Here’s an 11-minute video of CNN commentators (and a few guests), most of whom are certainly Democrats, discussing the debate and agreeing that Biden’s performance was dismal—that Biden appeared disengaged and incompetent. As David Axelrod notes, Biden did make some good points, but his performance, particularly near the beginning, made Democrats panic.
Yes, of course Trump blustered and lied, but his supporters are used to that, and probably ignore the lies. Debates are about appearances, not substance, and appearances were critically important in this debate when so many Americans, like me, are worried about Biden’s ability to run the country. Biden flunked. And remember too, he has coattails. If Biden’s defeated, it will affect other Democrats across the country. We’re faced with the prospect of a Republic President, a Congress with two Republican houses, and a conservative, pro-Republican Supreme Court.
My view is the same as that of most of the commentators, and I especially agree with Van Jones. “it was painful.” But I also liked his quip: it was “an old man versus a con man.” Jones added this:
“I just want to speak from my heart. I love that guy. That’s a good man. He loves his country; he’s doing the best that he can. But he had a test to meet tonight—to restore confidence of the country in a debate, and he failed to do that. And I think there’s a lot of people who are going to want to see him consider taking a different course now. We’re still far from our convention, and it’s time for this party to figure out a different way forward if he will allow us to do that. But that was not what we needed from Joe Biden, and it’s personally painful for a lot of people: it’s just panic—it’s pain.”
Most of us Democrats harbor similar affection for Biden, but that doesn’t mean he should now run the country.
A different way forward? Who could the Democrats nominate now? The money has come in, the posters and buttons are printed, and the Democratic Convention is ready to roll. Will Biden step aside now? I wouldn’t bet on it. He and his wife appear convinced that he did okay. And who could take on the painful job of saying, “Joe, it’s time to step aside”?
From Richard:
The fundamental problem is that the only voters who are undecided are low attention voters. Anybody who is engaged at all has clearly defined views on Biden and Trump and will not switch their votes. Low attention voters will not notice Trump’s lies or the idiocy of his views. They will only decide based on mood. That is why Biden’s performance was so devastating. If people voted on facts or truth the election would not be close anyway.
Untrue.
My family and I are not “low information” voters, we simply know what a woman is (for example). It’s not complicated. Biden and the dems have been literally “insane” on the gender (critical) issue. It has affected us personally. The changes to title IX a la Biden and Co. exacerbate the problem. The “party of science” has ditched science and facts.
There are -also- plenty of voters (many jews I know for example) who are undecided after Oct 7th and Biden’s waffling. Others (independents) are legitimately worried about the border.
And yes, Trump exaggerates and lies, and is transactional, but his policies on the border and Israel were solid. The wall was the right idea. And he seems to know what a woman is.
I fully understand the ambivalence.
+1
“… Trump exaggerates and lies, and is transactional, but his policies on the border and Israel were solid.”
Were they “solid” re Israel? Then how can we explain this:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/14/trump-book-jordan-abdullah/
This is why one can not trust Trump as far as one can swing a cat. Trump believes Netanyahu snubbed him. No one knows what his Israel policy will be moving forward, because the man has no principles.
The West Bank is not Trump’s to “give” to “anyone”.
Anecdotal “evidence” from a book has no bearing on foreign policy.
More importantly what does this (above) have to do with the *very* successful/significant Abraham accords that came from the Trump administration? The accords may still -even now- be signed onto by Saudi Arabia. This despite the Israel-Gaza war.
Yes, the US-Israel relations were far stronger under Trump. That’s how I see it.
It is hard to imagine how you as a woman give more importance to Trump’s anti-trans stance than to his anti-abortion stance.
And you left out the most important foreign policy component of the next few years, the Ukraine issue. Do you really think Trump is more solid than Biden there?
It seems to me that you may not be dispassionately considering information.
I cannot speak for Rosemary, but I find the whole “transmania” cult disturbing and a threat to my rights as a woman. I am not disturbed as much as I am by antiabortion legislation (though I am well beyond childbearing), but still find “transgender” rights as some seem to be pushing to be unacceptable.
