The View From 30,000 Feet

If Biden were to drop out, and if, as the latest hints and nudges from heavyweights suggest, the pressure is on to do so when he’s done with the NATO summit this weekend, hard to imagine better timing than on the eve of the GOP convention to drown it out and scramble its script.

— Philip Gourevitch (@PGourevitch) July 10, 2024

Once more, with feeling: 

A)  if it isn’t Harris, who pays for all the lawsuits to get ballot access/changes? 

B) If it isn’t Harris, what replaces the $240 million?

C) If it isn’t Harris, who has the name recognition?

D) What’s the record of success changing candidates this late in the year? LBJ did it in March, and HHH still couldn’t rally the troops.

This is such a bunch of crap from people who think real life is just like TeeVee.

Agreed. Another possibility: Right after GOP convention. After the parade of awfulness culminating in Trump's inevitable US carnage speech, then suddenly voters are presented w/a younger, fresher alternative. @ddayen and I discussed this idea on the pod: https://t.co/adHUy6srXn https://t.co/UMkfSeKpMz

— Greg Sargent (@GregTSargent) July 10, 2024

Whom they’ve never heard of and probably don’t trust as far as they can throw them. And rather than an historic victory it’s 2016 redux as Democratic voters say “Fuck it!” and stay home.

I haven’t witnessed a self inflicted implosion like this since the 1986 Red Sox.

The damage being done may be irreparable and will create a worse situation for any replacement candidate.

These are just agents of destruction now.

— Mike Madrid (@madrid_mike) July 10, 2024

What Mike said.

If it’s one thing I’ve learned in politics it’s that most people that make their money and fame out of it would rather be the captain of a sinking ship of their own making than actually row and make things better.

— Mike Madrid (@madrid_mike) July 10, 2024

Except when the ship goes down it was the candidate’s fault (see Clinton, Hillary), and their Big Ideas cannot fail, but only be failed.

And: editors are afraid of Trump and —rather than examining their inappropriate fear— make themselves feel brave by attacking Biden. https://t.co/AXJPJNDdhd

— Timothy Snyder (@TimothyDSnyder) July 10, 2024

Fritschner has a long thread there, worth reading, that makes two major points: political journalism is a herd practice; and “Dems in disarray” is a popular political journalism narrative.

Biden may be past it. He may be selfish or in denial. But it's the other guy who tried to overthrow the Constitution first by fraud, then by violence. Perspective please.

— David Frum (@davidfrum) July 9, 2024

Maybe Biden won't win this one for us. Maybe we will have to win it for him. I wrote in 2017, and I stand by it today: "What happens next is up to you and me." https://t.co/zx5HE02N19 pic.twitter.com/xd5lGu9wzM

— David Frum (@davidfrum) July 10, 2024

It is, indeed, up to we, the people. Not to the few, the elite, the scared of their own shadows. If Biden is going to win, it’s up to us to get him there, not up to him to win for us. It says a lot about the few, the scared, the mainly anonymous (“many Democrats say”) that they want someone certain to do it for them.

it is genuinely baffling that this is not the candidate people are calling senile pic.twitter.com/O5w1hBT3p3

— Armand Domalewski (@ArmandDoma) July 10, 2024

Or unfit, incapable, and insane. There’s a whole campaign to be conducted between now and November. Maybe those points can be got across.

Sen. Tim Kaine to @JoeKhalilTV: "I have complete confidence that Joe Biden will do the patriotic thing for the country. And he's going to make that decision. He's never disappointed me.“ pic.twitter.com/3k3ykeJmbD

— Kristen Eskow (@KristenEskow) July 10, 2024

Profile in courage. Yeah, let’s make these people our leaders to victory.

What could go wrong?😑