By Philip Klein
Thursday, July 11, 2024
Going into Thursday night’s press conference, the best
hope for Democrats was that President Biden’s performance offered a definitive
enough answer on his mental fitness to bring the brewing civil war within the
party to a conclusion one way or another.
A miraculously great night that staved off the rebellion
among Democrats was one way to accomplish this, or on the other end of the
spectrum, a complete face-plant by Biden that produced the groundswell needed
to force him out of the race. The latter would allow Democrats to move on to
the process of selecting a replacement as soon as possible.
Instead, Biden delivered a performance that offered
something to both his critics and his defenders, ensuring that the debate over
his disastrous debate performance, which has already hit two weeks, will drag
on.
On the negative side of the measure, Biden was raspy and
took a number of long pauses. He referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as
Vice President Trump (on the heels of having mixed up Ukrainian president
Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin), claimed he was taking
advice from the commander in chief, referred to a nonexistent broad federal
rent-control program, and talked about how he had to do a better job of pacing
himself. He mentioned how his staff had given him a list of reporters to call
on and jabbed them for adding too many events to his schedule.
At the same time, he did field questions for an hour, in
some cases giving long and detailed responses, which, even though riddled with
errors (such as claiming Hamas had lost popularity in the West Bank), are
something that his defenders can cite as evidence that he is still sharp enough
to remain as the nominee.
As I said right after the debate, aging is not a linear
process. Elderly people in a state of mental decline can have good moments, bad
ones, or just okay ones. Democrats who fear sticking with Biden understand that
it’s only a matter of time before Biden has another bad one — but as long as he
produces okay ones, it will be hard to replace him as nominee.
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