I was fortunate to grow up in a part of the country that encouraged girls’ sports. Those experiences helped me gain confidence. I can’t imagine having to compete against a “girl” with testicles (and the testosterone that goes with them.)
With self-identification, “transwomen” are allowed to invade women’s locker rooms, prisons, etc.
Lab girl,
Thank you.
The trans-issue is -actively- leading to a reversal of the rights of women – of adult human females. Trans identified males are being admitted to women’s prisons in several states (the most vulnerable of women), the clear distinction between sex and gender identity has been blurred by the revisions to Title IX a la Biden and Co. Women’s sports are being affected in a very real way – multiple female records are being broken – by men identifying as women. Young adults are being “affirmed” without adequate analysis/therapy (no waiting period) – many who identify initially as trans turn out to be gay (the data supports the claim), many are simply experiencing the anxiety puberty brings or have psychological co-morbidities that have not been addressed. In a grievous injury to normalcy, science and reality, many of these same young adults are being subject to social transition, to blockers, to cross sex hormones, and to “gender” reassignment surgery. The damage is irreversible, lasting and (of course) phenomenally lucrative for the pharmaceutical industry.
The US is on a path to a veritable “hell” for confused young adults despite many (or most) western nations reversing course on the issue based on the Cass Report.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/courage-strength-optimism/2966643/the-cass-report-should-be-the-death-knell-for-gender-pseudoscience/
Quote:
“History will not look kindly on the medical professionals, researchers, and activists who abandoned scientific protocol and basic common sense to justify their gender experiments. A new report out of the United Kingdom just made sure of that.
Last week, the U.K.’s National Health Services published a 388-page report, written by longtime pediatrician and President of the Royal College of Pediatrics Hilary Cass, thoroughly dismantling the arguments for invasive and irreversible procedures on gender-confused children. It is the most robust and methodical review of the medical evidence for gender transitions ever conducted, and it proves what many of us have been saying for years: that so-called gender-affirming care for children lacks supporting evidence, has lifelong consequences, and is rooted in a noxious ideology that does not care about either”
==============
Increasingly, corruption is pervasive within the “affirming” movement, and it appears that the scandalous negation of science goes all the way to the White House.
https://www.realityslaststand.com/p/the-scandal-goes-all-the-way-to-the
Quote:
“That part of the story would have discussed recently unsealed WPATH documents, subpoenaed by the state of Alabama, as part of a lawsuit, Boe v. Marshall. Alabama parents, medical providers, and a Birmingham pastor named Paul Eknes-Tucker sued the state because of its ban on “gender-affirming care” for minors—and the criminalization of those who practice it.
We got a sneak peak of some WPATH internal communiques a few weeks ago, when the advocacy group Do No Harm shared emails between Johns Hopkins and the federal Health and Human Services’ Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. AHRQ had been asked to conduct a systematic evidence review on “gender-affirming care,” and knew that WPATH had hired Hopkins researchers to conduct such a review. Maybe they could share?
The emails show that Hopkins did conduct a systematic review, and that—like all the other SRs—it found diddly squat in terms of evidence supporting the efficacy of hormones and surgeries. But WPATH prevented Johns Hopkins from publishing these reviews because they didn’t come to WPATH’s preferred conclusions. WPATH hid this very important information from the entire world, then published standards of care saying an evidence review was impossible. And a government agency knew this!”
+1
Labgurl, I agree with you. My argument was just about relative importance.
Rosemary, I agree with your assessment of the insanity of many Democrat policies, but I still strongly disagree that the reasons you mentioned to support Trump over Biden are more serious than the many reasons to keep Trump from returning to power. Each candidate is wrong about many single issues.
Lou Jost, thank you for your comment. First, how do you know I am a woman?
But kidding aside, there have been more abortions since the overturning of Roe (albeit, yes, a reduction in states with “bans”). The Abortion pill is widely available, with the supreme affirming it’s usage nationwide. 63% of all U.S. abortions are now medically induced.
