Hey everyone. I am coming in with a debate #hottake, but since the immunity decision is dropping on Monday, I’ll do a separate post on that. So, you’ll get two short Jackals within one week, before we break for the 4th of July. Let’s get into it.
Why is there Italian in your headline?
In Italy - where I watch most of my soccer - you can see the coaches on the sidelines say this when the players begin to lose their heads: “Calma.” It directly translates to “calm,” but the sentiment is, “Calm down you big babies.”
As someone who has been through multiple presidential campaigns, supposedly “game-changing” moments, and “paradigm shifts,” I can tell you we’ve all been here before. And social media can make a random event - like a debate in June - feel like the biggest deal in the world when, in reality, voters will forget about it in two weeks.
That said, there is absolutely no doubt that Joe Biden had a terrible debate on Thursday, and the effects may be lasting. There were times when he was completely incoherent. If you want to see my live reaction, just start here. Biden’s major political vulnerability has been that voters think he is flat-out too old to serve a second term, and he fully validated these concerns with a performance that made you question whether or not his brain was working.
Democrats made some half-hearted attempts at excuse-making by saying he had a cold and/or was under the weather, but it sort of feels like saying you lost the game because you were injured after the game was already over. And if it is actually true that Biden had a cold (which I think it is, if you listen to him right after the debate and the next day), then his team failed him by not leading with that information before the debate started. Biden should have walked out onto the stage and said, “Sorry folks, I’m a little under the weather.” That Biden - an experienced politician - didn’t think of that himself only reenforces the idea that his sharpness is lacking.
So, his performance was incredibly bad; does that mean the race is over? No, but Democrats do have a crisis on their hands.
Democrats are bad at politics.
I am not a Democrat, so I am super comfortable saying this, but after every bad outcome they have a tendency to pee their pants and make their problems exponentially worse. After the debate, there were about a million pieces written about how Biden should consider dropping out and letting the Democrats choose a new person at the convention in August. They did this before a single poll was released or before the ratings for the debate even dropped.
Lol and behold, we now have both: Few people watched the debate (only 4 million total from the 18-34 demographic!) and polls are generally showing no movement:
Republicans were always going to say Biden debated poorly/has dementia/cannot be trusted with the nuclear codes. But now Democrats have given the GOP a whole narrative to run with in November because they couldn’t pool together and provide a coherent response.
I know what you’re thinking: This was so bad that no one can spin it. Democrats just have to be honest.
No Republican thinks this way or has such a defeatist attitude. Tim Scott goes on TV every Sunday and says we need to get back to Donald Trump’s 4% unemployment (it is at 4% right now). After the E. Jean Carroll verdict (which means Trump is legally an adjudicated rapist), Republicans lined up to support him. After his conviction in New York, Republicans fawned over him.
Republicans repeatedly deny reality because reality is unfavorable to Donald Trump. If I were a Democratic surrogate, I would have done the same thing for Biden after the debate! “Sure, he flubbed two lines but he spoke to policy issues for which Donald Trump had no answer. And a few misspoken words cannot change the fact that Trump wants to kill every American who did not vote for him.” It’s super easy, and Democrats repeatedly fail to do it.
OK, but are Democrats going to replace Biden?
When answering this question, my gut ultimately says no, but the discussions are definitely happening. I liked this piece by Tim Miller on what the current course should be:
Joe Biden needs to talk with his family.
And he needs to come out of that conversation either with a plan to pass the torch to a new generation or an unwavering commitment to change course.
Here’s what changing course looks like. He must summon an energy and a spirit and a forward-looking message that was absent in Atlanta. He must be committed to never letting what happened on Thursday night happen again—never putting on the kind of mumbling, robotic, incoherent performance that the whole world witnessed.
He must show that he is willing to do everything in his power to win this election. Go out and campaign among real Americans. Demonstrate that he has the vigor and will to earn their trust. He must take the fight to Donald Trump clearly and directly in interviews and on the stump. And he’s going to have to do so in the belly of the beast—on Fox News and in MAGA America to show that he is up for it.
