After the disaster in the confrontation with Trump on TV, the president Joe Biden should step back and withdraw from the race for the White House. The analysis that Thomas Friedman, one of the great American columnists, winner of three Pulitzer Prizes, makes in the New York Times of tonight’s debate between the Democratic candidate and the tycoon is merciless.
In an editorial titled “President Biden is my friend. He must drop out of the race,” Friedman writes that the debate “It made me cry. I can’t remember a more heartbreaking moment in the American presidential campaign. in my life”.
But Friedman is not alone. In fact, there are several US political analysts have expressed concern about the poor performance of the president ahead of the November elections. Many have criticized Biden for his confusing statements.
CNN political commentator Van Jonesa special adviser to former President Barack Obama, called Biden’s performance “pitiful.” “He’s doing his best. But tonight he was faced with the test of regaining the trust of the country and the (Democratic) base. And he failed to overcome that,” Jones said.
Another CNN analyst, John Kingopened the post-debate discussion by saying that there was now “a deep, broad, very aggressive panic in the Democratic Party” following Biden’s “poor” performance. As a result, some in the party were “talking” about asking Biden to “step aside,” King said.
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Meanwhile Trump would have won the TV debate, according to what emerges in the meantime from a CNN instant poll conducted via text messages among 565 registered US voters who said they had witnessed the confrontation live on TV. The percentages are quite clear. According to 67%, the former president had a better performance, while before the debate 55% of the same sample of respondents said they expected Trump to win in the debate.
Also according to the poll, 57% said they had no real confidence in Biden’s ability to lead the country and 44% supported the same of Trump. Only 36% of those who watched the debate said they had a lot of confidence in the former president’s ability to lead the country and 14% said the same of Biden.
Dem fears: “Disoriented, difficult to support him”
The US president’s performance has meanwhile set off alarm bells and panic in the democratic establishment, leading some leaders to wonder whether he is the right candidate ahead of the November elections.
“He seemed a little disoriented. He got louder as the debate went on. But at that point, I think the panic was already setting in,” said David Axelrod, former Barack Obama campaign strategist and commentator CNN politician. Axelrod also gave voice to a conversation that took place last night among many Democrats: “There will be a discussion about whether it should continue.”
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From the start of the debate, the president appeared to be struggling with his voice. Biden cleared his throat and coughed several times, a condition that, according to several sources cited by CNN, was caused by a cold.
As the broadcaster does not fail to point out, Biden often remained staring into space and with his mouth open while Trump spoke. He has occasionally struggled to wrap up his points, giving ground on issues like abortion on which Democrats have an advantage.
“It’s hard to argue that Biden should be our nominee,” said one Democratic operative who has worked on campaigns at all levels for more than a decade. “The main thing he had to prove to the American people was that he had the energy and the stamina. And he didn’t,” said Kate Bedingfield, a former White House communications director who has been with Biden since he was vice president.
Criticism also to the moderators: “Lack of fact checking big flop”
But it’s not just Biden and the two CNN anchors who moderated the debate, Jake Tapper and Diana Bash, also end up in the crosshairs. Both chose not to do live fact-checking, therefore not to interrupt the candidates for the White House when they cited incorrect facts in their speeches, opening the door to an avalanche of criticism on social media.
“The timing of a presidential debate between these two candidates is not the ideal situation for a fact-checking exercise,” CNN political desk director David Challan warned The Washington Post. The two moderators spoke only a few times, almost exclusively to enforce time limits. “Our job tonight is to facilitate a debate between the two candidates,” Tapper began.
“The absence of real-time fact-checking is the great flop of this debate,” wrote Anthony Coley, a commentator for NBC and MSNBC. In particular, the silence of the moderators was criticized when Trump accused Biden of being in favor of abortion even in the eighth or ninth month of pregnancy, or even “after birth”. “How is it possible that neither of the two moderators has corrected this nonsense about abortion after birth?”, denounced Kate Smith, communications manager for Planned Parenthood. Biden himself has denounced Trump as the bearer of the idea that “whatever he says is automatically true”.
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