Redburn Reads, Oct. 1, 2023
Friends,
Can Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump next year?
I still think so, but I have to admit, given the constant drumbeat of polls showing voters consider Biden too old for a second term, that I’m not as confident as I once was. And a lot of prominent people are starting to panic, leading to calls for Biden to step aside or for someone to challenge him for the Democratic nomination. So as a nearly 73-year-old geezer myself, I thought I’d share some of the different viewpoints I’ve read on the question.
I’ve been out of the RR business lately, mostly because I’ve been battling a bout of sciatica that has been plaguing me pretty much all year, but which has been especially painful since late July. I’m hopeful things will improve now that I’ve finally had an epidural injection. But getting out of bed each morning is still difficult and I’ve found it hard to get going in the morning. I’m consulting two surgeons in October to explore my options for back surgery in hopes of finding a more long-lasting solution. OK, enough about me.
Let’s start with the fact that Biden is already old and he’s getting older. It shows. Yes, Trump is almost as old, and he’s a lot more mentally impaired than Biden. But it doesn’t show as much to the typical voter, because he’s been rambling incoherently for a long time, he doesn’t feel the need to make sense so he just babbles on rather than stumbling over words. Biden, on the other hand, has been dealing with a stutter his whole life – and he actually tries to be coherent when he talks.
Still, among voters, Biden has a real problem – and I’m not going to spare you some blunt truths from insightful insiders.
For his Morning Shots newsletter, never-Trumper Charlie Sykes discussed Biden’s age in late August with Mike Murphy, a thoughtful anti-Trump Republican political operative who worked for John McCain. Here’s some excerpts:

On Wednesday, I sat down with campaign guru Mike Murphy to talk 2024. Our conversation ranged over the state of the race; the fallout from the debate; and the clash between a psychopathic Donald Trump and a deeply cynical politician like Nicki Haley. You can listen to the whole lively conversation here.
Charlie Sykes: Okay, so let's take a deep breath and dive into this: The Joe Biden Problem. Because I do sense there's a certain amount of denialism or a certain amount of fatalism about all of this. We get a lot of pushback saying, 'Stop talking about Joe Biden’s age.'
Mike Murphy: Make it go away.
Charlie Sykes: My response is: It's not going to go away. Denial is really not a not a sound strategy.
And the reality is, if you talk to any voters in the real worl, — I mean, any voter — every conversation, and I mean, every—every—conversation, will eventually get to the question of Joe Biden's age. Now you went out there and you said that Joe Biden should step aside, not run. That's obviously not going to happen right now.
So, let's just talk about this.
My real fear here is that everything's hanging by a thread. And you only need a couple of Grandpa Joe moments. If something happens to Joe Biden next September or October, like what happened to Mitch McConnell, all bets are off. I mean, it is a terrifying thing.
Do the Democrats have a Plan B? And are you sure that that would actually be a better idea for them? So make your case.
Mike Murphy: Yeah, those are the questions. Joe Biden has what I call a '2 + 2 = 5 problem.' When you're an incumbent running for reelection, historically, the election is a referendum on you: keep him or fire him.
Right now, perception is reality. The perception is he's doing a lousy job on the economy, and that is death for a president running for reelection, politically.
Now, they have time to change that perception. But it's hard to do. People believe what they believe.
Charlie Sykes: Right. Why do they believe that? Because the Democrats will say, 'Well, look, the unemployment rate is at historic lows,
Mike Murphy: It's true.
Charlie Sykes: Inflation is coming down. What is with these people?
Mike Murphy: The numbers are good, but that's not the prism. People look at real wages. What can I buy, for what I earn? And they're only starting to creep up now. They've been stagnant. They feel inflation. They feel it in the car payment, the mortgage, the grandkids can't afford a house because of mortgages; and the last two years have gone way up for the same house. . ..
So, he's got the perception problem there. Then the one thing Trump beats him on in surveys is running the economy, which is a very scary number.
Mike Murphy: The other thing is the age deal. The age problem, if you're president, is like all of a sudden, you wake up one day and you've got antlers.
