's administration and there aren't any reports I can recall that suggest any internal disagreement. Man ran a tight ship. Starting as Obama's VP. His hold on power is convincing.
i unreservedly applaud what biden has achieved in office; the issue is his control of his mental faculties, not his control of the executive branch
The difference is that Obama and Biden were selected by Democratic voters in a series of primaries. They weren’t chosen by a bunch of delegates or pundits at a brief less than 2 weeks convention. That’s why a replacement for Biden would need to be universally acceptable to basically all Democrats.
ok, start with a slate of 6 at the first debate, and have the convention delegates vote for their preferences from that debate; top 5 move on to the next debate
then keep winnowing it down by one every week until you get to a winner
i also assume there will be national polling going on so that they wouldn't select someone the party absolutely hates since that would defeat the whole purpose of the exercise, ie., someone with the numbers to beat trump
Who picks the six?
it would have to be the convention delegates
LOL and how do they do that? Have 12 possibilities do a series of debates?
i have the same questions/worries about selecting a biden replacement, but i have to admit after that debate performance i'm on the fence about which path is riskier, biden remaining the candidate or picking someone new.
Read. The. Transcripts.
No. Because he looks that way when not talking. Even at the rally where he gave a good speech when he wasn't speaking he looked kind of vacant. Dillon when asked about him she had to pull an anecdote from 2022 about his mind. She sees him each day. Why hasn't he done long interviews or town halls? Do his staff think he can't?
I think it's very likely he fell off in the last year or so. Given some time and non-urgent situations I think Biden can think just fine. But presidency doesn't allow that.
Regardless he's still better suited than Trump and he's not going to drop out.
"Regardless he's still better suited than Trump and he's not going to drop out."
If the Democratic Congressional leadership issued a statement that Biden was medically unfit to be President and should resign he would have little choice. The problem is that they currently aren't confident that Harris would have a better chance against Trump. This could change at any time. And it is the downside of letting the Presidential candidate pick a VP candidate whose primary purpose was to make the President look good.
And Harris is the only realistic alternative to Biden, trying to make someone else the candidate would likely be a disaster.
this has nothing to do with biden's speech impediment. he's had it his whole life and performed well as a public speaker for decades, including the last election's debates. his performance last night was indicative of serious levels of confusion and some sort of cognitive issues. maybe it was temporary due to sickness, but if it was just a cold they could and should have just postponed.
I'll take you at your word if you say you are an experienced clinician who routinely and successfully diagnose patients via telemed.
in extreme cases you don't need to be an experience clinician to identify a medical problem. i can tell when someone's been shot without being an ER doc. and i can tell there was some sort of cognitive problem with biden based on watching him speak for 90 minutes during that debate.
_You_ get to decide what are extreme cases? And you don't have any medical training whatsoever? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
very strong argument. the long string of caps really makes the point.
The point, since it flew clean over your head, is that _you_ don't get to decide what is an 'extreme case' and what is not. I'm guessing you haven't even read the transcripts, amirite 😉 But you go on pretending your armchair diagnosis carries any official weight.
Hacked or extreme sarcasm! Or it’s possible he is f’ing with his audience. To determine who TGAF about,
—r
TGAF to give a f
Same thought. Or just having fewer fs to give in general.
Somebody has clearly hacked Kevin’s site. I hope he gets control back soon.
In my dream, it's November 6, Biden succumbed to pressure and resigned, the analysts are saying Trump won because Biden stepped down, and the pundits are criticizing Biden's poor judgment.
When asked why they demanded Biden's resignation, the general response is, "Yes, but I'm only a pundit. I'm supposed to criticize the president. A president isn't supposed to listen to pundits. He's supposed to make good decisions."
And then I wake up and say, "Thank God it was only a dream!"
@ Jim Carey:
I have made similar comments. The same pundits (and that now sadly includes Kevin Drum) calling for Biden’s resignation or withdrawal would pivot instantly to condemnations of the Democrats for being in disarray.
