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Was This the Sign That the NYT Editorial Board Was Going to Push for Biden's Ouster?

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  June 28, 2024 11:30 PM

Joe Biden is heading for election defeat in November. Is there any hope of recovery from this awful debate performance? Probably not. Biden doesn’t possess the charisma, political skill, or mental faculties to pull what will be an epic political comeback. Obama, Clinton—sure. Those men had the chops to be president. Biden showed last night that he decidedly doesn’t have what it takes. There’s a reason why we had stories of Obama trying to coax Biden out of the 2020 race. He knew his vice president didn’t have what it took to be commander-in-chief. Now, the whole nation knows. 

The Democrats and the media are in meltdown mode, but they are also doing damage control. I’m sure you saw that party members are discussing replacing Biden on the ticket. At The New York Times, two of the paper’s most prominent editorial writers, Nicholas Kristof and Thomas Friedman, have called on Biden to call it a day. 

Friedman: 

I watched the Biden-Trump debate alone in a Lisbon hotel room, and it made me weep. I cannot remember a more heartbreaking moment in American presidential campaign politics in my lifetime — precisely because of what it revealed: Joe Biden, a good man and a good president, has no business running for re-election. And Donald Trump, a malicious man and a petty president, has learned nothing and forgotten nothing. He is the same fire hose of lies he always was, obsessed with his grievances — nowhere close to what it will take for America to lead in the 21st century. 

The Biden family and political team must gather quickly and have the hardest of conversations with the president, a conversation of love and clarity and resolve. To give America the greatest shot possible of deterring the Trump threat in November, the president has to come forward and declare that he will not be running for re-election and is releasing all of his delegates for the Democratic National Convention.

Kristof:

President Biden is a good man who capped a long career in public service with a successful presidential term. But I hope he reviews his debate performance Thursday evening and withdraws from the race, throwing the choice of a Democratic nominee to the convention in August. 

One of the perils facing this country, I believe and Biden believes, is the risk of a victory by Donald Trump. And after the debate, it’s hard to avoid the feeling that Biden remaining in the race increases the likelihood that Trump will move into the White House in January. 

Biden has never been a great debater, but his voice and manner didn’t put to rest the doubts about his age and effectiveness. Rather, he amplified them. I happened to chat today with a woman who is undecided about whom to vote for — she says she distrusts both Trump and Biden but will choose based on who will do better for the economy — and I bet that now she will be supporting Trump. 

In some sense, this may be unfair. This was one debate. A candidate’s physical frailty, hoarse voice and rambling responses may not be good predictors of how that person will govern. But in this election, they probably are good predictors that the candidate will lose in November and not have a chance to govern again. 

Now, the editorial board has called on Biden to exit the race. When two key figures call for the same thing, maybe we should have expected the other shoe to drop.

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I don’t think there can be a change at this point. Biden has enough committed delegates, and he’s not one to give up, especially if his opponent is Trump. Democrats have strapped themselves to an out-of-control rocket, and the fuse has already been lit. Still, it’s not as if the signs weren’t there. Again, we saw them, but we’re also glad you, liberal America, were blind to them or dismissed them outright because conservatives made the observation. Thank you. It allowed Trump to win the race last night.