Joe Biden is 81 years old, and that makes him the oldest person to ever have occupied the White House as President of the United States.
We know the stress that comes with that job, and can see it visibly in the way that all of the men who have occupied the position during this modern age when photography and video have become crystal clear means of communication have aged physically. At most, it's an eight year job, but sometimes, realistically, it seems that Presidents age twice as quickly as a result of the time they've served as President.
It is certainly legitimate to question the stamina and mental sharpness of an 81 year old man who is President of the United States. Serving in that office has caused President Biden to age, just as it did all of his predecessors. And already in his eighth decade, the stresses and strains of the responsibility may very well be beyond the mental and physical capacity of someone who is of that age.
But all of that depends on the person occupying the office.
As far as age goes, this is new territory. So far, it has observably been President Biden's predecessor, and current opponent, who seems to have deteriorated mentally and physically more than Biden has, since he was first elected in 2016.
But Biden's age has been a long running theme of the news media, even before he made his decision to run in 2020. And because it is one of their long running themes, it gets far more attention than it merits. There's no evidence, none, that has been seen up to this point that indicates this President is not capable of performing his daily duties as President of the United States. But the media has brought it into this campaign and let it sit there and gather momentum, and they've kept at it because this generation of news commentators, directors and reporters, lack the kind of common, political sense that their predecessors had. The news media in the United States is a take sides, biased, propaganda outlet, not a news media. And that's why they haven't bothered to check their own facts when it comes to reporting on this Presidency.
Examples of Biden's Age Affecting His Ability to Serve as President and his Conduct in Office
Here is where the crickets are chirping.
The extremist news media, outlets like Fox News, Newsmax, and their ilk, make mountains out of molehills. Oh, there are things that point to the fact that Biden is now in his 80's. He walks with a stiff gait. His hearing is somewhat affected, especially at times when there's a lot of noise around him. He has, on occasion, exhibited some forgetfulness when it comes to protocol, though his Republican opponent never gets names or dates or even locations where he happens to be at the time correct, by comparison. And if we're honestly comparing, Trump shows the same kind of blank stares, eye-blinks and slow responses that the far right wingers play over and over as evidence of Biden's age affecting his abilities. He's needed assistance stepping off platforms and getting down stairs quite a lot recently.
It's not been that long ago that this President took a ten hour train ride one way from Poland into Kyiv, took a stroll down the street, a good way, at least half a mile, with President Zelenskyy, walked back, got back on the train and rode for 10 hours out of Kyiv back to Poland. I cannot be convinced that Trump would have ever attempted anything like that.
And while there is not anything that the news media has been made aware of, or has been able to report to confirm their pre-concieved conclusion that Biden is too old, let's make sure there is some understanding of how the Presidency works under an experienced Democrat, as opposed to an inexperienced, egomaniac Republican. There are plenty of competent people within the administration, appointed by the President, to do the work of the executive branch. It's not like he has to do everything, which is one of the reasons why his predecessor failed at it so badly that 154 scholars from the Presidential Greatness Project, mentioned in the debate by President Biden, did indeed determine that Trump was the worst President in American history.
Sorry, but I just had to make mention of that fact somewhere. That same project rated Biden as the 14th most effective President in history, by the way.
The business of running the executive branch of the United States government has not been affected by the fact that the current President is 81. At least, the news media as a whole has not provided any evidence to back up their claim that "Biden is too old." This has, from a legislative, political, foreign policy and economic perspective, been the single most accomplished and successful Presidency overall since Lyndon B. Johnson and John F. Kennedy. And if Biden had been "too old," that would certainly not have been the case.
There are also plenty of provisions in place, from having a competent Vice-President, to procedures that can be initiated by the cabinet, to ensure the security of the nation should the President somehow become disabled, regardless of the reason. And even if the possibility exists, and the risk of a disabling medical or mental crisis does occur, please tell me this? Does that risk justify supporting the other guy? Because the outcome of that would be far worse than anything that could happen if the back-ups must be called on to step in during a second Biden term. So think about that when casting a ballot.
So What About Biden's Debate Performance
What about it?
Biden did not use the debate to deliver a stump speech from the campaign trail with the same old talking points from rallies and speeches for the purpose of pumping up the crowd. He made an effort to actually answer the questions, and for well over 90% of the time, he responded to what was asked, and he didn't lie. It was quite difficult to respond to Trump's remarks, because Trump never actually answered the questions being asked by the moderators. So when it was the President's turn to respond, after a Trump statement, he did appear to be a bit confused and had difficulty responding to the off-topic lie told by Trump. And that's a credible accusation, because the fact checkers concluded that Trump lied 90% of the time, and none of his responses that were truthful, or partially truthful, actually answered a question directly.
I'd be a little confused as to how to respond to that, too.