Forget about the fact that the disarray in question would stem from following the advice of the same pundits who would then mercilessly ridicule anyone who actually implemented their advice in the real world!
informal poll:
if you think leo voted for biden in 2020, post '+++'
Joe, you did such a great job! You answered every question! -Jill Biden as her husband gaped at her, then smiled as it sunk in. I never talked to anyone above the age of six that way. But anyway. Here's why I think those who dismiss other possible Dem candidates are wrong: they poll similarly to Biden against Trump without having run yet. Biden's been doing it for ages. With 81% of voters discontent with the choice Biden/Trump, imagine the potential. Not that it'll happen, with the paragons of sound judgment of the Biden family pushing him to stay in the race.
Yes, Hunter Biden will give Joe great advice. "Dad, just snort this and you'll feel fine!"
Let’s assume that Biden decides to leave the race. What would be the mechanics of choosing a successor? Would you have essentially a beauty pageant? Would there be any rules? How would you deal with potential sore losers? Would the Bernie wing of the party be allowed to participate?
I'll throw my hat in with everyone else who said that we need to run with what we have. In fact, Dems and managers need to be unapologetically, forcefully upfront about it and say, "So what? He's not a retarded pervert loser, and we're better off now than when that limpdicked failure was President. You know, the one who rapes women because that's the only way he can get laid." There is no "high road" or escape clause out of this. The only way forward is forward - BUT - Dems and managers need to load and shoot for bear. This is it, and I sure the fuck hope it's sunk in that we are in an existential fight for whatever we can salvage from twenty years of Democratic fecklessness.
He's not a retarded pervert
there are about 170 million voters in the US and unfortunately about half of them do not appear to be very empathetic
you could have multi-angle professionally-lit video of him raping a dozen nuns in st. patrick's cathedral and they'd just chuckle... 'yup, that's just trump; whatcha gonna do? at least he keeps the mexicans in mexico'
so, given that overt appeals to our humanity hasn't been a winning formula, what's your plan B?
The Karl Rove strategy — you go after your opponent’s strengths, in this case ‘strengths’. Insecure Donald has to think he’s a Winner, so remind voters that in every way he’s a Loser. Didn’t get Mexico to pay for that wall. Never got the promised infrastructure bill passed, or the promised great health plan — in fact never even brought ought a bill or a plan. Didn’t reduce the budget deficit or debt or the trade deficit as he promised; they all got worse. Of course, these were all someone else’s fault. And if you elect him again, he’ll fail again and again and again, because that’s the kind of loser he is. But it will always be someone else’s fault, won’t it? Not just a loser, a whiner who can’t man up and take responsibility for when he screws up …
+1
You go after Trump as a degenerate scumbag with the personal morals of a sewer rat, who is also off his head, because that's what he is. No more abstractions about "threats to democracy". No more long evidence-based arguments about "policy", because swing voters don't care and Joe loses his train of thought halfway through anyway. Just focus exclusively on the depraved character of Donald J Trump, found by a court to be unfit even to run a charity, and ask voters if they really want such a loathsome creep representing America to the world.
Three thumbs up.
Right on!
Kevin Drum finally jumped the shark. Delete your account Kevin, and for God's sake, stop listening to your Republican buddies for advice.
This election has to be won by making the case that Trump is unfit for office. Biden is not the right person to do this with so many questions about his own fitness. He needs to get out soon to try to change the conversation.
I don't understand the unwavering support of the Trump cult. Earlier today I was remebering the Jan 2017 Women's March. What happened to all that energy for opposing Trump? We know so much more now about how terrible and dangerous he is.
Honestly, I thought before and still think winning is about firing up your supporters and dispiriting your opponent’s. Above I laid out the negative side, the positive is reminding (especially the young) voters that Democrats are for fighting against climate change, Republicans will make it worse. Reminding (especially women) voters that Democrats will take measures to preserve what remains of rights to reproductive health care, and extend them if we have the Congressional votes; Republicans are trying to eliminate them.