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/opinion-relief-supreme-court-did-191048238.html
Quote:
“The same Supreme Court that overruled Roe vs. Wade two years ago on Thursday followed well-established constitutional principles to dismiss a lawsuit that sought to restrict the availability of mifepristone, a drug used to medically induce abortions. The bottom line is that the decision upholds the Food and Drug Administration’s rules for mifepristone. This is crucial for reproductive rights; it is estimated that 63% of all U.S. abortions are now medically induced rather than being performed surgically.”
I am pro-choice in the way most Americans are, in all cases where rape, incest and where the life of the mother/child is threatened, and similar to much of Europe, within ~15 weeks. I am not supportive of abortions “at any time whatsoever – for whatever reason”. For most women, it’s a difficult decision, and it should remain a difficult decision without it being made impossible. At some point, the zygote does become “human”.
There are few “rights” that are absolute. We seem to need a reminder of the responsibilities that go with rights. What happened to compromise?
There are choices available with abortion. Not so much with the trans issue.
Once a young girl’s breasts are removed or a young boy’s penis is removed – there is NO going back. Once a woman in a female prison is raped by a trans identified male, there is NO going back. Why Biden and Co. are charging full steam ahead on the trans issue when most (or many) western nations are reversing course a la the Cass Report remains a mystery and an ugly/painful one.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/courage-strength-optimism/2966643/the-cass-report-should-be-the-death-knell-for-gender-pseudoscience/
Quote:
“History will not look kindly on the medical professionals, researchers, and activists who abandoned scientific protocol and basic common sense to justify their gender experiments. A new report out of the United Kingdom just made sure of that.
Last week, the U.K.’s National Health Services published a 388-page report, written by longtime pediatrician and President of the Royal College of Pediatrics Hilary Cass, thoroughly dismantling the arguments for invasive and irreversible procedures on gender-confused children. It is the most robust and methodical review of the medical evidence for gender transitions ever conducted, and it proves what many of us have been saying for years: that so-called gender-affirming care for children lacks supporting evidence, has lifelong consequences, and is rooted in a noxious ideology that does not care about either”
1+++ for both of your comments.
+2 (first comment) And above one, also!
Barry, could you list for us the lies, falsehoods, exaggerations, and other misleading statements that came out of Biden’s mouth? I think I have a handle on the one’s that Trump spewed, but I’m a fairly low-information voter, so I probably missed Biden’s, particularly as Trump can put me in a nasty mood. Can you help?
Well, he didn’t beat medicaid for one.
He said he was the only president that didn’t have any troops dying in the world – did he forget Afghanistan?
He claimed that Trump did nothing after US troops were attacked in Iraq. In fact Trump ordered a drone strike to kill Soleimani (sp?)
His other meanderings
He said Trump told people to inject bleach. That is not what he said; it was evident that he was talking about the disinfecting light treatment
There were other items that were clearly not correct.
Look, I don’t like Trump. But don’t deny that Biden is often untruthful, and willing to repeat untrue lines to maximum effect. He said he ran in 2020 because of Charlottesville and the “fine people on both sides” implication that Trump loved nazis, but that was a falsehood to begin with. He’s also lied about his personal life a lot. Biden’s as much a slimy politician as any of them.
He brought up the “fine people on both sides” quote as an endorsement of neo-nazis, when in fact Trump said very clearly that neo-nazis and white supremacists should be condemned completely.
Darryl, I will revisit my post as proof that tone does not always transmit successfully in print! But, yes, thanks for pointing those things out.
I almost choked today when I heard Biden’s North Carolina speech when he said that the one thing he did know was how to tell the truth. Goodness, even the “fact checkers” have finally started to acknowledge that the entire “neo-Nazis are fine people” thing was media-propagated BS with edited video. Biden either knows he is lying, or he believes the hoaxes. I don’t know which is worse.
Enough! I have despised Trump for decades; I can’t stand defending him, but facts are what facts are. What an election.
Feel the same. It’s gruesome defending Trump. But facts are facts.
And (per Shapiro)… “they don’t care about your feelings”
This was not just propagated by the media. The Biden Administration (Biden, Harris) and others (Sanders, Warren) pushed that lie.
The Democrats have only themselves to blame for getting themselves into this pickle.