And you go down to announce the great news that we found a cure for cancer, and all anybody wants to say is 'What are those antlers?' It won't go away. So, when they say, 'Hey, old grandpa is not the guy to fix the economy, which is throwing me' — that's 2 + 2= 5. That is the lock they're in.
You look at their quotes, and they remind me —if you go back, being Jurassic, I do stuff like this— and you look at what Democrats used to say about Jimmy Carter in 1980: 'Well, everybody hates him, but they've nominated a crackpot old actor who used to be in movies with monkeys. No way that nut will win.'
They forget it's fundamentally a referendum on the guy in the chair. So, they’ve got to fix Biden's perception on the economy.
Now they're trying to. They opened the campaign with a big, 60-second television ad, which was what incumbents in trouble always tell the consultants to run. 'Well, why don't we do an ad about all my great accomplishments? I wrote a script.' It's 40 minutes long. And the ad is basically, 'Hey, idiot: Don't you know while you're screwing around, I've been getting up early and I passed the equity and manufacturing bill and blah, blah, blah, listen up.'
And you know, voters don't work that way.
They're like, 'What are you doing for me right now that I can feel and where are we going?'
So, the Biden spot, which is everything's going great, is the wrong spot.
So, they're trying to force feed the good news, which people tend to— like all forced-feedings—gag on. So anyway, they don't fix that because they can't fix age. I dread the day it's so bad they put out the press release for Biden taking a karate lesson or something. I can see how bad that could go. All the 'Biden is fine talk' No, people don't think he's fine.
And here’s the perspective of Daniel Drezner, a very smart liberal academic, writing in his own Substack feed.
This is an perfectly valid issue to raise. Joe Biden is 80 years old right now; that is already the oldest age of any U.S. president ever.¹ If he is re-elected, he will be 82 years old when he’s sworn in. He will be 86 if he finishes his second term — which, by the by, only a third of U.S. voters are convinced would happen. Folks can talk about modern health care and how today’s 80 years old is not like last century’s 80 years old all they want — Joe Biden is still a very, very old.
The polling that has been conducted on this issue also shows that no matter how much Biden boosters want to move past this, voters have not gotten there yet. Pick your poll — Associated Press, Fox News — and the result is the same. Heck, in the AP poll, 69% of Democrats stated that Biden was too old to be effective for all four years. When the media says that voters are concerned, they’re not lying.
It’s not just that Biden is old — he looks old. The hard-working staff here at Drezner’s World googled “Biden old” for stories because that’s the kind of crackerjack research team I have. Here’s a picture from one story from The Hill this past July:
It is my professional political opinion that Joe Biden looks like a raisin. A raisin that has been sucking on a lemon for the last decade. When he’s walking, he looks like a shriveled raisin looking for more lemon juice to drink up.
Yes, the media is playing a role here. As Derek Thompson recently noted, “the sheer volume of Old Biden content reflects that we're barreling toward a rematch between one guy whose depravity is very old news and another whose superpower is not making much news, and that's a genuine crisis for takes.” It’s not a big role, however. Biden’s age is a fact. The polling data is a fact. The media has very little need to gin up the age take.
You know who has a legitimate problem sounding coherent? That would be Donald J. Trump, Biden’s predecessor and likely 2024 challenger. In just the past week, Trump claimed that he defeated Barack Obama in 2016, that Americans need ID to buy bread, and that Biden is leading the U.S. into the Second World War. He froze up during one of this campaign ramblings in South Dakota. Mainstream media observers are beginning to ask the same questions about Trump’s age as Biden’s It’s not surprising that the Fox News poll found that 52% of Americans don’t think that Trump possesses the “mental soundness to serve” as president. This might explain why Trump, of all people, does not think Biden is too old to be president. So all I ask is that when campaign reporters bring up Biden’s age, they also ask hard questions about Trump’s age.
To the question, is Joe Biden too old, my friend and former Washington Monthly colleague Jim Fallows adds some much needed perspective.
