This is big trouble--for the Democrats. They are reverting to the same mentality that gave us 45--a yearning for a past that can't be replicated. The front-runner is now someone who, at times, goes off on tangents that release non sequiturs that imply he's not connected with reality any longer. He says things that apologists scramble to cover with the excuse of it's not what he exactly says, it's what he means, and what he means, is, you know, basically good.
Just like 45. True, Biden insults, or means to insult, no one. He isn't angry 150% of the time. He has some sense of style and loads of basic likability. He's not a racist and doesn't inspire others who are. He has a decent, cordial, meaningful relationship with important allies abroad. And he's had experiences of being inside the Oval Office, at the cutting edge of major decisions during Obama's presidency, which had solid, overall, consistent national support.
Granted, that feels a bit better. If that were all that needed consideration, that would be enough. Some have already decided that.
But like 45, he's losing the grasp a presidential candidate must have at a moment's notice. While no one can agree on everything Biden says, his answers must make sense for that present moment. And increasingly, they don't. It's all coming at him too fast now; his reactions under fire suggest that. His once-soothing voice catches. It ain't good.
Now we have a Hispanic upstart who calls him out for it, and he's the one who gets ripped to shreds. Why? Because a pity party's starting to form for Old Joe. Doing that might very well get him the nomination--and lose the election.
How could he possibly do that? Because 45 will apply immediate, powerful pressure on him with his unending innuendoes, lies, exaggerations, and accusations that have the veneer of truth but can't get close to it--the effects of which smearing will be the truth to matter enough, because we already know 45 doesn't have to make much sense to obtain irrational backing. Either way, it will be the endless grinding of being put on the defensive that may easily prove Biden to be insufficiently responsive to knock a sitting, if horrible president out of his perch with responses that will stand up to the otherwise meaningless challenge of a cad, mountebank, and fool, albeit a very persuasive one. 45 will do his best to make his challenger look weak, including repeating that word about him or her endlessly, as if repeating it will make it so (kind of like calling himself a "genius" once again, which he did the other day).
The bottom line will be if Biden or any other Democratic nominee can remain attractive enough to get people out to vote; a 'meh' attitude toward Biden, or a pity party extended toward him, won't work. Too many people will stay home. That's what beat Hillary Clinton.
On MSNBC's post-debate discussion last Thursday night, Nicolle Wallace (my opinion of whom has receded a bit; she's long on brains but short on wisdom) scolded Castro for potentially giving 45 fodder for anti-Biden spots, should he gain the nomination. First of all: Wallace had no call to pre-suppose that, even if Biden's barely leading the Democratic polling at this time; it seemed that she's already anointed him as the nominee. Second--and most telling--the very comment seems to suggest that Democrats need to very delicately sneak around 45 somehow and not make him too angry, as if someone would be sneaked into the back door to be elected. If nobody makes too big of a commotion, we'll all wake up that Wednesday morning having disposed of this menace.
I have news: Ain't gonna work that way. 45 is angry and will stay that way. He will unleash every kind of insult and prevarication possible, both on the debate stage and in massive tweeting. He will manipulate the voting process in ways we haven't imagined yet, including (I believe) turning a blind eye to another round of Russian meddling. And if he loses, he will mess with our Constitution in truly shocking ways, even more shocking than now. He could, by executive order, suspend the counting. He could, with his slimey lawyers, hold up decisive state tallies which had close votes by recounts. He could, by throwing count totals into court, resist right up to the next inauguration date and perhaps try to hold that up, too.
The amazing thing about our reaction to him is that, even at this point, even after all he has done, too many of us still refuse to consider all the more that could be done. And will, if he feels he has to.
Think of the nonsense that this round of TV ads for his campaign will bring. Think of the scare tactics that will bring out loyalists. They will be vicious. They will need responses. No Democratic nominee will be able to ignore or hide from them.