I think there is a great opportunity to run against do-nothing Congressional Republicans, and tie the Presidential campaign closely to the legislative. Specifically, I would promise that a Democratic Senate and House would eliminate the Kabuki filibuster*, and use its power to pass new, Supreme Court-proof Voting Rights Act and Reproductive Rights Act.
*If anything is allowed to remain of the filibuster, Senators must be required to stand at the podium and speak to the issue on the floor — no irrelevant material would be in order. That would preserve the Senate’s tradition of not limiting debate by rule, but only by cloture vote.
I hope those who support Biden can admit one thing: He is not going to get any better; he is not going to get any younger. …..
Many of Trump’s voters will finally admit on camera that he is a horrible person who should not be president. But they will vote for him anyway because the alternative is Biden. (My new favorite is the big burly guy wearing a maga hat outside a trump rally who told a reporter: “I wish he would just shut the **** up!”) No matter what he says or does, Trump probably doesn’t have to win over any new voters or change any minds. Biden does. And his meltdown did not change any minds. Biden has to understand that if Trump wins, what happens next will be Biden’s legacy. What Trump does will be the result of Biden’s arrogance, just as what Trump has done already — and the continuing fallout such as in this past week’s Supreme villainy — is the result is Hillary’s and the Dems’ arrogance and stupidity.
The Atlantic published an article recently on the Bowman debacle with the headline “What Left-Wing Democrats Haven’t Learned From Defeat.” Which made me laugh. It’s the “moderate” Dems who haven’t learned anything from the most consequential elections in a long time against possibly the most flawed opponent ever. And a lot of suffering for a long time is going to be the result.
Yeah I hope I’m wrong.
For many in Trump’s cult, it’s because the alternative is a Socialist or Communist, i.e. Democrat. The extent to which Republicans’ propaganda has demonized Democrats is frightening. (I also oppose demonizing Republicans, FWIW)
I have no difficulty whatsoever with demonizing Republicans. If you can call a demon a demon, you’re basically butchering the English language. A member of the Nazi Party is by definition a Nazi. Similarly, the Republican Party is essentially the same as the Nazi Party and that makes a Republican a Nazi. And also an evil malevolent person.
I don’t think that anyone who’s voting for Trump because Biden’s worse would be even slightly mollified by candidate for president Harris. I don’t think there’s many hardcore Republicans who would vote for a black woman.
That's the whole point of leaning on the narrative that Biden is too old. Everyone knows there is an established process for determining presidential fitness, and everyone knows Biden would abide by the process.
'Cause, see, this whole farrago of nonsense is a dog-whistle. If Biden steps down, who's in charge. That's right, the uppity black woman. Isn't this blindingly obvious?
One candidate is a convicted felon, fraudster, and sexual abuser; is a proud racist and misogynist; supports dictators and opposes democratically elected leaders; sides with US enemies and antagonize allies; has openly declared he wants to be a Dictator and tried to stay in power by force; used the Presidency as a personal and family piggy bank; rambles incoherently every time he talks, can't stay focused on any topic, can't stop lying, and is completely clueless about any topic; and when President managed to turn a booming economy he inherited into a near depression, added more to the debt than any other US president, gave a huge tax break to the rich, his incompetence dealing with COVID caused the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans, had a revolving door of staff, several of which were also convicted of multiple crimes done on his behalf, and his Presidency is almost unanimously considered the worst of any US President.
The other has been the most effective President since FDR, has had zero scandals while in office, has managed the best post COVID economy in the world, but is old, has a long life history of stuttering, and talks like an old man in a soft voice.
Yet Kevin and a whole bunch of supposedly smart pundits are asking the latter to drop from the race if not to outright quit office. The problem with the US is that far to many Americans seem to have grown worms in their brains a la RFK Jr and think the Presidency is just another reality show that needs to be won by the one who speaks the loudest.
