Joe Biden is old and, unfortunately for Democrats, everyone can see it.
Nate Silver, prominent pollster formerly of the 538 Blog, wrote on his own blog recently that the trends reveal Joe Biden is no longer the favorite to win the 2024 election. Just in the past year, there's been a huge slide.
If you'd asked me a year ago, I would have told you that Joe Biden was a reasonably clear favorite in the event of a rematch against Donald Trump.
Not an overwhelming favorite, mind you. But perhaps a 65:35 favorite...
If he were 10 years younger, he might still be a 65/35 favorite. But if his campaign is substantially encumbered by his age, he's probably the underdog. If you're someone who would rather not see Trump re-elected again or who cares about the election for other reasons, it's time to face the facts. You need to adjust to the new reality and not be mired in anchoring bias by your previous impression of the race.
Yeah, his introduction explains why he no longer thinks Biden is the favorite, primarily because he's an old man who needs someone to watch him take the stairs and may or may not have pooped himself at the Vatican.
Silver breaks down Biden's polling problems and electability issues into three categories.
First, Biden's approval ratings absolutely stink and, in an election year, that really, really matters. In the middle of the term? Who cares! 9 months from the election? Yeah, everyone cares!
So it's no longer safe to ignore that Biden has consistently trailed Trump in polls both nationally and (more importantly) in swing states. Or that Biden's approval rating is just 39 percent and shows no signs of improvement, well below the threshold that would ordinarily make a president a favorite for re-election.
The second problem Silver identifies is that Trump is not looking quite as weak as he did even a year ago. Trump is going to sweep the Republican primaries, none of the cases against him are moving very fast and even if they did they've only helped his approval rating, and the economy was better under Trump, so he has the "were you better off 4 years ago" line at his employ.
Finally, Silver acknowledges that Biden's age is a giant issue for voters. People went into 2020 assuming Biden would be a one-term president and hand the reigns off to someone younger.
Shockingly, the DC swamp creature who has (for decades) used his position to enrich himself and his family wasn't as eager to give away power as the Democrats thought he would be.
So now they're stuck with an ancient man against a person that people may not like, but who proved to be better for the country.
But [Biden‘s] losing now and there's no plan to fix the problems other than hoping that the polls are wrong or that voters look at the race differently when they have more time to focus on it. Neither is so implausible and it is likely to be a close race. But even the most optimistic Democrats, if you read between the lines, are really arguing that Democrats could win despite Biden and not because of him.
The Democrats are entering panic mode and, unless they make a switch at the convention, it's looking like a train wreck for them.
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