All along, they’ve embraced cancel culture. You’re not allowed to question whether BLM riots are beneficial. You’re not allowed question whether “trans women are women”. You’re not allowed to ask whether lockdowns are the right policy. You’re not allowed to question whether Lia Thomas should swim in the women’s section. You’re not allowed to question DEI ideology. You’re not allowed to wonder whether an affirmative-action hire, picked for being a black woman, really is up to the task.
All along, journalists have asked, not, “is this true?”, but “is this in line with party ideology?”.
And you’re definitely not allowed to ask whether the emperor has any clothes, or whether the candidate is too old. Result? A stark-bollock-naked emperor.
Moral of the story: accept and value dissent!
+1
Word.
I read this to my sister and she said it should be on billboards.
Not only that but this “emperor” cannot tell you of his clothing omission without confusing the issue.
+1
+2
+1. We need an option of a centrist common sense party based on classic liberal principles with nary a one in sight.
+1
The Democratic Party has not embraced cancel culture, and that’s the difference between the parties. The Dems don’t let the extremists decide the platform, unlike the Republicans, who have entirely submitted to their extreme flank. That’s why Biden was nominated, and Hillary before him, and Obama before her.
Their platform is centrist. Biden has focused on the economy and jobs with priorities on the Infrastructure and Chips acts. And he didn’t give in to the pro-Hamas demonstrators. And his border policies seem to be working, unknown by most Americans is that immigration is way down. Oh, and walls don’t work. Most immigrants enter through legal channels.
Clearly though they have failed to portray that effectively to voters.
Yep.
You’re also not allowed to question during the Covid lockdowns why BLM protests are safe but religious services or beach volley ball is not.
+2
Does Joe Biden want his legacy to be him being wheeled out of the White House, doddering and confused, after he’s been removed from office under the 25th amendment?
Someone, and apparently that person is not his enabler wife Jill Biden, needs to discuss this scenario with him.
I think this was the Democrats plan all along
Get Joe elected
Joe resigns citing sudden health reasons.
Kamala is now the president
Claim moral victory for identity politics as the USA has a black female president.
The end.
“The republicans govern without shame, and the democrats shame without governing” – Bill Maher.
This is where we are.
It goes without saying that Biden cannot carry out a second term in office. More importantly, he is not cognitively or physically fit to serve as president today. He should resign for the good of the country, if he still cares about that.
I’m in total agreement with those here who decry the woke-ism of today’s Democratic Party, period. But do we really care more about gender idiocy that actually attempting to subvert a democratic election? I cannot believe that to be true even of those here who hate what the Democrats have become.
Ted, I share your concerns about Trump and the last election. But the Democratic Party leadership shoved through a farce of a primary, fought ruthlessly to keep people off the ballot who did not willingly step aside, and continues to challenge third-party options. Now we have talk either of an open convention or of Biden withdrawing prior to that. It is too late to rerun the primaries, so Democrats (and some independents) will be left, once again, to rubber stamp the candidate who they are told to elect.
Let’s have that discussion about subverting democracy.
Party politics are awful on both sides and are hurtful in general. Has unfortunately been going on for some time. But I can’t believe you honestly put this on the level of post election lies, fake elector schemes and a riot at the Capitol.
There are some issues about which I have pass/fail criteria, and I don’t argue, except for either the hell of it or the fun of it, about degrees of awfulness for those who fail.
As you suggest, we are witnessing an ongoing breakdown of both parties. I will claim it is even worse: both have been guilty of assaults on fundamental constitutional rights.
It’s a tough dilemma. The “gender idiocy” isn’t just foolishness, it’s actively harming: kids who are getting unproven “gender affirming care” instead of evidence-based treatment; parents who feel bullied into supporting these treatments against their best judgment; women athletes displaced by biological men; women prisoners incarcerated with biological men; and women who want same-sex care providers. And in addition to transgender irrationality, there’s DEI abuses, immigration, and weak support for Israel.
These are serious issues and I can’t say I blame voters who give them greater weight than the issues involving Trump’s horribleness. Four years ago I unhesitatingly voted for Biden because Trump was blatantly unacceptable and I believed Biden would have a moderating influence. He didn’t. Worse, it’s more and more apparent that he hasn’t willfully chosen these positions, but that he’s lost the capacity to fully understand what his administration is doing in these areas.