I read this when it was first posted today. There were no comments at the time. I assumed Mr. Drum was telling all who thought Biden should quit the race that the logical result of that thinking was that he should resign so... put up or shut up. But maybe he is serious.
I'm just preparing for the worst because, you know, it's going to happen eventually that these maggots come to power. My fellow citizens are evil bastards. Do I really care if they suffer under the boot of the maggots? Maybe not... assuming I can also avoid that fate! The future is bleak. Or not... time will tell. Good luck everyone!
I am like Kevin, generally committed to the Democrats, and like Kevin, I think that the debate performance was almost certainly disqualifying. The only thing that would convince me otherwise would be seeing him sit down for interview after interview for the next few weeks and nailing each one; then I might be convinced it was an outlier and he was hung over from cold medicine.
Of course, if Biden remains the nominee, I will plug my nose in November and vote for him; we are voting for a team. But I think that Biden lost a lot of votes with the debate. I believe we can do better, both in an electoral sense, and in the sense of having confidence in a president with his/her hand on the button. I will unabashedly encourage him to drop out.
+1; Exactly my feelings.
We’ll have polls soon to see if this actually loses votes for Biden.
I don't think his poll numbers will go down much as there is a large, solid anybody but Trump voting block, but this block is not big enough for him to win.
(I used to be an enthusiastic Biden supporter, but since the debate have become an anybody but Trump voter)
I think so far, he's down three. Most of that would be posters here like Drum and others that think Biden should quit, I calculate. Let's call them what they are: TrumperBros.
I just emailed my senators and congresswoman for the party to take action in persuading Biden to drop out. They could do it privately (who knows maybe they are) or make public calls if private persuasion isn't working. (Taking this small action made me feel a little better)
I spent quite a bit of time reading articles and comments on Wapo and NYT and based on which comments were voted up the consensus is that Biden should drop out.
Trump overtakes Biden in NH poll after president's disastrous debate
For the first time in the run-up to the 2024 election, former President Donald Trump leads President Joe Biden among New Hampshire voters, 44% to 42%, in a new poll conducted after last Thursday’s presidential debate.
In December, Saint Anselm polling found him leading Trump by 10% in New Hampshire
https://www.seacoastonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/07/01/trump-overtakes-biden-in-nh-poll-after-debate/74273779007/
> What's important is that the president can't be a person who's obviously not all there
Why do Democrats have to follow the rules but Republicans get to change the rules? You obviously aren't suggesting that Trump, whose vice president had to lead him around by the sleeve, was obviously all there.
Thank you for saying this.
As for a moderate Republican, I would suggest there's value in picking a member of the Latter Day Saints. Of all the groups most marginalized by Evangelicals, LDS members are at the top. And of all the communities likely to sit out 2024 because they hate Trump's unapologetic sins and his lies, LDS is again at the top. LDS might be the key bloc to retaining Arizona and expanding the map into Wyoming with the help of Liz Cheney.
Call it the 2024 One America campaign
I think I might have mentioned that the turning point will be large poll swings. If it's 4+ points, Biden will have strong public pressure to exit the race. If it's an 8-pt swing, he'll definitely be out and he'll be asked to resign the presidency.
Why would a big swing matter? Because it would give Trump's campaign the ability to say "fuck you" to mainstream media and just spend his time focused solely on maintaining enthusiasm with his base. He'll stop trying to reach out to Latinos and Blacks. No visits to the Bronx; he'll go to states he lost by small margins, such as Georgia and Arizona.
And a big swing would also reflect depressed enthusiasm among Democrats and liberals -- a signal towards the Great Sit Out in the general election.
Importantly, if he fell that far behind, he'd have to do a lot more work and public appearances than what their carefully controlled and managed campaign has done. That's going to age him rapidly, exacerbating any age-related issues.