The Ploy

NOW EVERYBODY KNOWS
THE DEBATE WAS A SETUP

Okay, so the ploy worked.

All week long we heard about how Joe Biden was firmly on task prepping for the debate, honing his responses, getting ready to dazzle us with his keen grasp of administrative detail and a clear picture of all the great things we could expect in his second term.

We’d be surprised at how sharp this old guy really is.

The idea — obvious now — was to set Joe up for a total collapse under the Trumpian onslaught. Which, if things worked out right, might have the secondary benefit of demonstrating how nasty and cruel The Donald really is.

And the point of this charade?

To create a consensus among the Democrat constituency, as well as among key stakeholders — those folks I call the “Central Committee” — that Joe is finished.

This is why the debate was scheduled so far before the Democratic National Convention. There would be time to build anticipation for the person who’d step in and save the nation from Trump.

Some commentators had speculated along these lines well before the debate. For instance, former Michigan Representative Thaddeus McCotter wrote in Human Events way back in February of 2023 that Biden was slated for only one term.

And now we can see that those who took this tack were entirely right. Early post-debate poll results showed that more than 60 percent of Democrats think this is the end of Joe.

(One might ask what the other nearly 40 percent are thinking. But really, you can chalk those numbers up to interminable Trump hatred and the sampling imbalances that have become common in modern opinion research. I think the actual negative response rate is much higher.)

The relevant question now is: Who’s going to be Joe’s replacement?

Michelle Obama?

Gavin Newsom?

Hillary Clinton?

Kamala Harris? (Not likely that. As Bob Hoge of Red State has put it, “her approval rating is somewhere beneath the Marianas Trench.”)

Would the Central Committee swallow hard, and embrace RFK, Jr.? Admittedly that would be a hard swallow. But it’s not unthinkable, given post-debate panic on the Left.

Despite his antagonism toward the deep-pockets pharmaceutical industry, and his accusations of CIA involvement in the murders of his father and his uncle, RFK, Jr. is essentially a man of the Left.

In politics much can be forgiven for the sake of ideology.

There’s no doubt the debate was a severe blow to those who had counted on “Good Old Joe from Scranton” to confound the skeptics and come through in the end. This meme, taken from a typical lefty Facebook page, illustrates their dashed hopes and broken hearts.But then, from the standpoint of those behind-the-scenes manipulators, all of this a good thing. It will make lefties cling more tightly to the real candidate, whoever that turns out to be.

And you may be sure it’ll be someone the manipulators feel confident can stand up to Trump in a way they knew all along Joe Biden could not.

(Note to Republicans: Everything has changed now. This election will not be a matter of Trump walking over “Sleepy Joe.”)

So drastic has been Biden’s decline that many people wonder why the Central Committee went with him back in 2020. Didn’t anyone spot the signs of his deterioration?

Well, if you look at video from the time, he didn’t seem all that bad. Yeah, he was a little distracted, a bit slow on the uptake.

But I think those weaknesses were perceived as useful. A President whose focus was starting to blur could be more readily “guided” than someone at the top of his game.

And make no mistake, the serial disasters we’ve witnessed during the last three years weren’t the result of Joe’s mental slippage. They were intentional: planned, directed, and carried to completion by the corps of operatives left over from the Obama Administration.

The way things have turned out, however, Joe’s condition was worse than anyone thought. The disconnected mumbling, the tripping on stairs, the hair sniffing, the improvised and ever-evolving personal history — all of that eventually became too much of a liability.

Big Brother may be only an icon (in Orwell’s book you’re never quite sure if Big Brother is actually still alive), but he has to have a plausible presence in people’s minds.

Instead, as I’ve written jokingly before, Joe Biden became “the Max Headroom of our day,” a comic character that might be computer-generated, and from which people expect a succession of ironic outbursts and silly antics.

Give Karine Jean-Pierre her due. She’s nimble at the press room podium. But she can only twist the truth so far, covering for Joe while keeping a straight face.

Biden’s deficiencies have exceeded his usefulness. So the fix is in. He’s got to go.

It may be that his successor has already been selected. Or, over the next few weeks, we may watch a series of trial balloons being floated across our TV screens.

That remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, the Dems will likely continue propping Joe up. For awhile. Then an announcement will be made about an unexpected health crisis which, sadly, precludes his running again.

But God bless him for the wonderful job he’s done under such difficult circumstances.

He’s a great American.

Oh, and what about Kamala? How can the Dems pass over the first woman-of-color Vice President?

Don’t worry, she’ll be taken care of. Her place in history is secure. She’ll support the new candidate enthusiastically.

Somebody will make her an offer she can’t refuse.

Don Corleone, call your office.

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Even before the debate you could sense an air of desperation on the Left. This tasteless meme appeared after the recent death of actor Donald Sutherland…Not that Republicans can’t be a little snarky themselves (Danger! “Star Trek” reference)…But this image captures leftist post-debate hysteria perfectly…