Biden’s Stephanopoulos interview will do little to calm fluttering Democratic pulses

Like a father confessor, ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos tried everything to jolt President Joe Biden out of his complacency. He pleaded with him. He queried him. He exhorted him. Nothing worked. Throughout the interview, if that’s what it was, Biden rebuffed his entreaties as though they couldn’t be more outlandish.  

Down in the polls? Not a bit of it. Democratic lawmakers preparing to ask him to step down? Never happening. And so on. He clearly couldn’t grasp that his presidency isn’t in trouble; it’s cratering. 

Whether Biden is suffering from cognitive issues may be an open question, but he appears to have developed a severe case of Ruth Bader Ginsburg syndrome. Like her, he’s clinging to his post in the delusion that he can outlast his foes. The most he could say about Donald J. Trump, who is on course to dislodge him from the White House in a crushing defeat, is that he’s a liar. Big deal. If anything, Biden seems to regard the real obstacle to a second term as a nasty press corps. He was about one second away from announcing that the media is the enemy of the people and decrying the nattering nabobs of negativism. With his cloistered inner circle and clear repugnance for the media, Biden, you could even say, seems to be taking on Nixonian characteristics. 

When Stephanopoulos asked him whether he wasn’t as vain as Trump in pursuing another term at the age of eighty-one years old, Biden scoffed. He couldn’t even process the notion that he possessed anything in common with Trump. Instead, he claimed that his crowd in Wisconsin today showed that he could rally the nation against Trump. Stephanopoulos was incredulous. No one draws bigger crowds than Trump. “I don’t think you want to go there, Mr. President,” Stephanopoulos admonished him. Asked how he would feel if Trump were elected, Biden explained, “I’ll feel, as long as I gave it my all, and I did as good a job as I know I can do, that’s what this is about.” Gulp. What happened to the much-ballyhooed crusade for democracy and freedom and liberty? 

The interview will do little to calm fluttering Democratic pulses. On Capitol Hill, Senator Mark Warner is trying to convene a group of his fellow legislators to visit and convince Biden to exit the race. Presumably, he will redouble his efforts now that Biden has offered a fresh reminder that he’s living in a political la-la land. Even the Almighty that he regularly invoked wouldn’t be able to resurrect his shambles of a presidency. 

The only observer amid the wreckage that I have been able to discover who remains bullish on Biden is one Curt Mills, the executive director of the American Conservative. In his view, the idea that Biden is on the ropes is preposterous — merely a “media narrative.” If the Biden White House is looking for fresh blood it might sign on Mills as a kind of in-house critic. He temerariously explained to me that “Biden is now the perceived underdog, but America loves an underdog. Being the favorite in the race is tricky terrain. Trump is savvy — and must manage Republican overconfidence.” So far, Trump, who has kept mum for the most part as Biden thrashes around, appears to be doing an excellent job of doing just that.