George Washington was great because he repeatedly walked away from political and military power when he could have easily become king, emperor or tyrant. Instead, he set in motion the peaceful transition of power that lasted from 1797 until 2021, when it was bloodied by Donald Trump and a seditious mob of political extremists. It was America’s most shameful day since the attack on Fort Sumter, which marked the official beginning of the Civil War. It will endure as such for as long as the United States exists.
Joseph Robinette Biden, the 46th president of the United States of America, was born in November 1942, during Operation Torch, an Allied invasion of French North Africa during the Second World War. He was elected to the United States Senate in 1972. Should he seek re-election, it would mean that he would be nearing 87 years old at the beginning of 2029 when he would leave the Oval Office, coinciding with the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the Great Depression during Herbert Hoover’s administration. At that time, Franklin Roosevelt was 47 years old. Imagine FDR serving as president in 1969 at the age of 87 when man walked on the moon.
John Kennedy was the 35th president of the United States, and was born in 1917, which made him the first president born in the 20th century. He was 43 years old when he was elected president. His generational peers included Lyndon Johnson (1908), Ronald Reagan (1911), George H.W. Bush (1924), Jimmy Carter (1924), Richard Nixon (1913) and Gerald Ford (1913). Among them, only Johnson and Reagan were over 20 years old when Biden was born. Like John McCain, born in 1936, Biden is a member of the “silent generation” that preceded the “baby boomer” one.
Teddy Roosevelt was born in 1858 on the eve of Civil War, and turned 40 on the eve of the 20th century. It is staggering to contemplate Teddy Roosevelt serving in the White House in 1947, or Abraham Lincoln running in 1896 in the stead of William McKinley.
The Washington, DC, media has long sought to disqualify age as a reasonable topic of conversation around a prospective Biden candidacy for a second term. In fact, the conventional wisdom holds that President Biden must run because he is the only candidate who can stave off the return of Donald Trump, who is plotting his vengeance and campaign from Mar-a-Lago at this very moment.
The conventional wisdom is a delusion. It will not hold any more than did the notion that Kevin McCarthy would be the Speaker of the House beyond name only. He is the figurehead of an extremist cabal that gives power to impostors like George Santos, wacko birds like Marjorie Taylor Greene and feral punks like Matt Gaetz and Lauren Boebert.
The Jim Jordan-chaired conspiracy theory committee, dreamed up by Tucker Carlson and one of the drones in Peter Thiel’s basket of chuckleheads, will be everything its most alarmed critics predict — and so much more. Disgraceful won’t begin to describe it, but the truth is that nothing will stop it until it implodes under the weight of its combined absurdities, contradictions and hypocrisies. Until then, it will be a brick oven of chaos that heats up insanity, and boils it in a stew of sedition, grievance and make-believe plots.
The next months will bring escalating chaos across America’s political institutions as the MAGA House goes wild, and instigates a successive series of crises that will bring the country towards an even greater one. Everything will be turned on President Biden as he is relentlessly blamed for the misconduct that he didn’t commit, but lacks the skill to stop, rebut and overcome at this stage in his career. Specifically, the MAGA House will turn the issue of Trump’s outrageous theft of the nation’s deepest secrets and his spectacular corruption into a cudgel to assail President Biden, Hunter Biden, the Biden family and the Biden administration as corrupt and hypocritical.
How will it have come to pass that the most corrupt pack of extremists in the history of American politics will be able to tar and feather President Biden and brand him as dishonest, careless and corrupt like they did Secretary Clinton?
Simple.
Epic carelessness. For whatever mystifying reason, President Biden and his staff could not manage to properly handle classified documents and intelligence. The result has been the appointment of a special counsel, which is simultaneously appropriate and politically disastrous for the Biden administration.
The simple truth is that from this moment forward President Biden will be crippled politically under the weight of accusations that all end in the lethal “but Biden did it” attack that will impact every Democratic candidate’s campaign that chooses to get on board with the defense. The cost will be their credibility and the corresponding cost of losing the ability to articulate a plan for anything better. The result is a political carousel that just spins faster and faster — going nowhere it hasn’t been before and going nowhere new, ever. What that carousel produces is a disoriented electorate that sees two equally inept, extreme and corrupt factions. The voting decision becomes fear-based as voters try and evaluate which side will do more harm. The result is a disaster and crisis that is still unfolding. Our political crisis is caused by cynicism and delusion as much as it is by the failure of President Biden to be able to escape the gravity of a broken system in which trust has been incinerated by a pliant media and maliced opposition.
President Biden should not run for re-election.
Instead, as I’ve said previously, he should travel to every corner of America, and remind the American people about the gratitude, responsibility and obligation they should feel towards their country on the eve of the 250th anniversary of its independence. He should talk about the future with optimism, while being clear-eyed and direct about the massive changes that will play out in American society over the next 20 years. He should talk about a vision for the future he won’t reach, but to which his grandchildren will. He should quit politics and embrace leadership. He should become the steady man in the arena who is ready to yield to the rising generation that will take America into the next decades of the 21st century. It is time for him to step aside because two years of “ her emails” stories are as predictable as they are banal as they are lethal. It is time for change.
I've said this before to Bill Kristol, so I'll repeat it to you:
Biden will be the 2024 nominee unless he has a medical reason not to be.
Call that stubbornness or political "suicide" if you like. The simple fact is that it is late for this kind of hand-wringing and drama.
Pete Buttigieg, Gavin Newsom, Kamala Harris, etc. etc. etc. are not prepared, and are not preparing, to take the reins of the free world. They were gearing up to have Biden's back to take the fight to MAGA for 2 years, not a week ago. They are not about to stop on a dime and prepare for a Democrat presidential primary now. We've seen how that circus starts and ends.
Rather, we have to ask ourselves if, indeed, we have lost faith in the Biden administration over the last week over these events, of all events. If so, it would be because, bluntly speaking, we have no faith in our leaders, our politics, our system, or the public to weather any kind of storm.
If, on the other hand, we have some faith and confidence in ourselves and our principles, I suggest we man up a little. The enemy has complete, sneering confidence in their own foul principles; we could stand to be at least half as stalwart.
Biden is our leader, and there's a good reason why. Let's not wishcast otherwise, and proceed accordingly.
Strongly disagree. Yes the MAGA world will do all they can against Biden. I also believe that this is when MAGA will be shown for the hollowness and evil they are When the truth emerges and the MAGA lies are exposed Biden will be left standing
Skill and capacity are the determining factors not age. Different people “age” at different rates. Will not buy the age argument
If Biden chooses not to run it is his decision and not being driven out by the MAGA mob