Millions of Americans voted in the two party primaries. Democrats chose Joe Biden and Republicans chose Donald Trump - and both were chosen overwhelmingly. It looked like we were going to have a choice between a decent man who accomplished good things and a lying, sex abusing, felony-convicted narcissist. I was fairly confident the voters would not give Trump a second term.
But then a presidential debate was held and Biden did not do as well as expected - and all hell broke loose in the media (both print and broadcast). Instead of just reporting that Biden had a bad night at the debate, they began reporting that he was now over-the-hill and was too frail to complete a second term. They began to call for Biden to drop out of the race and for Democrats to choose a younger candidate as his replace.
I can understand why the media reacted the way they have. It was a fairly boring presidential race up until the debate and the public was not paying a lot of attention to them. They created a hysteria to boost ratings (and profits). And if it results in a Trump victory, that's Ok with them because covering Trump's disastrous second term would also mean high ratings. It's disappointing, because I had thought at least some of them were better than that.
But even more disappointing are the "fair-weather" Democrats that are showing themselves. They were happy to support Biden when the voters chose him, and things were going fairly well. And they knew the media hysteria was bullshit. Biden had a successful first term, and with a Democratic Senate and House could have done even better in a second term.
They know the media hysteria is ridiculous and untrue, but they have begun to fear for their own jobs. They think the voting public might believe the media (that Biden is a doddering old fool) and fail to show up on Election Day. For them, perception is more important than truth, and they are afraid the perception fostered by the media could affect their down ballot races.
It is an act of political cowardice - and it feeds into the publicly perceived myth that Democrats are weak while Republicans are fighters.
Both the media and the fair-weather Democrats seem to think that all Democrats need to do to win in dump Biden and choose a younger candidate. They are wrong.
How would a new candidate be chosen? The primaries are over, and there's not enough time or money to hold new ones. And holding an open convention would not be fair to the millions of primary voters - and could create a fight that would divide Democrats only about four months before the election. It would give the voters the idea that Democrats are in chaos and unable to rule.
It would be prescription for defeat!
The most important thing for this country is to keep Trump out of the White House. Democrats should be fighting hard to accomplish that - not arguing about who their candidate should be.
