A Misguided Electoral Panic
Joe Biden has been the best president of my lifetime. He’s unquestionably the most progressive president since FDR.
But now many see him as incapable of again defeating Donald Trump. A bad debate performance has led media outlets like the New York Times and Washington Post to redouble efforts to remove Biden as nominee.
I know a lot of people who think Democrats would do better with Kamala Harris heading the ticket. But replacing Biden with Harris —and she is the only real alternative nominee —would be a terrible mistake.
Some very persuasive articles discuss this issue. I hope you will read:
*David Roberts’ brilliant thread on X. He explains why the idea that “all will go well” if Biden is replaced with Harris is a “deeply deranged fantasy.”
*San Francisco’s Rebecca Solnit writing in the Guardian. See “Why is the Pundit Class so desperate to get Biden out of the race?” She notes that the NY Times has run 192 stories on Biden’s capacity since the debate while ignoring Trump’s plans for Project 2025.
*Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos wrote “Switching Out Biden won’t save Democrats from its critics.” He too dispels the idea that the media will start focusing on Trump’s danger to the nation should Harris become the nominee.
Other prominent commentators trying to break through the zealously anti-Biden agenda being promoted by the NY Times and Washington Post include Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, Rachel Bitecofer, Mike Madrid, Marcy Wheeler, Simon Rosenberg, and Nikole Hannah-Jones.
There are many more.
I want to add one point I haven’t seen elsewhere. David Roberts goes back to 2000 in describing how the media has unfairly targeted Democratic Presidential candidates. This pattern actually goes back to 1968, when media spent all its time questioning Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey while giving Richard Nixon a pass.
The media’s treatment of Nixon has remarkable similarities to its cover-up of Donald Trump’s plans to end democracy.
The “New” Nixon
1968 differs from 2024 because Democratic Presidential nominee Hubert Humphrey was opposed by the anti-war movement and the Party was divided. Many believe Robert F. Kennedy would have been the nominee and been elected president had he not been assassinated. Given the turbulence among Democrats, nationally exposed at their notorious 1968 Chicago Convention, media coverage of internal Democratic Party fights was understandable
But that did not excuse the media from focusing post-convention on Humphrey’s shortcomings while ignoring Richard Nixon’s troubling past. Nixon’s campaign created the fiction that he was a “New” Nixon.
The media bought it hook, line and sinker. Just as they are normalizing Donald Trump in 2024.
Nixon also promoted a “secret” peace plan to end the Vietnam War. The media credited Nixon’s invisible plan over Humphrey’s apparent failure to offer a credible alternative. The truth was that candidate Nixon was working behind the scenes to scuttle the real Johnson-Humphrey peace plan—-but that huge political story was missed by the media; it was “discovered” years later.
Like Joe Biden, Hubert Humphrey had an honorable Senate career. He was an early champion of civil rights and a longtime advocate for national health care. In contrast, Richard Nixon was a mean-spirited racist who had little to show for his long career as congressmember, Senator and Vice-President.
Yet the media favored Nixon. It promoted Nixon’s “newness” and ignored his dark history, just as leading outlets ignore the dictatorial ravings of Donald Trump.
I was too young to vote in 1968 but was strongly for Humphrey. I was influenced by my grandmother who knew Nixon’s history and despised him.
The only contested elections where the media fairly covered a Democratic presidential nominee was Bill Clinton in 1992 and Barack Obama in 2008. This was likely because the media never liked George H. W. Bush and had long battles with John McCain, the Republican nominees in those years. The media made up for its support for Clinton in 2000 by boosting the image of George W. Bush as a “regular guy” while portraying Democrat and climate change activist Al Gore as a bit of a weirdo.
Much of the media has proved it has a different agenda from what’s best for the American people. President Biden offers the best chance to defeat Donald Trump. The articles above make it clear why.
