It's so unfair, people. Joe Biden has spent most of his life, and especially the past three-and-a-half years in the Oval Office, pouring his blood, sweat, and tears into making life better for all Americans and the world--and no one is giving him the credit he so richly deserves. At least, that's what CNN's Bakari Sellers believes, and vehemently argues on a recent podcast.
"The Weekly Show" is hosted (unsurprisingly) by "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart, and Sellers appeared along with two other guests: Tommy Vietor, a former Barack Obama administration national security spokesman and progressive podcaster, and Jon Favreau, who is best known as Obama's former speechwriter.
Our friends over at Real Clear Politics caught the conversation (when you watch the video, you'll see it was more of a panel than an interview), including this choice exchange between Stewart and Sellers, when he pushed back on the CNN host's insistence that Democrats are making a mistake by calling for Biden to step aside because of his age:
Jon Stewart To Biden Campaign: "Stop Gaslighting," "It's Not Just Age, It's Cognitive Decline"https://t.co/SwBmeRDaee
— RCP Video (@rcpvideo) July 12, 2024
"You couldn't deliver that performance at a job interview and get the job. And I'm not talking about the presidency. I'm talking like a cashier at Home Depot" pic.twitter.com/qyB2xbdZsp
JON STEWART: I'll be perfectly honest with you. I don't know of a job interview that you could have gone on and delivered the performance that was delivered by Joe Biden and gotten a job. And I'm not talking about the presidency. I'm talking about like cashier at Home Depot, like a job that you would not think, "That is the hardest job in the entire world."
BAKARI SELLERS: The only problem with that, Jon, and the only problem with framing it as such is the fact that you discount everything that he's accomplished in the first 3.5 years
JON STEWART: No, I don't. he's not running for what he did for 3.5 years. He's running for the next four.
BAKARI SELLERS: But nothing happens in a vacuum. And what we have to do is -- people just want to, my friends on the left, we want to only magnify what we saw at the debate, which is fine. I get it. We're talking about age, but I'm also talking about the accomplishments prior to and the threat that is right down the road. We do ourselves a disservice by saying our guy is old. We know that, he shuffles. We know that!
JON STEWART: It's not "old," it is cognitive decline. It's not just age, it's cognitive decline. There are people who are very least--
How interesting is it (at the beginning of the video at the end) that Stewart compares former President Bill Clinton's "bimbo eruptions," and how they were managed/treated by the media, and this never-ending nightmare the Biden people find themselves in? Okay, let's proceed.
WATCH: Even Rachel Maddow Is Questioning Whether Biden Is Dealing in Reality
This is the point where Favreau chimes in, bringing up the elephant in the room--and the key argument against Biden staying the course that his loyalists have yet to rebut with any success:
JONB FAVREAU: It's an inability to communicate, right? Like, I'm not a doctor, but like he can't, we need the candidate that we run for President needs to be able to communicate effectively. That's just the most basic, it's the most basic part of the job of being a candidate for president is you need to communicate effectively.
If you are unable as a candidate to communicate the party's message, accomplishments, and future policies to the public/voters, you truly cannot be the nominee. Period.
Stewart then rightly complains about all of the gaslighting by the tight circle around Biden:
JON STEWART: Or reassure us that here's how we operate in that environment. But to suggest that this discounts 3.5 years, it doesn't, but it does give you a window into the next four. And if you look at his performance in 2020 versus his performance in 2024, there is an inexorable decline. It's just undeniable.
So what I don't understand is OK, fine, he stays but deal with it head-on, stop pretending, stop gaslighting.
Sellers makes a good attempt at gaslighting, ironically, immediately after that, claiming no one's trying to "silence the debate" over Biden's cognitive abilities:
BAKARI SELLERS: Like that's fine. Deal with it head-on. That's fine. I don't want to silence the debate. I think it's fine. I think it's healthy. Talk about it.
But I'm also saying that there is a f**king monster that is November 4th.
Vietor deals a crushing line here, and it's the reason donors and elected Dems are fleeing the sinking ship--they know they'll lose with Biden at the helm on Election Day:
TOMMY VIETOR: We're getting our a**es kicked by the monster.
The night of the press conference, Vietor spoke with CNN's Jake Tapper in the waning hours before that newest Biden debacle in front of the world. Tapper asked him whether he thought it was "possible for the president to erase" the damage done to his campaign by the debate.
He said that he thought it was "very hard" to see how that could happen, while quickly cushioning what might be perceived as criticism of Joe Biden with exuberant praise: "I want to say I think that Joe Biden has been a great president. I think the NATO summit today is an example of exactly why...[But] I think the challenge now is, time comes for all of us."
Indeed, it does.
The video below is queued up to begin with the Stewart quote in the post above, although you can watch the whole thing, via YouTube
Related: OPINION: What Is Barack Obama Up To?
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