Was Joe Biden capable of leading the United States for another four years or not? We will never know. The incumbent president has in fact turned the American elections (and the Democratic Party) upside down by announcing his (belated) withdrawal from the race for re-election. After having insisted until the end that he would stay and despite having resisted fiercely for weeks, the octogenarian Biden finally found himself isolated against the entire Democratic leadership, which burned the earth around him and forced him to give up the role that was naturally his. The reason? A claimed and apparently necessary renewal of America, which “must start now” and which for the Democrats must be represented “by a young and vigorous figure”. Therefore, it was not precisely his age that condemned him, but the Democratic leaders themselves, frightened by his poor performance in the electoral debate against Donald Trump, where the president seemed lost and in cognitive decline with possible compromises of physiological functions. It was not a medical record that nailed him, but his damaged image as a leader: a fact that nowadays is considered as serious and perhaps more serious than the content and substance of the executive decisions of a head of state.
A president with increasing health problems, whose non-verbal communication can cause serious damage to the image of the country, is reason enough to lead to very negative consequences for America. Even if the damage to the image of the Democrats has occurred anyway, and could be irreparable, especially compared to the miraculous episode of Donald Trump’s escape from assassination, for the Democrats, ousting him so late is a huge risk – it had never happened before in American history – especially because this forced choice does not guarantee safe alternatives. Considering that the presidency is at stake, only the November vote will tell us whether the intuition of the Obamas and Clintons, supported by the authoritative New York Times, which launched the anti-Biden campaign, has proven correct. It is worth remembering here that, just a few hours after Donald Trump’s victory in 2016, the New York Times itself gave Hillary Clinton a 90% certain victory. And that the most listened to newspaper in America (and the world) has already made mistakes on other occasions. But that’s how it is.
If we look back and at the parallels in history, when Lindon Johnson announced that he would not run for a second term in 1968, it was still March: his resignation also set off a chaotic chain of events, which ended with the choice of Vice President Hubert Humphrey, who however lost to Republican Richard Nixon. Some time earlier, in March 1952, President Harry S. Truman, another elderly and ailing Democrat, had also chosen not to run again. And in that case too, his replacement Democratic candidate, Adlai Stevenson, lost to Republican Dwight Eisenhower. Will it be like this again? For now, all we know for sure is that we will have to wait another three months before taking stock of this crazy American July, and analyzing the deep reasons that pushed the Democrats to this U turn, a U-turn, as the English say.
In the meantime, the only useful exercise is to analyze whether and why Biden is no longer capable of living up to the task that he still carries out (and will carry out until January 20, 2025). And to do so we must look at the media that, led by the NYT (in turn prompted by Barack Obama, still today the deus ex machina of the Donkey party), have opened fire – friendly – against the current occupant of the White House.
According to the weekly The Economist – the British magazine that published on its cover a photo of a walker with the symbol of the US president (a very unfair and politically incorrect choice, especially in times of #Metoo and body shaming) – the reason is to be found above all in the president’s lack of sincerity: “It has been agony to watch an old and confused man struggle to remember words and facts. His inability to sustain an argument against a weak opponent has been disheartening. But his campaign’s operation to deny what tens of millions of Americans have seen with their own eyes is more toxic than both, because its dishonesty provokes contempt” accuses the magazine, thus focusing on the lies and intellectual dishonesty of a man who – one could speculate on the basis of Anglo-Saxon accusations – is too attached to power.
Of course, Biden is blameless for his declining abilities, “but not for his insistence, supported by his family, his top aides and the Democratic elite, that he is still capable of doing the world’s hardest job. His claim that this election is a toss-up between right and wrong is undermined by the fact that his campaign now depends on a lie for its very existence.” This is the tombstone according to the Economist, and therefore also for the Times and, above all, according to the Democratic campaign’s financiers, who in fact immediately froze the president’s re-election funds. Lying is a grave offense, lying to citizens is unworthy of a leader.
But the president doesn’t buy this narrative. “Isolated, frustrated and angry,” his close friends, who joined him at his summer home on the Delaware coast, describe him today. “He felt betrayed by allies who turned their backs on him in his hour of need,” they say. Only a handful of trusted advisers and first lady Jill Biden remained at his side. While even Ocasio Cortez, the “socialist passionaria” who, together with Bernie Sanders, moved Biden’s party to the far left, after supporting him until the end, has turned to Vice President Kamala Harris, who is now the Democrats’ candidate in pectore. Or not?
Yes, because in Joe Biden’s darkest hour, to the lack of respect he felt towards himself after a life dedicated to the administration, a mystery is added: it was the president himself who demanded that Harris take his place, but she would not be the person identified to replace him by those who stabbed him in the back. The Obamas, no less than the Clintons and the powerful former speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, are indeed the architects of the “caesaricide” but, together with several prominent Democratic governors, such as Gavin Newsom of California and Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania (both considered possible presidential candidates), they are working for another solution before Congress.
So, political America is in chaos: the Republicans risked having a former president and candidate assassinated by a mad criminal, while the Democrats committed a cold-blooded “political assassination”. With the consequence that Donald Trump is now the favorite for re-election, while the Dems are plummeting in the polls and in uncertainty about their replacement. Why this “suicide” by the Donkey Party? Have they only now realized that Joe Biden could no longer govern? Is Harris capable of competing with the “miraculous” Trump? And again: is the choice of the first black American woman to run for president really the symbol of the alleged renewal that the Democrats have in mind? It’s hard to say.
The vice president’s candidacy, in fact, would not deprive Donald Trump of his strongest arguments used against Biden: the responsibility for inflation, immigration, the questionable management of the war in Ukraine and Israel, and finally the alleged “witch hunt” that led to the indictment of the tycoon. Harris has also already run for a national office – the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020 – and stumbled badly. A series of unsuccessful interviews, together with a lack of a clearly defined vision and a poorly managed campaign, led her to withdraw even before the primaries. While, once chosen as Biden’s vice president, she did not shine for her ability nor did she earn the favor of the people (as instead happened for the incumbent president, former vice president of Obama and unanimously recognized as reliable and determined to serve his country in the best possible way). After all, the American economy and jobs had not been put in danger by Biden, nor had domestic policy undergone serious upheavals under him, and foreign policy (except for the withdrawal from Afghanistan) seemed the same as his predecessors, nor had the president abused his role or been directly involved in scandals.
The same cannot be said of Donald Trump, who paradoxically the Democrats are pushing (albeit involuntarily) back towards 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, with their behavior. A “suicidal” behavior, if seen from Europe. To the point that some joker has gone so far as to say that “not even the Italian Democratic Party could have done worse than this”. The arduous judgment is up to the American voters.
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