Don’t forget to join our 2WAY at 4:15pm ET today LIVE via Zoom or on YouTube.
Lots to discuss!!
Joe Biden aggressively tried to shut the door on any more talk of his stepping down from the ticket with his early muscular Monday letter to Congress and his pop-up “Morning Joe” appearance.
Rob Reiner liked it:
Among the biggest debates right now are these:
1. Are Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, and Nancy Pelosi going to do anything in public to suggest the party should debate whether Joe Biden should be the nominee? My sources all say and think the answer to that is “no.” So where would that leave those who previously said “Joe must go”?
2. Is Joe Biden right when he says that most Democrats want him to stay and fight against Trump? The data suggests that Biden is not right — and that he is on track RIGHT NOW to lose badly to the Maven of Mar-a-Lago. There’s time for that to change, but the fundamentals that put Biden in this hole are all still in place, even as his hold on the nomination looks secure.
And then this: This is NOT a good polling day for Joe Biden, in the public or private data.
YOUR RESERVE READING IN ADVANCE OF THE 2WAY (all printed with permission)
This stuff is also not great for Joe “In It But Can He Win It?” Biden:
From Matthew Yglesias, in an extraordinary and essential reading column about feeling bad about not seeing Joe Biden’s mental decline:
Columnists calling on Biden to step down provide, in my view, are a small boost to Trump’s election odds and a minuscule increase in the odds that Biden actually steps aside. I think we have to say it anyway, because this is journalism and we owe a duty of truth to our audience. But in narrow cost-benefit terms, the public criticism of Biden has negative expected value.
Elected officials have a different set of responsibilities. I’ve seen some people express frustration that Barack Obama came out with such a strong statement of support for Biden. But Obama slagging Biden in public would have been a boon to Trump and accomplished nothing. Same for Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries and Nancy Pelosi and everyone else who matters. These are politicians, and they do not share journalists’ obligations of candor.
From a Red Wide World of News reader:
My oh my – How will they ever walk that cat back! All those people who went on the record urging Biden to get out – How can they change their minds now?
We have the Original – RED MAGA -
Introducing BLUE MAGA – Like Red MAGA but with better manners.
However, as they say – if you want MAGA – vote for the real thing – not the cheap imitation Biden is peddling.
As you noted, Biden is like Trump – He could have a stroke on 5th Avenue and Blue MAGA wouldn’t bat an eye.
From another Red Wide World of News reader:
The problem with the “Biden is intransigent and sticks it out” course that seems to be gaining traction as the most likely case currently is that it requires the media and Biden’s elected and non-elected cheerleaders to go back to lying about what is plainly evident to the rest of the world. How can they want to continue to live that lie just to win an election? Haven’t the last eleven days been humiliating enough for them?
From a Biden staffer, sent late last week:
I’m so vexed by this on so many levels. I was in Atalanta for the finance committee meeting and then the watch party Thursday night with the donor base. It was like watching a live feed of the Titanic hit the iceberg with the people that financed the boat. Awful. Like a torpedo hitting the campaign.
I really hoped he would take the space created by the pushback to figure out a graceful way to drop out.
The thinking at the moment is that the Bloomberg poll was good for him. The Hill has no juice or power. They wring their hands, circulate letters that never go public and an endless set of zooms and text chains that never amount to anything other than anonymous outcry. They have no delegates. Unless they go big they can’t take what he already possesses, the nomination…..
I think Dodd is one of the few people Biden might listen to.
From a plastic surgeon:
Hi Mark,
I wanted to share something that may be an interesting tidbit for you to throw into a conversation.
I’m a plastic surgeon and never treated Biden. But I assure you (and could provide the proof) that he has had a facelift, probably before becoming VP. I don’t say this to disparage him, but rather to point out that his outward appearance has mislead us about his actual age.
Carter was the first president born in a hospital. Biden is the first president to have had a facelift. It can’t be a coincidence that he is the oldest president ever.
Looks do matter; presidents have generally been taller and more handsome than the average citizens of their time. Beyond attractiveness, the facelift gives an appearance of youth and vigor that belies their chronological age.
Of course, important impressions are made by the way a candidate speaks, moves and acts, and as been seen recently words and behavior can trump facial age. But in no small way the public has been misled as to Biden’s true age by his facelift.
Should candidates need to disclose if they have had a facelift? Obviously not – it is still a medical issue and should remain private. But it is an interesting thought exercise about how his facelift has long deceived the public as to his youth and energy. Is that something that should be disclosed. Again, I don’t think so, but I bet there are some who would disagree.
This topic is actually less relevant today, now that his behavior overwhelms his appearance. But we are where we are today because of how he looked four, eight and welve years ago. What if we knew then he had a facelift? What if he did not have a facelift back then and looked his age? Would he have been VP and then the nominee in 2020? Had he “looked his age” back then, perhaps we would be on a different path today.
Do you think it would be a fun topic to throw out for a few moments in a 2Way? If so I could help prepare some talking points for you.
All the best,
Steven
STEVEN TEITELBAUM MD FACS
Associate Clinical Professor of Plastic Surgery, UCLA School of Medicine
Past-President California Society of Plastic Surgeons
Past-President Aesthetic Surgery Education and Research Foundation
We will discuss it all at 4:15pm ET, but here is my current thinking: Joe Biden has a very tight grip on the nomination as compared to three days ago — and a path to a general election victory that is today more narrow (and maybe significantly more so) than it was just a fortnight ago, with no obvious route to fighting his way back. And his path back then was to win PA, MI, WI, and NE to get to exactly 270 with no margin of error.