Also, whew, lemme tell you, one way to get blocked on here is to flood my mentions with "OH SO YOU HATE BIDEN/WANT TRUMP/YOU'RE TRYING TO DESTROY THE REPUBLIC" and so on because I posted a link to an article.
Look, idk what the right path forward is for that campaign and neither does anyone else. Screaming at strangers about it on the internet probably doesn't help.
But it's extra wild when the likely pivot would just be to swap in Harris, who would continue to have the exact same policies as Biden but without the burden of being a million years old.
But here's the thing, and I'll say it as someone who monitors and analyzes media: the bad media coverage isn't going to let up. It's going to drive his poll numbers down and it's going to be relentless. There's blood in the water, and maybe it's not fair, but that's the reality right now.
The only way it *might* stop is if he does something that really demonstrates that he's got some crazy-youthful energy/stamina/whatever that he maybe doesn't actually have. He should probably be on every TV show possible right now, doing every interview he can, just relentlessly in our faces.
Showing up in an ABC interview tomorrow night isn't going to fix it. He can come off absolutely perfect and it's not going to turn the tide of the current media narrative. It just won't. And again, this might not be fair to him, to his supporters, or to the country.
But the narrative is the narrative, and it's hard to overcome. If he dropped out of the race, it would shift to a different story. If he stays in, which he says he's going to, we need to buckle up for four months of non-stop, wall-to-wall *this*, fair or not.
this is basically where I’m at
Biden cannot win in an environment where this is the main media narrative from now until the election
if there is no way to get the media change that narrative, and I’m not sure there is, Harris may be the only option even if that also comes with massive risk
The narrative should be:
Why do people want to be Trump’s VP? Remember Pence?
SCOTUS rejects history, from Declaration of Independence all the way to Magna Carta?
How do American women regain bodily autonomy?Not “Biden is old and slow.”
It’s a doom narrative to foment chaos!!
The one thing I really wonder, and we'll see, is whether what we're actually seeing isn't so much a ratfucking as legacy media having a tantrum about becoming insignificant that no one is really listening to but themselves
Thanks for acknowleging reality. The media has been awful for ages. Biden's campaign knew it- yet they asked for a June debate, blew that debate, and now they're saying the media is mean. The campaign obviously has no idea what to do. Complaining about the media's BS isn't going to get them to stop
The 'Biden old' narrative won't stop and personally I accept it as preferable to the alternative catastrophizing narratives (unstoppable Trump KOs Biden, Dems in disarray and fighting about new nom) + the enormous logistical challenges of getting new nom on ballot and campaigning in just 3 months.
I'm certainly not wedded to this candidate. But I am highly skeptical that a different choice would not then involve months of criticism of the switch itself or of the new candidate.
I think if he stays in the should-he-drop coverage eventually stops or at least slows to a trickle as it no longer becomes practical, e.g. past ballot-printing deadlines. And Biden Old is baked in to some degrees. Might be more risk with a new candidate getting their own But Her Emails storyline.
Olivia Nuzzi (yes I know) has a massive article in NYMag where she describes seeing Biden at a fundraiser in April where he asked her for her name.
Joe Biden asked Olivia Nuzzi what her name was.
It was joever a week ago but it's never been more joever than today, until tomorrow
Listen: This is a Big Deal because if it isn't, the New York Times will look silly and Trump might lose. Now act shocked Joe Biden doesn't know off-brand Ann Coulter and admit that the Democrats Are In Disarray and, therefore, Vote Republican, got it?
/s
ON was the writer for the massive 2019 Biden campaign profile. This got her frozen out of the Biden circle for years - they hated her for it - but as part of that assignment she spent six months on the trail with them.
That he doesn't know her name five years later says everything.
Don’t agree w this. If we replace democratic primaries with “a bad news cycle picks our nominee” we’re cooked.
Too old to do it and make the newspaper be nice to us are v different things
Now that SCOTUS basically gave immunity to sitting presidents in office, can't he simply send Seal 6 to take out (to lunch, of course) some of his opponents?
The bad media coverage was NEVER going to let up, because the presumptive GOP nominee is demonstrably unable to do the job, is actively pro-fascism, and is showing more dementia every day. That means they can’t have their horserace, and mentioning Trump’s negatives isn’t “balanced.”
Which is why Trump’s inevitable physical collapse can’t happen soon enough. That horse has to be dead so there’s nothing left to flog before they’ll give it up.
🤔However: Would you continue to stick with Biden even if the polls continue to show him losing to Trump in the #BattlegroundStates, by a margin outside of the standard error of measure, by the end of July?
I will vote '🔵 No Matter Who' as I did in 2020 to try again to defeat 🔴💀🔴Herr Trumpfenfuhrer.
I will vote for whomever the Dems put up against the GOP. I think the “low information voters” might have a little trouble if the nominee is changed at this relatively late date, though.
Biden has little to no upside unless he uses his new #officialact powers - which he clearly states he won't. Change is risky, but so is "staying the course", 1 term loser GHW Bush's strategy.
it's depressing, but i agree that the NYT and their ilk are not going to let up. they've picked their 2024 "her e-mails" story-line and are gonna shit on biden with most of the front-page from here on out.
The right wing media have no value if they want democrats to die. They aren’t going to print information favorable to democrats. That’s basically what we are seeing. @chrislhayes.bsky.social
