Biden’s losing battle with the age issue
President Joe Biden looked frail and sometimes confused at ceremonies in France to mark the 80th anniversary of the Normandy invasion. In other words, no change — Biden looked pretty much the same as he always does these days.
Back at home, Democrats pushed back furiously this week when the Wall Street Journal published a story headlined, “Behind closed doors, Biden shows signs of slipping.” The article, “based on interviews with more than 45 people over several months,” reported that Biden “appears slower” than in recent years, “has good moments and bad ones,” and in negotiations with lawmakers cannot summon the “detailed knowledge of issues and insights into the other side’s motivations and needs” that he could in years past.
The Wall Street Journal described a White House meeting in January in which Biden negotiated with congressional leaders over funding for Ukraine.
“He spoke so softly at times that some participants struggled to hear him, according to five people familiar with the meeting,” the Wall Street Journal reported. “He read from notes to make obvious points, paused for extended periods and sometimes closed his eyes for so long that some in the room wondered whether he had tuned out.”
The headline seemed almost funny. Behind closed doors? Biden has been showing signs of slipping, right out in the open, since he entered the White House. Just look at videos of Biden’s first full press conference, on March 25, 2021, and address to the nation, on March 11, 2021. His walk was stronger and his speech far clearer than it is today. That’s just a fact. Of course he is slowing down, exactly as the Wall Street Journal reported. And given the realities of aging, it’s not going to get better. It’s going to get worse.
Nevertheless, Democrats complained that they had told the Wall Street Journal Biden performed masterfully behind closed doors and that the Wall Street Journal ignored them. “Surprise, surprise — everyone attacking POTUS is a Republican with an agenda,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) posted. “I made clear to the Wall Street Journal regarding the January meeting on Ukraine that the president was absolutely engaged and ran that meeting in a way that brought everyone together. I’m not quoted — I wonder why.”
The defense of Biden seemed almost funny, too.
Were Democrats really saying he was fully in command behind closed doors?
If so, why be so sharp behind closed doors and struggle so much in public? “If I were the president running for re-election, I would simply stop being so secretly inexhaustible and sharp as a tack and do it in public at speeches and campaign events,” was the wry post from conservative commentator Mary Katharine Ham.
Addressing the Democratic defense, the political reporter Olivia Nuzzi wrote, “The problem with this, of course, is that the Joe Biden the world observes in his public appearances resembles more closely the Joe Biden described by the Wall Street Journal than by the Democrats who claim he is secretly sharp as a tack.”
That is the obvious truth.
Just go to the videos. You don’t have to go back decades, to when Biden was in the Senate, or even 10 years ago, when he was vice president. Just look at Biden at the beginning of his presidency, just three years ago. There is substantial decline taking place. It is not reversible. It is part of life for many people who live past 80 years of age. Yes, it happens at different times to different people, but the point is, it is happening to Biden right now.
What now? There are some observers who do not believe Democrats will end up nominating Biden for another term.
But the fact is, the party is fully committed to the aging president. There is no Plan B. When reelection time comes around, it is extremely hard to oust a president of one’s own party when he does not want to leave. As serious as Biden’s situation is, it seems unlikely Democrats can do anything to stop the nomination process that is already near conclusion.
Byron York is chief political correspondent for The Washington Examiner.
