Quit now, Joe
We got used to Joe Biden’s serial gaffes long ago. “That’s just Joe,” his friends and supporters say about his latest gaffes today.
I’m not one to make fun of him by calling him “Sleepy Joe” or any of his other nicknames, but now I’m starting to feel sorry for Biden.
He’s showing signs of mental confusion. And he’s looking and acting way too old for his political aspirations.
If I could talk to Biden, I’d tell him the truth everyone knows but doesn’t have the heart to say out loud: “Joe, face reality. It’s time to get off the stage. You don’t need any more of this campaign crap. It’s time to quit while more people still love you than feel sorry for you. While you still have a little dignity left. While you still have time to spend with your family.”
Biden knows the score better than any pundit or fake journalist you’ve seen on TV.
He knows he’s too old and too out of touch to run. But he won’t admit it. He’s hanging on, pretending he has a political future when all he has is a past.
It’s only because of his name recognition that Biden is still leading in the polls, basically doubling up on the numbers of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
But Biden is kidding himself if he thinks he can win the primary and defeat Trump next year.
In today’s new leftward sliding Democrat Party, he’s a living relic, another over-the-hill D.C. lifer with stale ideas pretending to be “woke” and carrying too much politically incorrect baggage from yesteryear.
Biden’s popularity in his own party peaked months ago and can only go downhill from here.
When the dozen Green New Dealers running for president start dropping by the wayside, their left-wing supporters are not going to all jump on the Biden Bandwagon. They’ll sign on with Warren or Sanders.
What Biden is doing is re-running the Hillary Clinton campaign — only four years later.
It’s not working for him, either.
He still thinks that he’ll take the White House next fall by repeating the campaign slogan “I may be too old. I may be too moderate. I may be boring. But only I can beat Trump.”
That might have worked for him in 2016, but we’ll never know because he deferred to President Obama’s wishes and the Clinton Machine.
Now Biden’s running a hapless, desperate, half-hearted campaign that’s become more like a personal sob-story tour.
In Iowa he’s been doing what he wouldn’t have done four years ago — using the death of his wife and daughter in a 1972 traffic accident as a way to talk about the importance of free health care for all.
So what should poor Joe do?
If I were advising him, I’d tell him to do exactly what Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck did: retire.
Luck shocked the pro football world this week by calling a press conference and saying he had decided to quit the game he loved — at 29.
Luck explained that after seven years in the NFL, he was too physically beat up and mentally worn out to go on.
Biden doesn’t have $50 million to live on like Luck does. But he does have the $15 million he’s reportedly made since he left the Obama administration.
That booty and a dozen speeches a year ought to be enough to keep Biden and his loved ones from having to move into a sidewalk tent in Los Angeles.
So what should Biden do?
Does he want to leave the national political playing field as a successful VP or as a failed presidential candidate?
Does he drop out of the race on his own or risk embarrassing himself so much he’s pushed out.
If I were him, I’d call Andrew Luck for guidance.
The viewpoints expressed above are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The Independent.
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