Napoleon Bonaparte always wanted ‘lucky generals’. In political terms, so-called ‘lucky politicians’ are more often than not, those who the history books consider a success. Joe Biden, it could be said is both lucky and unlucky – unlucky in the sense that he came to the presidency too late, but lucky in that the assassination attempt on Donald Trump and this week’s Republican Convention in Milwaukee should take him out of the headlines and offer him the opportunity to regroup and devise a new strategy for both staying in office and fighting a resurgent Trump.
Unfortunately, Biden is being very badly advised and undertaking interview after interview, presumably in order to show how on top of the job he really is. Unfortunately, each interview has the opposite effect. With every interview, his physical and mental weaknesses become every clearer, to the extent that the question ought not just be, is he capable of running against Trump, but can he see out his term of office?
His supporters tell us that he has good people behind him, and they can take the strain, but the American people did not elect these people in the shadows, they elected Joe Biden in the expectation that he was fit enough to see through his term.
Since that disastrous debate performance, a stream of Democrats have publicly called on Biden to stand down, but he appears resolute in resisting such pleas. He protests that his record speaks for itself and he ain’t goin’ nowhere. So far, the actor and Democratic donor and fundraiser George Clooney has garnered the most headlines when he called on him to go. Nancy Pelosi, the former House Speaker, didn’t quite go as far but she clearly believes Biden to be in the last chance saloon.
Many senior Democrats believe that if Barack Obama and Bill Clinton called on him to do ‘the right thing’, that would be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Maybe, but I’m not so sure. Clinton and Biden do not get on, and Biden has never forgiven Obama for effectively preventing him standing against Trump in 2016, when he was the incumbent vice president. Instead, Obama told Biden ‘It’s Hilary’s turn’.
Biden knows that if he steps out of the race, there would then be growing calls for him to resign the presidency. His wargaming advisers will have warned him about this, as will his wife Jill, sister Valerie and son Hunter. All three of them are key voices he listens to, more than he does to his White House staff. But if he sticks to his guns, there’s little anyone can do to remove him, apart from one thing – involve the 25th amendment to the US constitution. This would truly be the nuclear option.
The 25th amendment was passed in 1967 in the wake of the Kennedy assassination to provide clarity over the presidential succession. There had beeb several occasions in the past where the succession was unclear, or whether a succeeding vice president automatically assumed all presidential powers in the event of an incapacitated president, whether these powers would be temporary, and how the sitting president could reclaim the position in the event of a full recovering from a health condition.
Importantly, it also outlined how a sitting president can be removed. It’s the stuff of TV dramas and both the WEST WING and MADAM SECRETARY have addressed.
It's quite clear that the Republicans want Biden to be Trump’s opponent in November. Biden may not realise this but Kamala Harris, his advisers and his family surely do.
One of Keir Starmer’s mantras is ‘country before party’. If Biden’s closest circle care about the future of their country they know what they have to do. Biden should gracefully quit the race, and do it now. Right in the middle of the Republican convention. The media spotlight would shift away from Trump and he would hive his party the time to coalesce around a new candidate by the time their own Convention starts on 19 August. If Biden doesn’t quit within the next week, it’s up to the American equivalent of the ‘men in grey suits’ to persuade him to. But have they got the balls to do so? We are about to find out.
This article first appeared on iNews on Tuesday 16 July.
