america’s choice
The good news is that following confirmation that the November US election will be a rematch of the 2020 contest – the current President of the United States against the former one – Joe Biden, last month, delivered a much more combative and coherent annual address. He ad-libbed, silenced the hecklers, experienced no ‘senior moments’ and enjoyed himself to such an extent that even Fox News had to concede he seemed ‘jacked-up’. The need to project vigour, grit and resilience was essential as the mountain he has to climb over the next seven months is steep, and getting steeper by the day.
The bad news is that Biden’s performances are not always such.
In interviews, the 81 year-old has struggled to recall when his term as VP began and ended. Nor could he remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died. He recently confused Emmanuel Macron with the former French leader Francois Mitterrand, who died almost twenty years ago, and referred to Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as the president of Mexico. Perhaps more worryingly he struggled to recall the name of the terrorist group Hamas. Mind, neither is 77 year-old Trump immune to such memory mix-ups. He has claimed, on at least seven occasions, either that Barack Obama is still president, or that he ran against him. He regularly confused his party-nominee rival Nikki Haley with sworn-enemy, Nancy Pelosi, and shockingly identified a picture of E Jean Carroll, who accused him of r*pe, as his ex-wife, Marla Maples. Inexplicably however, the more bizarre his gaffs, the higher he polls. Furthermore, Trump’s current well-publicised legal woes only serve the same purpose.
Sleepy Joe needs to do more. Objectively, Biden has clearly achieved much more than many of his detractors predicted but he needs to frame the coming contest as a choice between what he and Trump would do for the US, and its economy, over the next four years. Whilst some see this election as a choice between a senile president run by his handlers and a stupid president unable to listen to his handlers, Joe Biden needs to highlight he is a decent, honest, albeit forgetful, sincere public servant up against a dangerous demagogue, a would-be dictator who, if elected, would believe each and every action is both justified and vindicated. Biden cannot afford to fail.
America isn’t spoiled for choice when it comes to its presidential nominees-in-waiting but its decision is vital to the world today. And tomorrow.
