For the good of the country, it is essential that a Democrat with at least a semi-national profile enter some remaining primaries to challenge President Joe Biden’s renomination.
Even at this late date, a victory over Biden in even one or two primaries could provide the embarrassment needed to drive the president from the race finally. Despite conventional wisdom, the right candidate really could pull such an upset.
First, let’s examine why this is necessary. Then, let’s look at how things could and should play out if the gambit works.
A top-tier or mid-tier Democrat, someone with a bigger profile than current challenger Dean Phillips, a good man the left-leaning media unfairly belittled back when the media still was protecting Biden, should enter the race because the world is in a parlous state. Facing such challenging times, the public deserves better than a choice between a corrupt and doddering Biden and the raging menace that is former President Donald Trump. With China, Iran, Russia, and Muslim terrorists all saber-rattling, and with the United States facing an unprecedented and dangerous level of national debt, and with domestic political divisions as raw as any in some 60 years, it is in the realm of unpatriotic to refuse to give the public a different choice.
In most cases, embarrassingly belatedly, more and more Democratic pros and leftist intelligentsia now realize Biden has no business running to stay in office until he is 86 years old. In the past week, loudly progressive-left writer Ezra Klein and left-friendly number cruncher Nate Silver both have said Biden should withdraw. They join astute consultants James Carville, David Axelrod, and Mark Penn, and even former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in saying that Biden is not up to snuff. And yes, it is dangerous to have a diminished president, lacking energy and frequently somewhat brain-fogged, if a national crisis occurs.
Still, Biden seems determined to run, and qualifying for Democratic primaries has closed in all but six states plus Washington, D.C. In Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, South Dakota, Oregon, and even populous New Jersey, there aren’t anywhere near enough delegates available for a new challenger to even approach a convention majority against Biden.
Potential challengers, though, should recognize this situation involves more than simple arithmetic. It’s also a matter of public pressure and of psychology, especially Biden’s psychology. As long as Biden keeps winning primaries, he will see no reason to withdraw. Yet if somebody takes him on and actually beats him in a public vote, even in a less populous state such as Montana but especially in traditionally powerful New Jersey, Biden’s remaining aura will disappear. It would show astonishing weakness for an incumbent to lose, perhaps, Nebraska in May to someone who didn’t have even a semblance of a campaign in February.
Unlike when Phillips entered, the media now might tout rather than trash a new challenger. The Democratic electorate never really has loved Biden, but merely somewhat admires him even as it, too, worries about his agedness. In one or more of the remaining seven contests, it could well take its cue from a suddenly Biden-skeptic media and give the challenger some wins.
Even one such loss could send Democrats nationwide into panic, and the pressure on Biden to withdraw could become unbearable.
A charismatic challenger who runs a tick toward the political center from Biden’s operational leftism could prove formidable. (I could easily outline a whole platform, space permitting, that wouldn’t be to my conservative liking but that could both win Democratic primary votes and make the party much more attractive for the fall campaign, but that’s a topic for another column.) Someone to Biden’s left, such as Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), would be an easy target for Republicans to take down, but a less leftist figure such as Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA), former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), Gov. Andy Beshear (D-KY), or others, if they can make a galvanizing speech, could present the right political profile and enter the race with a bang.
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If such a candidate successfully forces Biden from the race and thus creates an “open convention,” the candidate, as the resident giant killer, would have a leg up on Newsom, Vice President Kamala Harris, or anyone else who later joined the fray.
Some of us don’t want any liberal Democrat to be president. But it would be better for the country for the Democratic alternative to be someone at least competent for the next four years.