US President Joe Biden’s halting performance in Thursday night’s Presidential Debate against former President Donald Trump has raised fresh questions about his ability to serve another four-year term. His shaky performance has Democrats privately in a flat panic, with some suggesting a decision needed to be made to replace the 81-year-old Biden at the top of the ticket ahead of the Democratic Convention in August.
While his Republican opponent lied regularly during the 90-minute debate, Biden simply struggled to deliver a forceful and coherent alternative on the night.
The news headlines on Friday morning said it all:
- The New York Times lead called it “A fumbling Performance and a Panicking Party.”
- The Washington Post: “Democrats Panic over Biden, doubting his future.”
- The Wall Street Journal: “Democrats Privately Discuss Replacing Biden on Presidential Ticket”…
- Or Politico: “Democrats really have no way to spin this” …
The broad consensus – that Thursday night in Atlanta, Georgia, was a failure for Biden and for the Democratic Party writ large, Biden’s voice croaky, halting, almost unsure of what he needed to say, at times trailing off – his response here to how Americans feel about the economy a case in point.
“We would be able to right wipe out his debt, we’d be to be able to help make sure that all the things we need to do – childcare, elder care, making sure that we continue to strengthen our healthcare system, making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary patient eligible for what I’ve been able to do with, with, with the COVID, excuse me, with – dealing with – everything we had to do with – look – if – we finally beat Medicare.”
At 81, he’s already the oldest President elected to the highest office, but he struggled to convince doubters that he was up to the job. While Trump, just three years younger, appeared more in control even though his penchant for embellishments and falsehoods were ever present throughout the 90-minute debate.
“We had the greatest economy in the history of our country. We have never done so well. Everybody was amazed by it. Other countries were copying us. We got hit with COVID and when we did, we spent the money necessary so we wouldn’t end up in a Great Depression, the likes of which we had in 1929. By the time we finished, and we did a great job, we got a lot of credit for the economy, a lot of credit for the military and no wars and so many other things. Everything was rocking good.”
Biden’s supporters said the focus should be on substance and not style, but the President did little to help his cause with undecided voters who have doubts about his mental acuity for the rigors of the job, as Trump piled on.
“The whole country is exploding because of you. Because they don’t respect you, and they have to respect their president and they don’t respect you throughout the world.”
This was Biden’s attempt to hit Trump on his recent felony conviction in relation to a hush-money payment for a porn stars silence during the 2016 election.
“The crimes that you are still charged with… and think of all the civil penalties you have. How many billions of dollars do you want with civil penalties for molesting a woman in public, for doing a whole range of things, of having sex with a porn star on the night while your wife was pregnant? I mean, what are you talking about? You have the morals of an alley cat during.”
Trump reacts, “I didn’t have sex with a porn star.”
The analysis was not particularly kind to either candidate.
James Long, a Professor of Political Science at the University of Washington, “Biden had to have this be kind of the opening round of the election campaign season where he really sets the narrative, where it’s about democracy. He’s running against a convicted felon. You may not love me, but the other guy is worse. And just sort of set that as the tenor of the campaign and keep that going for the next six months. Did he do that? No, definitely not. What did Trump have to do? He had to show up and not implode. He did that for 45 minutes. And I think the degree to which he imploded was probably less than the worst aspect of what we might have assumed. But again, I think he’s probably feeling really confident tonight and I think Republicans are probably feeling really confident tonight. And who knows, maybe in three or four days when we see polling, things will really have shifted. I think, I wouldn’t be so overconfident if I were them because I just, I don’t think Trump changed anybody’s minds tonight.”
A high-stakes moment for both candidates, but with only one leaving bloodied and bruised. Metaphors aside, Republicans will be buoyed by their candidate’s performance, largely because of how poorly the incumbent did, as Democrats now have a serious rethink about whether Biden is best positioned to lead the ticket into November’s election.
Talk about unchartered waters, as various scenarios get thrown around including for Biden to withdraw from the race ahead of the Democratic Convention in August which could create a free-for-all and political chaos just five months ahead of the election.
The early reading on that is its highly unlikely after Vice President Kamala Harris affirmed her full endorsement for Biden in the aftermath of last night’s political bloodbath for her boss.