And I'll be honest, it was not a good debate performance. It wasn't the worst debate performance in all of Presidential debate history, such as the far right media is reporting, but a lot of the importance placed on this debate, which opens the door for them to make that claim, came from the Democrats and the emphasis they placed on it. Trump's debates against Biden in 2020 will go down in history as the worst debate performances in Presidential debate history, but on that side of the campaign, it didn't matter, because his base doesn't care about a fair debate anyway, and they don't care how he comes off, the worse he is, the better it is for them.
This is Exactly What the Trump Campaign Needed
Biden has been picking up support for more than a month, after a period of time when polling data appeared to have him trailing in most of the "battleground states" and in nationwide polls. I have serious doubts about the accuracy of polls operated by news media outlets that set out to use polls to prove their assumptions, as well as how much interference in the collection of data there has been from Russian sources, which is evident, and even about the accuracy of how the data has been gathered, as several polling sources have admitted they've been oversampling Republican voters. But that data has shifted since Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts and a sentencing event is coming quickly.
And while the responsibility for Biden's debate performance rests solely on him, he was the one up there doing the talking, and it wasn't good, the reaction of Democrats to his performance has been inexcusable and extremely dangerous. It has given the right wing propaganda sources the words they need without using their own. The instant jump to the conclusion that Biden needs to be replaced is exactly straight out of the Trump campaign playbook. They couldn't have done better if they'd written the script for this whole scenario. The demands for Biden to step down, the criticism of his debate performance, that Fox News is reporting isn't coming from Republican sources. It's coming from Democrats.
I give Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Gavin Newsome, and several other Democratic Senators and Congressmen who commented publicly on this credit for not playing directly into the hands of Republicans and Trump supporting media outlets. Had all Democrats kept their panic to themselves, and had they let people with the knowledge and prior experience handle this, the Republican media would still have pointed fingers, made accusations and claimed this was a disaster and Democrats were in disarray. But that would have looked like their own bias. They're getting their quotes and talking points from Democrats who, in defeatist fashion, are jumping forward way too soon.
And if this does become one of those turning point moments that costs Biden re-election, it will be his own Democratic party, and the media that prides itself on being fair and balanced with a progressive tone, that will be to blame. Fortunately, the people in the Democratic party whose opinion weights heavily and counts the most are putting this all in perspective and trying to drown out the defeatists.
So Let's Put This in Perspective
This is all based on the false narrative that the media has been pushing since before the start of the 2020 campaign, that Biden's age is disqualifying. That notion has been debunked, and it has become clear, in the days since the debate, that is still not the case, and the debate performance is not evidence of that.
Be realistic. Trump's debate performance did not add a single independent, undecided Republican moderate, or frightened Democrat to his vote total. The Biden campaign's job of convincing them to get on board is now made more difficult than it was, perhaps. But then, perhaps not.
One of the news outlets had assembled a focus group of voters, most of whom had been Trump voters in 2020, in battleground state Arizona, in Maricopa County. Trump got no support from them. Biden didn't convince any of them to vote for him, but the possibility that they would cast a ballot for him rather than Trump left the door open to further possible convincing.
The debate temporarily shifted the focus from Trump's felony convictions and looming sentencing. For what its worth, it was horrible timing because it gave him a chance to spout his campaign talking points to an audience on national television before his sentencing, and it took the focus off his legal troubles. It almost looks like CNN planned it to do just that, change the content of the news cycle and what people are talking about. The emphasis in news media reporting will shift back to those convictions and the approaching sentencing.
The news media in this country, 90% of it, is owned by and controlled by corporate interests who could care less about democracy, individual rights and freedoms of ordinary Americans. What they care about, as we have all seen openly, is money. Those who did pay attention to the orange headed buffoon during the debate learned pretty quickly that he measures his values in the cost to maintain them. He's willing to sell our NATO allies out on the claim that they're not paying their dues, even though they are, and all of his alleged patriotism centers on money. If they're not carrying their weight, he said clearly, then let Putin have them. He's on the record with that comment, even though the fact that the NATO allies do pay their dues, and that's not a question.
So that's what we are up against. The only real damage done by all of the caterwauling and panic on the Democratic side was to Democrats themselves. It seems like our party just can't resist shooting itself in the foot at the most inopportune time.
As for me, I will continue to send in my financial support, and I will continue to drive the half-hour north to Wisconsin to help Democratic precincts have enough volunteers to walk streets and get out voters. I'm voting for Biden, I know how our government works, I know that his age hasn't been a factor prior to now, and won't be in his job performance, and I know that there's a system in place if there is an incident or an occurrence, and good, competent people will step in and take us forward. Biden isn't going to step down and there isn't any way to change candidates at this point that would lead to a November win. That's a fact that we all need to accept, and go back to work to make sure that we take advantage of the gaffes and mishaps that the GOP is bound to commit between now and November.
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