President Biden’s disastrous performance in last week’s debate is not making the news, despite the fierce backlash from his misguided supporters. And Donald Trump’s Golf Handicap This confusion will not be resolved.
The more we analyze the road ahead, the more clear it becomes that Biden’s continued candidacy is a kamikaze attack that will destroy the Democratic Party. If logic prevails, Biden will step down within this week. However, the Biden camp has been acting completely differently from logic for the past six weeks.
There is no way forward
Biden can only be saved by a complete collapse of Trump. And that is unless Biden himself has another collapse, which is a much better bet. It’s possible that Biden’s approval rating won’t drop much in the polls, but that would only create false hope.
How Polarized American politics That means the minimum Democratic vote share in battleground states could be around 45%, but probably a little lower, and the hostility between the two parties would likely result in Republicans and Trump getting roughly the same number of votes.
Staring Real Clear PoliticsIn the June poll, excluding “Biden/Trump” voters (i.e., those who initially said they were undecided), Biden had an average of 43.5% support on the day of the debate, while Trump had 45.1%. 39.7% agree And Trump 42.6 percentBiden’s approval rating was 3.8% higher than Trump’s, while he led by 2.5%.
That means that each candidate is supported by a combination of voters who are either neutral or don’t like one candidate but dislike the other candidate more.
The debates are unlikely to have improved Trump’s favor among passive voters, but they certainly didn’t boost them to Biden. Already trailing, the president needs to target both undecideds and passive Trump voters. With passive voters more likely to stick with Trump, Biden loses an important target.
If Trump could consolidate his current vote total and add just 1 percent of the votes from undecideds, he would have over 46 percent of the vote. If Robert Kennedy, Jill Stein and the other Don Quixotes could get just 8 percent of the vote, Biden would lose the popular vote to Trump. Five Thirty Eight Kennedy won alone with 9 percent. Even if Kennedy and others lost, at least Protest vote 5% He reached that point in 2016. For Biden to beat Trump, he’ll need to win nearly all of the remaining undecideds.
More importantly, the votes for Biden and Trump are not evenly distributed across the Electoral College, with Trump far ahead in battleground states and some of Biden’s votes wasted in California and other populous Democratic states.
If Trump gains just 1% more votes in each battleground state, he will reach 49.6%. Arizona48.8 percent Nevada49 percent Pennsylvania48.3 percent Wisconsin 47.5 percent MichiganBiden will lose in all of those states because the nasty candidate is sure to get a few percentage points of the vote. GeorgiaIn a state where Trump has led for more than 18 months, his approval rating would reach 47.2%, widening his lead to five points. Notably, Trump has led Biden in eight consecutive Pennsylvania polls, has led in Arizona for more than 14 months, and has led in Nevada since October.
And these poll numbers have held up for two years. Losing a civil lawsuit, Losing a criminal trialA totally inept Republican Congress, Trump’s continuing circus, and the traditional mainstream media’s desperate attempts to prop up Biden. The national numbers have barely changed in recent months.
And the above analysis is Trump’s consolidation during the election period plus one point.. That’s being very generous. Biden still lost despite winning at least four undecided voters for every Trump vote. Given how slowly voters are moving, it would be foolhardy to expect Biden to suddenly make a breakthrough.
There’s nothing left in the bag
A rough analysis of the numbers suggests Biden will almost certainly lose, but the dynamics of the race are even worse. First, what will Democrats say about Trump that hasn’t already been said? The former president is a liar. Criminal / Threat to DemocracyThe public has been hearing that for the past eight years, are Democrats going to say it more loudly?
They are so blinded by their own hypocrisy and propaganda that they don’t realize how hollow their self-righteousness is. After all, the Democrats have Senators and Representatives indicted. Get paid From foreign governments. They Interfered in the Republican primary election They tried to promote MAGA candidates for their own electoral gain. Several Democratic states voted for Trump. Ballot The conviction was not made beforehand and without any public comment or hearing being held.
Biden, on the other hand, is lying. His record is plagiarism, False statements, Bad decision and Changes and turns Trump’s litany of lies and exaggerations is legendary. Talented? Most Americans are against it, but support Biden. Changed from positive to negative He suffered a mental breakdown after the disaster from which he never recovered.
People may think Trump is the bigger liar, but it’s easy to see that all politics is corrupt, and Democrats are almost as dishonest and willing to sacrifice democracy for power.
The public has been saying it clearly for two years. Inflation is the biggest concern and Immigration is a big problem At least for eight months. Biden has no idea. Blame corporate greed And weak sources Border Policy Putting limits on illegal activities Millions of illegal immigrants From the past three years.
Biden will be worse.
And then there’s Biden himself. Mental decline, What was clear before the debate was the extent, not the extent of it: if you are mentally declining at age 81, that decline is irreversible and will continue. “Science Party®” You will understand that.
Biden will have to work without a network twice in the next three months. Will he be able to complete his nomination acceptance speech at the convention? He couldn’t even speak for 20 minutes. State of the Union Address He never misses a line, and lowering expectations won’t help: expectations and scrutiny will likely increase, not decrease.
So what about the second debate? Biden is three months older and a tie won’t do him any favors. Trump has his own problems, to say the least, but he benefits from decades of media attention, battles with reporters, and dozens of rallies. Public debates are second nature to Trump. And changing the rules to make the debate more of a circus, as the incompetent Biden campaign should have done, would not sit well with Trump or the media.
Biden has to debate. Biden’s campaign hiding The president’s true state will likely remain unclear for a long time to come, and canceling and hunkering down would be the final nail in his political coffin.
To be sure, Trump may also have a mental breakdown, and any impending sentence would be bad. But Biden’s apparent decline is far worse, and is likely to get even worse. Complicating everything as the election approaches will be the question of what Biden will be like when he’s 83, 84, or 85 years old.
Under Biden, Democrats face defeat. But they also face the possibility of a major defeat. What if disgruntled Democrats see Biden lose and decide it’s best to vote for Kennedy? Could angry young voters defect, giving Trump a landslide Electoral College victory? Could a few percent stay home and defeat three or four Democratic senators? That scenario seems more likely than a Biden win by a hair.
If the Biden team cannot accept this reality, none of them are fit for politics.
Keith Norton He is co-founder of Silent Majority Strategies, a public and regulatory affairs consulting firm, and a former political campaign consultant in Pennsylvania.