I could have confidence voting for a Democratic candidate who is to my left on these issues, but who is politically savvy enough to know that a line has to be drawn somewhere. I don’t have this confidence in Biden.
Women maybe care more about the gender idiocy as they have a lot of skin in the game. Men not so much
(Reply to Ted Gold, #6.) Democrats maybe can overlook “gender idiocy”, but I doubt Independents and many Republicans will. Why it matters; this is a close race.
I am not an American citizen and so have no vote to defend. But my observation is that *if* Joe Biden is suffering from some form of dementia it will get progressively worse. He may already be beyond the early stages (but I am no doctor) and it would, in my opinion, be foolhardy to expect another Presidential term from him.
Foolhardy and something like elder abuse.
Check out the numerous psychological analyses of Trump: already has dementia which increases continually with time. It doesnt help that he is a liar and a convicted felon. His brain is mush, his speech word salad with no sense or logic.
You apparently havent watched the blogs and news reports. Check them out.
The problem, for the Democrats, is that many Trump voters (especially those minorities moving away from the Democrats) would not be voting against Biden’s age, they would be voting against his policies: foreign policy, expansion of the debt, border policy, and woke policies. Changing candidates doesn’t touch that unless the candidate is willing to make a major shift on those things. The gatekeepers of the DNC aren’t likely to pick someone who would do that. And if a new candidate did, they’d be jeopardizing the Democrat’s base.
Let’s not forget, though, that none of Joe’s problems are new. While MSM has tried to shelter him (and his spokeswoman talks about deep-fake videos), he’s been like this for years. The DNC has backed him all along, knowing this was his condition. This is it’s own kind of corruption.
It’s the independent voters. You are correct the Democrats would be voting for Biden anyway, and Republicans will not suddenly vote for a Biden replacement. But its those independent voters, some still amazingly on the fence before last night’s debate, who will now not vote for Biden after that performance, but might vote for a viable Democratic alternative. At least that is the thinking behind removing Biden, in addition to the concerns about him being up the job for the next 4 years.
In the run-up to the 2020 election, I wondered if Biden had a Parkinson’s plus kind of syndrome, but eventually I decided it was just too much botox making him expressionless. He remains expressionless, but he is clearly struggling to string together a sentence, let alone one that makes sense. It’s surely time for Jill Biden to speak up and let the poor guy step down.
It’s sad that our choices are so poor this coming November. There appears to be no good options, and it looks like we’re to be saddled with the foul, insane clown again. We deserve everything coming our way.
Used to be understood as the “lesser of two evils”.
It is now the “evil of two lesser”
That was the slogan of John B Anderson’s 3rd-party campaign in the Carter v Reagan election. Needless to say it didn’t get much “traction” or “break through” then.
Just one more think to try to get across just how dangerous I think Trump is. He and his orbit are truly “revolutionaries” in a way I think few understand. There is a reason Bannon channels Alinsky by name. In the name of “deconstructing the administrative state” they either have no plan in place or truly radical ones. It is nihilism and where it will lead I have no idea. We already saw him try in the first few weeks of his first term. Purposely staffing agencies with folks who want to destroy them (look who he put in charge of the DOE), attempting to cut the science budget massively, etc. we’re looking at not just the courts, but also the economy (won’t be as lucky a second time around with Peter Navarro-types running it), foreign policy (bye bye NATO, bye bye Ukraine, hello isolationism and protectionism) etc. they won’t be as incompetent in pushing this through as before. All of the “reasonable” sorts who quit on Trump in round one are the types that will never be asked back. We all fear the woke machine on the left but this is going to be some stunning radicalism of a different sort.
+1
1++
All those newsfeeds saying the same thing…
Someone in NPR this morning remarked that Biden had a cold, and that had changed his voice. But even if true, that won’t penetrate the wall of peoples’ opinions.
ABC talking heads reported shortly after the debate that Biden officials started to spread that info 50 minutes after the debate had begun. But a cold does not cause a person to lose his train of thought.
