Every single damn appearance is wall-to-wall because major media wants to see if he’s gonna have more senior moments…or meltdowns
In fact, President Biden might be getting more airtime right now than Donald Trump. Not necessarily for a positive reason. But I don’t know about you: I never thought I’d live to see the day.
I guess possible dementia these days plays better than crazy.
Like who the hell was really going to deeply cover the NATO summit? Now everyone did.
And it’s serving another purpose: Biden loudly and now very publicly giving the middle finger to the Democratic establishment seems to be rallying people behind him. They feel compelled to have his back.
Why? Because people don’t like being told what to do. So they don’t like people telling Biden what to do.
Like the woman from Michigan whose dogs I sometimes walk. She hated Biden. Until now. All of a sudden, she likes him.
And these are the votes he needs.
Now all he has to do is not screw up. A tall order.
At the same time, I keep forgetting, and need to be reminded Americans don’t like to be told what to do, and our votes for President very often reflect that. Hell, when I wrote one of my first columns predicting a Trump win in 2016, it’s why I said Trump was going to win in the first place. Over the more qualified but more glib (and more female) Hillary Clinton and her minions of oh-so-earnest campaign staff who had self-satisfied overconfidence coming out of their pores.
It’s why Obama won. And George W. Bush. And Bill Clinton.
Biden’s first election was different; a referendum on crazy. (Which many people unfortunately seem to have forgotten.) But his was a rare case where the more experienced politician won.
“Don’t tell me what to do” is exactly what people are looking for in a President. Experience and proven competence seldom matter.
Is all this a pipe dream of mine? Yeah… But also I’m not so convinced Biden should drop out. This looks like it’s working for him right now. Yes, as long as he doesn’t poop the bed again, for lack of a better phrase. What are the chances of that? Frankly, not great. And no assumptions are ever “baked in.” So even though everybody did know, if anyone argues that further huge gaffes won’t hurt him further, well that’s BS. At the same time, I’ve never seen this level of enthusiasm for him, ever.
Nor this level of coverage. Not implying it was an intentional move, clearly it wasn’t.
(Although if I’m going to embrace any conspiracy theory on this one, I’d have to go with Nancy Pelosi suggesting he drop out. Because she’s shrewd enough to know some important-to-this-election voters still hate her.)
At the same time, the fact that major media is monitoring Biden’s every move and kind of ignoring Trump a little bit, may put Biden in a stronger position than anyone who stands to replace him. Again, as long as he doesn’t screw it up. Or as long as Trump doesn’t try another coup on the basis that the current president is not of sound mind.
Also, things that were hurting Biden, like Gaza have suddenly become non-stories in the eyes of major media. Not as sure about college age voters.
And efforts to bash Kamala Harris, which have been ongoing since day one and were coming a lot, I think, from Democratic rivals and racists, are suddenly only coming from racists.
Of course what it’ll come down to is are $ really drying up? But even if so, that spigot comes back on with a few good polls.