He refuses to let anyone take the high road. It's a fool's errand to try anyhow. It would amount to ignoring him, and he won't allow that. He will utilize media that can't stand him to create message boxes that must be addressed because, though untrue, they will be tuned to humiliate and create an image of weakness and incompetence--exactly how Democrats need to make him look, because that's exactly who he is.
Beyond that: Attempting to revert to an Obama-based time plays in the Republican ballpark, harkening back to some dreamy circumstance that didn't take place. Obama barely held the country together, trying to compromise and avoid extreme stances, but the Congressional Republicans forced him into too many executive orders and bullied him out of a Supreme Court nominee. That this indication of severe disruption in the system is upon us is nothing less than an extension to what was already going on. Think of the ridiculous, insipid things Republicans have said in recent years: They had begun from at least 2010, if not beforehand. And they will continue past 2020. You can count on that.
What needs to be fixed is not merely a return to cordiality and civility. That's the easy part. If someone else wins, that will come later. So it isn't going to be about being nice. Nice and a channel changer turns on the TV set. Many think that playing nice is the antidote to this incessant anger and bitter nihilism. It isn't.
It's about overcoming the denial of reality. Here's one part of it: 45 has set the rules of the game. He has already entered the realm of non-reality, allowed it to overwhelm him, and made it work for him, forcing his hated media to report the fact of his 13,000 (and counting) lies and give them the air time he wants, the result of which is happily (for him) not diminishing his devoted base but reinforcing it. His stated enemies are winning his battles for him, and all he has to do is think of something else fairly twisted to say every single day, even multiple times.
Within that reality of the extension of non-reality is an attitude which Republicans, sadly, have adapted far before he went down that escalator: Winning is the point. Jawboning is for fools. So they believe the lies. The lies are winning, so lying is just fine with us. The borders of our districts, borders that we have so neatly arranged, are such that our clientele have drilled down into comfortably mindless devotion. So if you think we're going to throw him under the bus, you have another think coming. Meanwhile, we are going to shut up.
That must be confronted with determination. The person who gets the Democratic nomination must be lucid enough to detect the nuances of the lying, quick enough to call it out, and the deftness of the language to show that an attitude of defiance of this rottenness can and should be combined with not mere cordiality, but a bluntness that demonstrates that we need not tolerate this nonsense for another minute. That's the essence that Democrats need to address: Not just policy, though policy is always in question; not just impeachment, though impeachment, in a more rational world, would have happened by now. The readjustment of and assumptions of the basis of governance itself is the issue here, and it will take a remarkable person to overcome the totality of what has taken place to this hazardous point and lead the nation forward, not back, to a new and hopeful place.
It may have been Joe Biden at one point, but it isn't now. It's beyond him. It may not be Julian Castro, for he may have deep-sixed his own candidacy (though I, for one, hope not) with his recognition of this new reality. But it will have to be someone who measures up in a way we may not have anticipated was previously necessary--but very clearly now is.
Parker Palmer, a great educator, philosopher and author, has written about his battles with depression. He says that confronting it takes enormous effort and constant attention. But the phrase he used to conquer it, or at least to hold it at bay, struck me as most cogent: The only way out is through. It's the same way we must now consider our damaged, sold-out, severely depressed democracy; not to revert to an earlier day, but to embrace a new one, in which possibilities can flourish and problems can be addressed not with hard lines, but with fluid, adjustable guidelines where all are quite sure that government acts in a humane and purposeful manner.
Whoever gets the Democratic nomination must fulfill that very high demand. But as Michael Douglas, playing a president, said in the film The American President: "America isn't easy. You've got to want it bad."
In this debacle, the only way out of it is through to the other side, where it's very unpredictable but filled with thoughtful options. The battle cannot be led by someone who's first thought is being nice and safe within comfortable reminiscences. It must be led by a new person committed to the best that this democracy can accomplish. We will see how bad we want it now.
Be well. Be careful. I'll see you down the road.