It’s really good. I think it is worth noting that for all the speculation on whether or not Biden should be replaced, very few people are acknowledging how it could produce a worse outcome than what is already in front of Democrats.
Let’s say, for instance, that the idea is to have Biden step down and pass the torch to Kamala Harris, his vice-president. Polls show that she fares worse against Trump than Biden does. What if they opt for someone else other than Kamala, like Gretchen Whitmer or Gavin Newsom? It isn’t as easy as just putting a new face on the Democratic project and explaining how they will, “continue Biden’s policies without him around.”
Incumbents have a huge advantage in elections, to the point where the incumbent has not lost reelection when there isn’t a recession at any time since World War II. Running someone else means throwing away that advantage and leaving it to chance (or, if you want to go by history, throwing the election to Trump).
There are no easy answers. Biden could - of course - lose to Donald Trump, but so could his replacement. To go back to soccer, the idea that you can just replace Biden with a new, fresh face and go on to easily win the election is a lot like me pretending that my favorite soccer team in FIFA1 can just go out and buy a $200m player when, in reality, we can barely scrape together $20m.
Does Biden have dementia?
No, he does not. I have said this a million times: Joe Biden is old. He looks old and he sounds old because he is old. A person with a declining cognitive ability cannot rattle off stats about black unemployment and then answer questions on redirect (which Biden did towards the end of the debate, when he began to turn things around). Neurologists have said that Biden’s lapses are normal signs of aging, not rapid cognitive decline.
But 81 year-olds have trouble getting words out and have issues with their memories that younger people do not, and that is a political liability for Biden. I also think that the 9 P.M. start time was particularly damaging to Biden, who is probably readying himself for bed around that time. But it can’t be an excuse for Biden, whose age will always be a vulnerability for him in the election.
I also ignore every claim the GOP makes about Biden’s age because they do (whether they want to admit it or not) doctor evidence to make Biden see more old and frail than he is, and they also spent a year (plus) telling us that Senator John Fetterman - who suffered from a stroke - could not serve in the Senate, but now have gone silent since he has recovered.
Why are you so calm?
Biden’s performance has obviously consumed all of the media coverage, but what got lost was that Trump also had a terrible debate. In the focus groups immediately following it, undecided voters broke from Trump and moved toward Biden.
Ultimately, I think no matter what happens with Biden - if he is replaced or runs against Trump again - Trump is going to lose. Politicos may think that Biden’s debate performance is a game-changer, and maybe that will show up in polls over the next few weeks, but the Normal Folks™ who do not follow politics are not primed to believe things like, “Biden had dementia,” because they are not terminally online and consuming conservative media.
They likely feel that Biden is too old, but they also do not feel like Trump is a viable alternative. I am lucky enough to have access to former Trump voters (one who almost voted for him twice!), and no one said to me that they are voting for him now. Anecdotal, but I think it’s illustrative: Trump is an incredibly unpopular figure and is a historically weak GOP nominee. He is also seen as old and unfit for office, and his potential VP pick (say, Doug Burgum) is unlikely to allay those concerns. If Democrats stopped whining for two seconds, maybe they would find some time to create a narrative around that.
The New York Times called on Biden to drop out after the debate. Guess what they didn’t say after Trump was convicted?
So, what’s next?
Democrats need to decide what they’re going to do. If they want to replace Biden, they should do it soon and come up with a plan. But that can only happen if Biden chooses to step down, and it sounds like he intends to stay in the race.
If he stays in, they need to get this Biden out and in front of voters as often as possible:
Where was this guy on Thursday night?
Should-Reads:
Speaking of the New York Times, their reporting on the January 6th decision from SCOTUS was also bad. Here is a good breakdown. Long story short: This will have an effect on a tiny handful of cases, and will have no effect on Trump’s case.
SCOTUS struck down Chevron. I will possibly have longer thoughts in a separate Jackal, but this is a good piece.
See you Monday for the immunity decision. And if you are a Democrat who is feeling gloomy, I predict that Monday will probably cheer you up.
FIFA is now called “EAFC,” but I will not call Twitter X and I will not use FIFA’s new name either because I’m cranky.