Is Joe Biden ‘Too Old?’
Sure. But it's the wrong question. Here are some better ones.
The “too” standard has been the premise of many recent pundit pieces saying that Biden should step down as “too old”, or that challengers in the party should ease or force him out. I’ll let you find those pieces on your own. I’ll just note that virtually all of these calls have come from people looking for angles in writing about the 2024 race. Virtually none have come from elected Democratic officials or Democratic candidates with direct personal stakes in the election’s outcomes. If they really thought Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were dragging them down, they would run against them — as Edward Kennedy did against Jimmy Carter in 1980, as Pat Buchanan did against George H.W. Bush in 1992.
What are the questions that do make sense about Joe Biden, about age, about generational shifts, and about press coverage? Here are six possibilities:
1) Is gerontocracy a problem?
Yes, indeed. I wrote about the problem early this year, and a year before that. It is most acute in life-tenure positions, and most destructive of all with the flagrantly unaccountable US Supreme Court. . .
2) ‘What happens then?’ The problem with magical thinking.
People who argue that Joe Biden should “step down” or “step aside” usually avoid discussing what would happen next. It’s like saying “Saddam Hussein should be removed” without considering: OK, what happens then?
Suppose Biden steps aside, before the 2024 election. There are 50 prominent Democrats who think their turn is due, who are sure they could perform better in office.
Actually, there are 500 of these people.
The day after the 2024 election, however it turns out, all 50 of them—all 500—will launch their campaigns. They’ll argue that they are the right person for the job. And, crucially, that other people are the wrong choice.
These campaigns are necessary for the future of the party. But they are bruising and destructive while they’re underway. The Democratic party will—necessarily and usefully—face this fratricide the next time around. It’s the natural cycle. The party is avoiding this embittering warfare right now for one reason only: because it already has a president and vice president in place.3) The virtues of age: Misunderstanding the job of being president.
Joe Biden is a better president as an old man than he would have been as a young man.
Biden ran for president, and lost, in 1988 when he was 46, and in 2008, when he was 66. (And became Obama’s vice president.) He ran once more in 2020, when he was 78, and survived, thanks to the Democratic primary voters of South Carolina, and then won the nomination and the presidency.
Why is Biden better as an old president than he would have been as a young one? Because experience, or luck, or Providence, has equipped him for the two essential aspects of the job (which, inconveniently, don’t make for great breaking-news coverage).
One of those is judgment. Not the second-by-second go/no-go decisions in the Situation Room that are glamorized in news accounts or critiqued at press conferences. They are part of a president’s responsibilities, but not the major part. The real test of a president is the larger strategic decisions, the ones that are pondered-over: We should draw a line and pick this fight. We should do our best to avoid this other fight.
I contend that Biden’s judgment on all of the biggest questions has been good. That is, I agree with most of his calls. The real point is that his judgment is probably better than it would have been in his 40s.4 And he is less anxious about “proving himself.”
4) The ‘too old’ meme brings out the very worst in the press.
The NYT’s latest big “Biden is too old” takeout based its headline and its lead anecdote on something anyone with international travel has experienced—bewilderment about what time it is, when you have arrived some place many time zones away. Apparently Biden, now age 80, asked “it’s evening here, right?” on arrival in Vietnam. In my 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s I have asked questions like that when arriving in Australia, China, Singapore, or elsewhere in the region. You’re in a fog. You don’t know what day it is, let alone what hour. Then the Times went for its classic “raises questions” framing:
The president is also facing persistent questions about his age and effectiveness as a messenger for his own agenda — part of a broader conversation in Washington about leaders, some with health problems, who remain in office well into their 80s or 90s.
“Persistent questions.” “Broader conversation.” In related NYT stories, “Provides ammunition for” and “Will lead to criticism that..”
If you think he’s too old, say that. Don’t give us “persistent questions” or “broader conversation.” That is beneath any reporter’s dignity—and I say that as my own judgment, not as something I’m pretending gives rise to “persistent questions.” . . .6) Overall.
