(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .



My Take on the Biden Stories [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-05-20

I have not read Original Sin, nor have I any intention of doing so. The book is just the latest instance of journalists withholding vital information until they can get a book contract. But neither am I going to try to refute what the book does say: Biden should never have run for re-election.

Every president in their first term faces a dilemma: if they don’t start planning for a second term, they will be perceived as a lame duck, which limits their political heft with Congress. (One reason Trump floats the idea of a third term is to avoid that problem; the main reasons, however, are that he wants to hold on to the prestige and power, and also avoid any possible retribution.) Even so, I had a feeling, vague at times, that Biden should really be what he claimed he was: a bridge to the next generation, which meant a single term.

I had few doubts about his ability to handle the job early on. He did great things (and got little credit) for much of his term. But the presidency ages everyone (again, Trump was the exception in his first term, but only because he refused to do the hard work the job requires. Now he’s aging rapidly anyway regardless of the job). So I was nervous about his ability to continue past 2024.

Then came the debate with Trump. I watched the whole thing live. From the moment Biden did his halting walk onto the stage, I knew he and we were in trouble. BIG trouble. I don’t care if he was recovering from a cold, was overprepared, underprepared, whatever other excuse his team came up with. Nor do I care that Trump put on an act. The fact remains that the country saw Biden as an old man no longer up to the job.

Every president’s team tries to protect him, often times overly so. Trump’s team did so in his first term, much to his annoyance. Was Biden’s team overprotective, shielding him for too long from the truth? Here I hesitate to say yes; they kept showing him polls and he kept dismissing them. Were they doing the country a disservice in hiding what they were seeing? More problematic, but again, it’s their job to make the boss be effective.

It’s the journalists who also knew and who kept quiet — or, when they didn’t, they were accused of bias because they refused to report the even more obvious decline of Trump’s mental state. THAT is one major failing that they still refuse to acknowledge (though here on dKos we rip them apart for it all the time).

All presidents have to have huge egos as well; it’s a basic prerequisite for anyone thinking of joining the grueling grinder that is a presidential campaign, much less trying to succeed at the most difficult job in the world.

The real disaster, I think, is that Biden waited so long to admit the obvious that he left no time for Harris to introduce herself to the country nor for the Democrats to vet her in a primary contest. And while I am sorry to have to say this, the country was unwilling to elect a Black woman as president. I’ve talked to Blacks who, while they voted for Harris themselves, told me that too many Black men just would not vote for a woman, even or perhaps especially a Black woman.

In 2008 I decided Obama was the best choice for president, and worked for his election. But even at the time, I worried that his election would be exploited by those who thrive on racism and who seized on his presidency as an opportunity to aggravate our country’s racial wounds. (I can’t say “reopen” them because they have never been closed.) Obama was good enough to overcome that and get a second term, but that didn’t last, especially when an expert racist, Trump, came along.

Last thought: Biden is not the only one at fault; the Democratic party as a whole is being led by old people — Pelosi*, Schumer, etc. — who bristle at any suggestion that it’s time for them to clear the field for the next generation, much as Biden did until reality left him no choice — and by the time he conceded that, it was too late.

(*Yes, Pelosi stepped down as Democratic House leader in favor of the much younger Hakim Jeffries, but she wants to control things behind the scenes.)

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/20/2323370/-My-Take-on-the-Biden-Stories?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=latest_community&pm_medium=web

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/