Mister Mark
He refuses to let anyone take the high road. It's a fool's errand to try anyhow. It would amount to ignoring him, and he won't allow that. He will utilize media that can't stand him to create message boxes that must be addressed because, though untrue, they will be tuned to humiliate and create an image of weakness and incompetence--exactly how Democrats need to make him look, because that's exactly who he is.
Beyond that: Attempting to revert to an Obama-based time plays in the Republican ballpark, harkening back to some dreamy circumstance that didn't take place. Obama barely held the country together, trying to compromise and avoid extreme stances, but the Congressional Republicans forced him into too many executive orders and bullied him out of a Supreme Court nominee. That this indication of severe disruption in the system is upon us is nothing less than an extension to what was already going on. Think of the ridiculous, insipid things Republicans have said in recent years: They had begun from at least 2010, if not beforehand. And they will continue past 2020. You can count on that.
What needs to be fixed is not merely a return to cordiality and civility. That's the easy part. If someone else wins, that will come later. So it isn't going to be about being nice. Nice and a channel changer turns on the TV set. Many think that playing nice is the antidote to this incessant anger and bitter nihilism. It isn't.
It's about overcoming the denial of reality. Here's one part of it: 45 has set the rules of the game. He has already entered the realm of non-reality, allowed it to overwhelm him, and made it work for him, forcing his hated media to report the fact of his 13,000 (and counting) lies and give them the air time he wants, the result of which is happily (for him) not diminishing his devoted base but reinforcing it. His stated enemies are winning his battles for him, and all he has to do is think of something else fairly twisted to say every single day, even multiple times.
Within that reality of the extension of non-reality is an attitude which Republicans, sadly, have adapted far before he went down that escalator: Winning is the point. Jawboning is for fools. So they believe the lies. The lies are winning, so lying is just fine with us. The borders of our districts, borders that we have so neatly arranged, are such that our clientele have drilled down into comfortably mindless devotion. So if you think we're going to throw him under the bus, you have another think coming. Meanwhile, we are going to shut up.
That must be confronted with determination. The person who gets the Democratic nomination must be lucid enough to detect the nuances of the lying, quick enough to call it out, and the deftness of the language to show that an attitude of defiance of this rottenness can and should be combined with not mere cordiality, but a bluntness that demonstrates that we need not tolerate this nonsense for another minute. That's the essence that Democrats need to address: Not just policy, though policy is always in question; not just impeachment, though impeachment, in a more rational world, would have happened by now. The readjustment of and assumptions of the basis of governance itself is the issue here, and it will take a remarkable person to overcome the totality of what has taken place to this hazardous point and lead the nation forward, not back, to a new and hopeful place.
It may have been Joe Biden at one point, but it isn't now. It's beyond him. It may not be Julian Castro, for he may have deep-sixed his own candidacy (though I, for one, hope not) with his recognition of this new reality. But it will have to be someone who measures up in a way we may not have anticipated was previously necessary--but very clearly now is.
Parker Palmer, a great educator, philosopher and author, has written about his battles with depression. He says that confronting it takes enormous effort and constant attention. But the phrase he used to conquer it, or at least to hold it at bay, struck me as most cogent: The only way out is through. It's the same way we must now consider our damaged, sold-out, severely depressed democracy; not to revert to an earlier day, but to embrace a new one, in which possibilities can flourish and problems can be addressed not with hard lines, but with fluid, adjustable guidelines where all are quite sure that government acts in a humane and purposeful manner.
Whoever gets the Democratic nomination must fulfill that very high demand. But as Michael Douglas, playing a president, said in the film The American President: "America isn't easy. You've got to want it bad."
In this debacle, the only way out of it is through to the other side, where it's very unpredictable but filled with thoughtful options. The battle cannot be led by someone who's first thought is being nice and safe within comfortable reminiscences. It must be led by a new person committed to the best that this democracy can accomplish. We will see how bad we want it now.
Be well. Be careful. I'll see you down the road.
Mister Mark
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