Judge the policies and record of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as you will. Recognize that Biden is the oldest person ever to hold this office. And that Donald Trump is the second-oldest. And that any candidate for this office will be imperfect, so that every choice is “compared to the alternatives.”
But don’t waste any more time telling me that Biden is “old.” Everybody knows that. Tell us things we don’t already know.
Another Washington Monthly alum, Jonathan Alter, also weighs in on the Biden age question. It doesn’t add any new information, but it is a fun read, so you might enjoy clicking on the link for the full version.
The following is — for now, at least — a fantasy. None of the people below have shown the slightest interest — at least in public — in urging Biden to withdraw. The chances of him changing his mind remain slim. But if the recent ABC News/Washington Post poll showing him trailing Donald Trump by 10 points—now an outlier— were to be replicated in the coming weeks, those odds could change. Biden isn’t surrounded by sycophants but his advisers all have a vested interest in his running. So he needs to talk to other people of stature who are willing to tell him some hard truths, and to explain why stepping aside is actually in his interest. Biden’s innermost circle consists of Jill Biden, Valerie Biden (his sister) and Ted Kaufman, who worked with Valerie on his first campaign in 1972 and served out his term in the Senate when he became vice-president in 2009. This delegation of dignitaries would have to convince them, too.
Here’s how they might try to make the case:
THE PRESIDENT:
Hey, everyone. Welcome. This feels a bit like an intervention, but that’s OK. I understand your concerns. I really do. So go ahead and make the case for taking away the keys, but, please, not to my Corvette. I told my kids and grandkids they’ll have to rip ‘em from my hands.
THE FIRST LADY:
They never will. . . .
NANCY PELOSI:
None of us here think you’re out of touch, Mr. President. We all think you’ve been a great leader for our country. The question is whether you’re a great candidate and the best person to beat Trump.
NANCY PELOSI:
But our voters want alternatives for the nomination — a democratic process for a president who loves democracy. They are shouting this as loud as they can.
CHUCK SCHUMER:
The polls are crazy consistent on this.
THE PRESIDENT:
I’m beginning to neutralize the age issue on the stump by saying that “I’m 600 years old” and it gets a big laugh.
BARACK OBAMA:
I wish the humor neutralized it, Joe. I really do.
CHUCK SCHUMER:
What’s scary is that all of our terrific gains in special elections this year are not rubbing off on you. . .
THE PRESIDENT:
Abortion and Trump on trial for months on end and all the batshit crazy stuff he says. Look, I’ll bounce back next year.
NANCY PELOSI:
Maybe, Mr. President. But the die may have already been cast. You said you were a transitional figure and now you’re clinging to power. That’s the way it looks to independents and to an awful lot of Democrats.. . .
THE PRESIDENT:
That proves my point. Do I really have to remind all of you that I’m the only who has beaten Trump? Anyone else would do worse against him.
NANCY PELOSI:
With all due respect, Mr. President, we no longer believe that’s true. This cycle is different from 2020 in important ways. We think almost any younger Democrat would match up really well against Trump and would be the only way to beat Nikki Haley or some other young Republican if one of them somehow pulls an upset. Nobody here wants to see you challenged for the nomination, which would be disastrous. We just think it’s best for the party for you to step aside in favor of new leadership, as I did with Hakeem.
THE PRESIDENT:
But you knew Hakeem was good. Who would we nominate instead of me?
CHUCK SCHUMER:
That’s what primaries are for.
VAL BIDEN:
You’ll rip apart the party that Joe has done so much to unify. . .
THE PRESIDENT:
You still haven’t convinced me that my record and incumbency wouldn’t mean more than a fresh face.
BILL CLINTON:
You understood in your ’72 race what has always been the case: These elections are about the future, not the past. Why do you think I ran on “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow” in ’92 and “Let’s build a bridge to the 21st Century” in ’96?
BARACK OBAMA:
My whole ’08 campaign was “Turn the page.” . . .
THE PRESIDENT:
You all have given me a lot to think about. Thanks for coming by.
