So Long
Biden has the thing that Trump just can’t manage — dignity
After the short, but weird blast of the UK General Election campaign, and there are (at least for the time being) indications that there’s going to be some vague level of competence in the business of government for a while¹, thoughts here can turn to looking at the foul-tasting everlasting gobstopper of political confectionery that is the US Presidential election cycle.
It had been clear for a while that Biden was faltering, and that perhaps the pace was beginning to catch up with him, however experienced and venerable a campaigner he is. The events of 14 July only really came as a surprise because of the timing. Perhaps the real surprise is how well co-ordinated the Harris campaign has been, and how solidly the drip feed of endorsements and announcements in the days since have been managed. They’ve also had the added bonus of keeping creepy Uncle Donnie’s profile very low, which must be annoying him no end after his attempt to exploit all the advantages of martyrdom without the inconvenience of the actual dying seems to have hit a wall.
Politics is often less about substance than about optics. The appearance of what happens is not, like the swan’s feet below the water, what goes on in public view. We’d known for while that the Democrats were getting restive, the numbers were looking shaky, and that the debate performance (for whatever reasons, either offered, or actual) had only intensified worries about Biden’s age, and his ability to properly serve a full second term. No one wants the FDR scenario, and for someone in his 80s this is increasingly probable, however fit he may feel he is. More than likely too, part of him at least doesn’t want to go; you can’t blame him for that. Clearly there was some behind the scenes manoeuvring going on to convince him that this couldn’t continue if they hoped to make sure a Trump presidency wouldn’t happen, and that finally the argument and the numbers made it clear to him that there was little option but to step back.
Politican though Biden may be (cue side-eyed suspicion), he does also seem to be a broadly decent human being. I think Trump, and the predations of the theocratic right, really do concern him. Talking about fighting for the “soul of America” is not mere rhetorical flummery. He means it, and he’s right. From outside of the US, as I am, the attempts of elements of the Republican Party to usher in a Gilead style nation using Project 2025 thinking make it look like parts of the country have gone mad, or that someone has been pumping mind-altering substances into the drinking water. Of course, there’s also a personal dimension to this, given how much of an obsession the Cheeto Mussolini has had with Obama and his presidency in particular², and Biden by extension.
From the outside there is a disjoint in some sections of American society between what people say their values are (constitution, “Freedom”, law and order), and what they are prepared to vote for in Trump, who seems prepared to junk it all for his own ends, and those of his hangers-on. Quite often, like the beginnings of the USA³, it’s not about giving everyone the freedom they shout about, but about ensuring it for themselves at the expense of anyone else in their way. As one former work colleague who hails from Pennsylvania said to me once, “if you want to understand America, think ‘I Got Mine’.” Trump and the US right have definitely played on that riff for a very long time, and there’s an electoral cohort who’ll undercut their own supposed principles to vote for it, and appear to approve of giving their orange guru elevated status to do as he will to make him an effective king above the law. It really shouldn’t be a zero sum game. It’s not an accident that Biden’s address very pointedly referenced Washington, and the idea that the creation of the Republic was fuelled by a desire to not be controlled by kings.⁴
But now, after having a lot of attention post-assassination attempt, and his “dynamic” speech at the RNC⁵, Trump‘s team finds itself on the back foot. The fact that Trump is now the much older candidate, and will face questions about his own cognitive capacities, shifts focus in a way they will find uncomfortable. It was immediately assumed he wouldn’t want more presidential debates, but it appears he may have been manoeuvred into agreeing, possibly to avoid accusations of running scared. There’s one thing for sure, the remaining time in this campaign in now going to be brutal and dirty. Perhaps Harris is the one with the stamina to be able to see that one through. She appears to have hit the ground running very quickly.
But watching Biden’s address on this side of the pond on the morning of 25 July, he has probably done the right thing, though it’s taken some time to get there. And what he has managed to do, and deserve, is what few do in politics really manage: he’s escaped with a lot of his dignity still intact.
¹ It won’t last. It never does. But for now let’s just enjoy the feeling, eh?
² I mean, I cannot for the life of me understand why that might be …
³ Like all things in the myth of America — and all countries have their own creation and embodiment myths about themselves, it’s way more muddy and complicated than that, but lets just park that one for the purposes of this for now, shall we?
⁴ Let’s be honest. quite a lot about the Pilgrim Fathers’ arrival was not about them being persecuted in Europe — I mean, if you’re pissing off the Dutch then just how awful must you be — but about wanting to be mad and awful without being restrained by any sense of moderation from outside of your own little bubble of insanity. America was really founded on religious fundamentalism, and the likes of Jefferson and Franklin, imperfect men as they undoubtedly were, were still trying to prevent some of the worst excesses of that mindset from taking hold. And now the most insane are now trying to fully roll those protections away.
⁵ So much for his call for unity after that shooting. He just couldn’t stop running his mouth off.