When Biden was elected, many of us wanted him to o commit to one term, giving the Dems plenty of time to develop a younger batch of potential candidates. If Harris replaces Biden, I predict a sure defeat given the current bigotry across the country. Ditto for Pete B and anyone other than a white male heterosexual.
Bigotry is not the only reason, or even a major one, why a Harris campaign would fail.
+1, first sentence. Yes, I did want/expected that to happen.
I was referring to what I believe about this country not electing a female, an ethnic/racial minority, a gay person, a non-Christian, etc.
I simply will not vote for Trump. Further, I will vote for the person that I think has the best chance of beating him.
President Biden won the California Primary with 89.1% of the vote.
More than 3 million Californians voted for him to be the next President.
President Biden got similar large margins and many votes in other States.
How can President Biden be replaced ‘to save democracy’ when so many millions of voters will have to be told that their votes are now cancelled?
Is that saving democracy, or cancelling democracy?
I watched the alleged debate between Trump and Biden with a mounting sense of despair. The nation faces unprecedented socioeconomic and geopolitical crises. Somehow, I’m supposed to believe that one of this pair of geriatric cases will be able to successfully navigate this troubled republic through the most challenging times it has ever faced. Of course, this wasn’t a real debate. Joe Biden’s cognitive decline has been increasingly difficult to conceal and has raised questions about his ability to function in any type of leadership role.
This raised a conundrum for the leadership of the Democratic party, whoever they might be. They needed to get Biden to forgo his second-term ambition without reinforcing dissension within the party. An obvious way to accomplish this goal would be a debate between Trump and Biden. This would be a first-of-a-kind debate with neither of the opponents the official nominee of their respective parties. Presumably, Biden’s performance would reveal the depths of his infirmities, shocking the public including his supporters, and Biden would be forced into canceling his candidacy.
On Thursday night, Biden walked into the setup. He actually did better than I expected. I thought that Biden would have to be led offstage, mumbling and stumbling, before the end of the first hour. He actually seemed to improve slightly toward the last half hour of the debate, probably the result of all the uppers he was fed during break times. However, Biden’s overall performance was shockingly low grade. His demeanor revealed both physical and mental deterioration.
Trump barreled through the debate focusing heavily on the Afghanistan debacle and illegal immigration. You might call this habit of concentrating on a few topics perseveration. Trump largely ignored the questions posed by the moderators. Tapper or Dash. In turn, the moderators ignored Trump’s behavior. After all, this was Biden’s night.
It will be interesting to read what foreign journalists have to say about the debate. Alexander Dugin compared it to an episode of Beavis and Butthead; I’ll especially be on the lookout for commentaries by Pepe Escobar and Alastair Crooke.
So far, Biden has not yielded to pleas to step away from his presidential campaign. There is no way to force him to do so. He has already won numerous primaries and has hundreds of delegates pledged to support him. Biden’s critics also have to face the embarrassing question of his continuation as President of the United States. If he is not competent to run for a second term, then how can he remain in his role as President? Invoking the 25th Amendment seems very unlikely.
Naturally, discussion of potential presidential candidates has erupted across the internet.
Kamala Harris: As VP Harris automatically becomes President if Biden resigns or is forced out of office. There is no enthusiasm for a Harris presidential ticket.
Other potential candidates:
Janet Yellen, former chair of the Federal Reserve and current Secretary of the Treasury. Her background should disqualify her from the Presidency.
Gretchen Whitmer, Governor of Michigan, is best known as the object of an FBI kidnapping plot.
Whoopi Goldberg – why not?
Gavin Newsom, California, here we come!
Michele Obama, allegedly Michele enjoys her current life and has no desire to return to the White House.
Hillary Clinton, always willing and more or less able. Deplorables beware!
A short list to be sure. However, it seems to me that RFK Jr. will ultimately benefit from this ongoing farrago.
Obviously, this ludicrous situation could have been avoided if we had an upper age restriction on those seeking the Presidency. Perhaps a simple amendment banning anyone from seeking the presidency who would have reached the age of 76 before the end of their four-year term. At the age of 86, I do not think I can be accused of bias toward the elderly.