Joe Biden unexpectedly drops out of the 2024 race leaving Kamala Harris the heir apparent.

 

Joe Biden has dropped out of the 2024 presidential race ending his political career. NBC News. Questions bout Biden's mental acuity became more relevant after a disastrous debate with Republican candidate Donald Trump. Biden faced widespread calls to drop out and be replaced by another candidate from members of his own party, calls which have increased in the past week. Biden had said for weeks that he was not going to drop out but according to his staffers he made the decision at 1:45 pm ET and sent out a tweet indicating he was dropping out of the race a minute later, leaving his staffers blind sided. Vice president Kamala Harris got Biden's endorsement and may now be the candidate nominated at the Democrats convention next week. The move will be a nightmare for Democrats as no candidate has quit this late in the race. There will also be challenges from Republicans in some states which do not allow a candidate to be replaced this late in the game. 

My fellow Democrats, I have decided not to accept the nomination and to focus all my energies on my duties as President for the remainder of my term. My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President. And it’s been the best… pic.twitter.com/x8DnvuImJV

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) July 21, 2024

My Comment:

I've got to admit that I got this story wrong. I thought for sure that Joe Biden would not be dropping out of the race. I didn't think his pride would let him as that has always been the worst of his many, many sins. But I am guessing that Biden was convinced that it would be more humiliating to lose to Donald Trump than to step down. 

Biden said that there were three options for him dropping out of the race: 

1. Divine intervention 

2. A medical issue

3. Polling showing that Biden could not beat Trump.

We can rule out #1 I guess. If Biden did get a divine message to drop out that would be funny but I doubt that is what happened. #3 is the most likely, Biden probably saw the same polling everyone has that show Biden both far behind in the popular vote and beyond help in the electoral college. Given that the first post assassination and post RNC-convention polls were probably available for him, I am guessing he finally saw the writing on the law and wanted to avoid humiliation. 

But I don't know if we can rule out #2. Biden supposedly got a Coronavirus infection but could it have been a cover for a more serious illness. Biden looked terrible getting off the plane after the diagnosis and it could be that his senility had advanced rapidly. If that's the case than it's absurd that he's still the president and it seems unlikely that he will any time soon. 

I think this is a terrible idea for the Democrats. They are likely to lose in 2024 regardless, but I still think that Joe Biden had the best chance of winning out of any of the candidates. Getting rid of him is going to suck what little momentum the Democrats have and it will cause a massive fight between now and the convention. Whatever small chance the Democrats had in 2024 appears to be totally gone now. 

Kamala Harris is the heir apparent but there is no guarantee that she will be the candidate. There will be an effort to get rid of her too as she polls as badly or worse than Joe Biden. She's also hugely unpopular and has been rejected by voters of her own party in 2020 and couldn't even win her own state before dropping out. I consider her completely insufferable and given the recent backlash to affirmative action and DEI, it's insane to nominate a candidate that totally embodies those traits. 

But it looks like she's got a decent chance of being the candidate, mostly because to get rid of her means getting rid of Biden's $200 million war chest. Picking a different candidate is technically possible but doing so would not be easy and it's doubtful that a decent candidate (which may not exist in the current Democratic Party, they nominated Biden after all) would want the job. Indeed, Harris might have trouble finding a VP candidate of her own., she might be smart to offer it to Joe Biden himself, despite the fact that he's incapable. They would have continuity there and it would not anger the genuine Biden supporters out there.  

The real question is what the Democrats expect from Kamala Harris. Is this a genuine attempt to have her win or is she the sacrificial lamb so they can say forever that they lost in 2024 because America is racist? The sane thing would be to divert money from the presidential race and try and get a tourniquet on the down ballot races in the Senate and House. But I am guessing that this is their desperate attempt to beat Donald Trump. 

As for Joe Biden, the best news for this is that he officially has zero chance of being President in 2025. Given how horrible of a president he is, I am glad at that at least. It doesn't fill me with optimism that he could be replaced by Kamala Harris who might be the one person on earth that would do a worse job that Biden has. 

Republicans are in a good position, even though I think most would have rather had Biden still in the race. Uncertainty is never a good thing and it will make people nervous. But Harris is a very weak candidate and that was true even before her involvement in the Biden administration. Every attack against Biden's record will land on her and in some ways she is worse, since the border was assigned to her and she did nothing to fix things. Even Biden's senility will be an issue for her as she either knew about it and didn't do anything to stop it or inform the American people that their president was a rutabaga or she honestly didn't know which means she is either as senile as Biden or incredibly stupid and out of touch. I'd believe either but it's not going to play well for her. And if they replace her? Then they are going to have an even bigger Democrat civil war than they already have. 

I think Trump is essentially unbeatable under these circumstances. Given the poor state of the economy, the absolute disaster foreign policy has been under Biden and the fact that people remember that things were better under Trump than Biden, it would have been hard to beat Trump even without the events of the last month or so. But after the triple disasters of the debate, the Trump assassination and now the instability at the head of the Democrats ticket, Trump has a huge advantage over whoever the candidate is. The Democrats are demoralized and divided while the Republicans are as united and enthusiastic as they have ever been under Trump.  

What will be the Democrats strategy if Harris is indeed the candidate? I am guessing that they will go full "everything we disagree with is racist" for any and all criticism for Harris. They will also have the media on their side and they are likely to go full conspiracy theory about Trump's own age and mental acuity. Those things aren't really in question, Trump has shown no signs of senility, which would be obvious if you saw his long and impressive acceptance speech, but they will try anyways. Also expect more whining about project 2025, which has so far done little other than convince Redditors that the end is coming.

Regardless of what happens, this news cycle has been insane. The past week alone has had the Trump assassination, the CrowdStrike disaster and now Biden dropping out. It's been a little much to say the least. This is the wildest election cycle I have ever seen and that includes the 2016 victory against Hillary Clinton and the 2000 massive fight between Bush and Gore. Anything can happen at this point and I won't rest easy until Donald Trump is sworn in...