You’re probably still worried, and rightly so. A second Trump presidency would be a far worse disaster than his first time in the Oval Office, when he still was forced to listen to some rational advisers. In a second term, he’d surround himself exclusively with sycophants and MAGA crazies.
But if you are panicking over the latest polls, take a moment to read an extremely informative take by former AFL-CIO political director Michael Podhorzer, writing in The Washington Monthly, calls "Mad Poll Disease._
On Sunday, an ABC/Washington Post poll gave us all heart attacks when it showed President Biden trailing former President Trump by ten percentage points. Responsibly, the Post and ABC took pains to say that that result was an “outlier.” But, more than a year before the 2024 election—before any of Trump’s trials or jury verdicts, before House Republicans do or don’t impeach Biden, before another sure-to-be-controversial Supreme Court term, and who knows what else—pretty much every major media outlet has weighed in with headline-grabbing polls showing Trump and Biden to be running even.
All of this has created enormous panic – both from Democratic partisans, and from everyone else who dreads a second (and forever) Trump Administration. Could it really be true that Americans are more likely to elect Trump after he tried to overthrow the election than before?
If you share this panic, you might be suffering from Mad Poll Disease. Symptoms include anxiety, problems sleeping, loss of affect, and feelings of helplessness about the future of democracy, which are only exacerbated by frantic Twitter exchanges about polling methodology and sample bias.
Today, I want to show that, regardless of the methodology, pollster, or publication, horse race polls— more formally known as “trial heats,” which ask respondents whom they intend to vote for—are worse than useless. This is especially true more than a year ahead of the election – but, as I’ll explain, it’s also true in the weeks and months before. . .
Horse Race Polling Can’t Tell Us Anything We Don’t Already Know
To begin to cure Mad Poll Disease, make this your mantra: Horse race polling can’t tell us anything we don’t already know before Election Day about who will win the Electoral College.
All we know, or can know, is this:
1. A popular vote landslide is very unlikely.
America is a rigidly divided nation in which the last six presidential elections have been decided by an average of 3 points, and, since 1996 (other than 2008), none have been decided by as much as 5 points.
2. The Electoral College is too close to call.
The Electoral College will almost certainly be decided by which candidate wins at least Georgia or Pennsylvania, plus two out of three of the other battleground states: Arizona, Michigan, and Wisconsin. (In a few less likely scenarios, Democrats would need to hold onto Nevada as well.) In both 2016 and 2020, the margin of victory in most of these five states was less than 1 point. Yet FiveThirtyEight found that the best polling had differed from the actual results in 2022 by only 1.9 percentage points on average. In other words, in 2016 and 2020, first Trump and then Biden won the states they needed to win the Electoral College by margins too small for the “best” polling to detect in the weeks before the midterms, when tens of millions of people had already voted.
3. Whether the anti-MAGA vote turns out again in the battleground states will determine the winner.
Unlike a voter’s choice between Biden and Trump—which hasn’t changed much in the last several years and is very unlikely to change in the next one—those who do not vote in every election are notoriously poor at forecasting their own behavior even a month before the election.
Since 2016, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin have been a continuous ground zero for referendums on MAGA candidates. When the stakes of electing a MAGA candidate are clear to voters in those states, MAGA consistently loses. That’s why, in the 2022 midterms, the Red Wave never happened in those states. When Trump won all five of those states in 2016, Republicans had state government trifectas in four of the states, as well as six of the 10 U.S. Senators. Since 2016, Trump and other MAGA candidates have lost 23 of the 27 presidential, Senate, and governors’ races in those states and only Georgia’s state government still has a Republican trifecta.
If polls taken weeks or months before the election can’t tell us anything useful about close races (which, again, are the only races that matter in our current system), why on earth would we pay attention to polls taken more than a year out?
Worry about the possibility of Trump redux and the fate of democracy, sure. But the best cure for Mad Poll disease is not to obsess over the polls but live your life as fully as possibly and then do what you can to influence a few voters in critical battleground states like Wisconsin, Arizona and Georgia. That’s my goal.
Take care,
Tom