After months of obsessing over the presidential contest, it was jarring to tune in to the annual Veterans Day commemoration at Arlington National Cemetery and see President Joe Biden center stage. The all-but-forgotten president is too literally a lame duck; his stride has given way to a shuffle. He looks lost. He tried to project force in his tribute, but you braced for the verbal trips.
Why did Biden think he could serve another four years?
He’s so diminished from the politician I’ve covered for 40 years, from the Senate through the vice presidency to the White House. In late 2022, Biden turned 80, but he celebrated unusually good midterm election results for his party and one of the most successful first two years of any president (the Afghanistan withdrawal aside).
And for the next four, Donald Trump will be stealing the bragging rights.
Midterm is when Biden should have announced that he wouldn’t run again, that he’d be the “bridge” to new leaders as he’d said in 2020. That he selfishly didn’t give way until far too late in 2024 helped doom Democrats’ chance of keeping the White House.