Suddenly, Biden is taking a page from the Trump playbook

President Biden and pastor J. Louis Felton pray at a church service Sunday in Philadelphia.

July 9, 2024 3 AM PT

Hello and happy Tuesday. There are 118 days until the election but honestly, can we please just hold it tomorrow and Get it Over With?

I’ve decided to embrace Donald Trump’s obsession with Weird Capitalization, because It Works.

Monday, Big Don sent out an email announcing that the Republican National Committee “Adopts 2024 Republican Party Platform.”

“We are a Nation in SERIOUS DECLINE,” he warned in language lifted directly from that document. Politicians “rejected our History and our Values. Quite simply, they did everything in their power to destroy our Country.”

The platform promises to fix that with “THE LARGEST DEPORTATION OPERATION IN AMERICAN HISTORY.” No surprise there. It also promised to close the Department of Education and let states decide what schools teach, at which point howling was heard from the grave of John T. Scopes.

But don’t worry. Despite the fact that this is straight out of Project 2025, Trump has never heard of those guys!

And, despite internal bickering, the Republicans dropped contentious vote-losers from their talking points. The platform made no mention of abortion — and promised no cuts to safety-net programs Social Security and Medicare.

And I have to tell you this one because it’s so bizarre: “BUILD A GREAT IRON DOME MISSILE DEFENSE SHIELD OVER OUR ENTIRE COUNTRY.”

So, Trump world is doubling down on winning, saying whatever it is those margin voters want to hear and then some.

But if there is one line that scared me the most, it is this — a clear statement of how democracy crumbles into enforced Christian nationalism: “To protect Religious Liberty, Republicans support a new Federal Task Force on Fighting Anti-Christian Bias that will investigate all forms of illegal discrimination, harassment, and persecution against Christians in America.”

Meanwhile, back at the White House.

President Biden walks across the South Lawn of the White House on Sunday.

Joe drops out, Dark Brandon steps in

Some of ya’ll wanted a new Democratic candidate, so Monday Biden served one up: Populist Joe.

In a letter to Congress and a surprise call-in to MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Biden came out punching (and rambling, to be fair) like his online alter ego Dark Brandon.

He slammed the out-of-touch “elites” for trying to force him out of the race when, he argues, regular folks want him in.

It’s a page out of the Trump 2016 playbook, effective because it makes him seem comfortingly confident and less almost-dead.

“I feel a deep obligation to the faith and the trust the voters of the Democratic Party have placed in me to run this year,” Biden wrote. “It was their decision to make. Not the press, not the pundits, not the big donors, not any selected group of individuals, no matter how well intentioned.”

Later, Biden held a call with mega-donors and basically told them to buzz off. It’s a game of chicken at this point — the donors can say they’ll stop giving. But if Biden stays in (with no further disasters) do they really put their cash back in the mattress and let democracy crumble?

Oh, Joe. Can you remember how we got here? Don’t worry, I can’t either.

But in this, I’m on Joe’s side. For all the hand-wringing since the debate disaster, I am not seeing an uprising of voters demanding he step down. Pundits need to pundit, and rich people are appalled and distressed whenever their soup is too cold.

But polls show Biden actually inched up to take the lead in two key swing states: Michigan and Wisconsin, and is within striking distance in four other swing states. So he’s far from out of this race, literally and figuratively.

That shows a key distinction that voters are making: There is a huge difference between “Should he be running?” and “Will you vote for him anyway?”

From my extremely unscientific polling of friends, relatives and wine-drinking moms at book club, the answers are respectively probably not and hell, yes.

Two reasons seem to back those answers. First, the real threat of fascism, which cannot be overstated. See above.

Second, Kamala Harris is in all practicality the only option aside from Biden, and — love her or hate her — no one is sure that switch wins any voters.

Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t. Is it worth the risk of finding out?

Episode vs. diagnosis

But that doesn’t mean we should all line up behind Biden with no questions. There are two issues that we should be asking about.

First, was that a one-off bad night, as Biden claims — or were we looking at something lasting and significant?

As Nancy Pelosi put it right after the debate: “I think it’s a legitimate question to say, is this an episode, or is this a condition?”

We all know what we saw, but the truth is, you can’t diagnose dementia through a television. But you can speculate endlessly.

The New York Times reported Monday that a Parkinson’s specialist has been to the White House eight times during the last eight months.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters in a contentious briefing that Biden has seen a neurologist three times as part of his routine physicals, and has not been diagnosed with Parkinson’s or any other degenerative neurological disease. Later Monday, as questions continued to rage, the White House clarified that the Parkinson’s doctor was not examining Biden. So there was an entire news cycle that could have been avoided with caution on one side and clarity on the other.

Cue the conspiracy theories anyway. Republicans are having a blast claiming that the media and Biden insiders have been hiding the truth for months. Some media have pushed back with the idea that they had inklings something was up, but nothing definitive. Anonymous sources rule the news cycle, claiming Biden has declined and everybody knows it.

The ability to govern vs. the ability to campaign

Enough with the anonymous sources and innuendo. Are we seeing a push for Biden to step aside because people think he can’t win — or because he can’t govern?

If someone in the White House, Congress or government-at-large has actual knowledge of an instance in which Biden has shown an inability to govern, out with it.

Blowing a debate is vastly different than say, forgetting how the nuclear codes work or even just forgetting the name of a head of state. If that type of lapse is occurring, there is a duty for whoever knows it to come forward, regardless of consequence.

This is about more than politics. This is about democracy. So the idea that those close to Biden know something — or that Biden himself is lying about a diagnosis — is serious.

But we have yet to see anyone step forward with that kind of knowledge. And I don’t think we will — whether you think Biden is too old to run or not, it is hard to deny that he has always been a man of decency, and surrounded himself with others who believe in decency as a governing principle.

I don’t think if Biden had been given a life-altering diagnosis such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s, that he would hide it from the American people to gain four more years as president — knowing he would be unlikely to physically serve all that time. Knowing the truth would eventually come out, knowing it would cement a legacy as a selfish liar who put himself above country.

Call me naive, but I think he’s a better man than that.

And if I’m wrong? If he just wants to win and see where it all goes? If he has dementia and no one will tell him? If he has another debate-level meltdown (the NATO conference is in town this week and he will be under heavy public scrutiny) that makes it clear it doesn’t matter what’s going on, Joe needs to go?

Harris is still right there, ready to step in if Biden has to step down — either as a candidate or a president. Because if we honestly believe he isn’t fit to run, doesn’t that mean he’s not fit to serve?

Shouldn’t we be demanding Pops hands over the car keys now instead of in November?

So we are left where we were before the debate: A candidate Too Old to Campaign the way we would like, Too Stubborn to step aside, but who also retains as Good a Chance as Democrats have of beating Trump.

For this election, that’s democracy.