Also not contradictory. I also believe he has the ability to continue to be a great president. I don’t believe he has the ability to be a great candidate. Being able to be fine in office is of no matter if Trump is in the White House.
I guess, then, in sum: Whatever story someone wants to tell about the state of the general election, there’s some data available somewhere to support it. That durned crystal ball defies invention once again.
I think he can do the job of President, but I worry if he can win the popularity contest that is the election. My concern isn’t whether he’s up to the job for another 4 years. I’m worried if he’s up for the job in these next 4 months. The job he’s facing now is whether he can create enough of an emotional connection in voters so that they actually vote him into office.
It’s kind of like how a handyman has to also be able to get the jobs in the first place. Someone can be great at making home improvements, but if they don’t come across well when looking over the job for the initial quote, they won’t get a lot of jobs. It’s not just how well they can do the job (e.g. tile the bathroom). It’s also how well they can make the customer feel confident that they can actually do the job. Right now with how Biden is acting, it’s not giving people a good feeling about how well he’d do the job regardless of how well he could actually do the job.
That argument is flawed - it assumes that the only reason a Democrat would want Biden to drop out is if they felt he lacked mental fitness. There are other reasons to want him to drop out - like if you think someone else would have a better chance of winning.
Thank you for de-muddying the waters! These are my feelings, precisely.
Biden is a fine president.
He will continue to be a fine president through his 2nd term.
I will vote for him.
I would prefer a candidate who has a better chance of beating Trump, because keeping Trump away from the Oval Office is more important than what happens to Biden.
Yeah, let us just get Biden/Harris into the White House next Jan 20th. i will stop worrying then, The Dems should win the House this time, and keep the senate,
Good thing your vote is the only one that matters. Makes me feel much better.
I don’t get the “And yet this.” Those are horrific numbers when you are only polling the incumbent’s own party.
I’m still panicking.
Just a personal observation: Since Biden took office, I’ve gotten many hours’ amusement out of the various Pit threads about Trump, his enablers and the GOP in general. But since the one-two gut punches of the debate and the SCOTUS ruling, I’m just not finding them funny anymore.
It’s suddenly crashed down on me me that, despite all the ridiculous things they’ve said and done over the last 3+ years, they could actually be back in power come January. Guess the joke’s on us.
My mistake, this is the part of the poll I wanted to respond to.
One thing it could do is help those voters who won’t say openly that they’re anxious about the prospect of a female President—but who are anxious and will vote accordingly. (Without admitting it.) In other words, I’m not talking about MAGA misogynists, but about people who are willing to vote Dem.
If Harris were President for a few weeks or months, and the things the anxious voters feared didn’t happen, then they’d get over their anxiety. (Again: not talking about open misogynists.)
As to what makes people anxious: maybe they suspect that a female President would lead to the women in their own lives being openly rude to them. Gloating about how women are superior. Making nasty remarks about men. Pushing them off the sidewalk as they pass. Or whatever the fear may be.
Anyway, it’s basically a fantasy. Short of Biden dying or becoming so disabled that his family and aides couldn’t get away with Woodrow-Wilsoning him, it won’t happen before Election Day.
I’m anxious about the ability of a possible female candidate to beat Trump.
There were doom and gloom predictions about how badly the debate would affect his chances and public sentiment (the very subject of this thread, in fact). It continues to dominate front pages for some reason.
But in actuality, his standing among the general public has not tanked. At most, it may have shifted slightly.
True, there may have been a small shift in how likely or not some people may get out to the polls and his level of support, but the idea that the campaign was irrevocably doomed (again, the sentiment the evening of the debate and going on even now on these interminable threads) is debunked.
And yet, people continue to deny this as though there’s some kind of hidden majority of Americans who are afraid of expressing this opinion or that his debate performance represents a major shift in public opinion. That simply has not shown itself to be the case. At most, the debate may represent a softening of opinion and “Stop Panicking!” has shown itself to be better advice than “Hey, keep panicking!”
The least effective way to stem panic? Yelling “stop panicking!” 
In any case at least understand the source of the panic?
Before the debate I knew Biden was behind, and that there were a few percent of voters who were not going to vote for him because they had bought into the narrative that he was “too old”, confused, weak …. I wasn’t worried because I was confident that Biden would come out and metaphorically dance rings around Trump in that debate, remove those worries, and run a great ground game that would deliver in the stretch.
My confidence, or at least hope, had that excellent performance, his not actually being feeble, his being easily able to demonstrate his quickness and his energy level, baked in.
He instead baked in the narrative of his age related declines. Events after the debate have not been reassuring.
His campaign came into the debate with his head under water. It had to be the event that got him to pop up to the surface. Telling us that he’s not much more under water than before, so no need to panic, completely misunderstands why so many of us are so worried.
Fair - telling anybody to stop panicking for any reason generally doesn’t work in the first place. Because panic is generally not a reaction that is the result of rational thought and certainly won’t be countered by rationality.
But the broader point that, hey, maybe it’s a good idea to slow down (remembering that this thread was started only a few hours after the debate) and not IMMEDIATELY jump to “head’s off mode” is still valid.
Yes, there’s various reasons for concern but the way people were acting in the aftermath (and a small, small minority still are) was ridiculous.
This is why getting Whitmer as well would be a huge boon. She’d win Michigan and actually is probably a better, in my opinion, overall candidate for president.
I could easily get behind Harris-Whitmer even if I think Whitmer is better.
I’m not saying Michigan is everything, but as of now, I am embarrassed to admit that I think Trump might win Michigan. Very bad if true.
Honestly I’m reading posts from those concerned and thinking that he should drop out as mostly calm and reasoned.
The panic I read is from those who are hysterical over the fact that the discussion is happening and that so many refuse to obey the command to shut up and get in line. And have absolute knowledge that Harris or any other not Biden option is positive to lose.
Yeah I’m not going to tell them not to panic. But personally I see a small window to have a very focused discussion. Once the Democratic convention votes then he is the candidate. And if we need to hope for a late inning grand slam then that’s what we do. And do what we can down ballot to minimize the damage of Trump in office.
If she wasn’t currently serving governor I’d like her a lot more for the job, but I agree that she’d be great.
Well, that was the point of my musings about Harris being able to assume the Presidency now (which I admit is highly unlikely). If the not-straight-out-misogynist voters who are uneasy about a female pres got to live under one for a few weeks or months, they’d see that whatever they were uneasy about wasn’t actually a problem.
The flat-out woman-haters are all Trump fans, obviously. No Democratic candidate was ever going to be able to get their votes.
In the reality that Biden might be persuaded to pass the candidacy torch to Harris, it would become important to give all the less-engaged voters who care about having a ticket to identify with, a new VP pick that catches their attention. If that’s a male with a vigorous-and-tough image, all the better.
Dwayne Johnson for the win!
Just kidding. Mostly.
Biden’s problems with the Arab-identifying population definitely aren’t helping in Michigan, right now.
This is so well-said. Those who believe that post-debate polls are wonderful for Biden are overlooking one crucial fact: even before the debate Biden had the lowest approval ratings of any incumbent running for reelection in history, who was reelected.
That’s from about a week before the debate, by the way. (My bolding.)
Fortunately we have a great Lieutenant Governor, so if she were to win, we’d be fine. It would also setup Gilcrist to run for Governor next.