Did Joe Biden Doom the Democratic party? Part 3

Or: How We ended up with Kamala Harris

When Nancy Pelosi saw Joe Biden’s performance in the June 27^th, 2024 debate, she was shocked. As was her mortal enemy Donald Trump. In fact, during the debate, Trump actually thought that he would look bad piling on a man who was helpless. At one point Trump said, “I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows either.” When a Democratic presidential candidate says “We finally beat Medicare”, that is the kind of reply he will get from his GOP opponent. When that happened, Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief campaign manager, thought: this is too good to be true, and she muttered, “Holy shit!” (Fight, by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, pp. 6-8)

But none of them should have been surprised. Let me explain why.

As early as September of 2023, Hollywood honcho Ari Emanuel told Biden’s former chief of staff, Ron Klain, that it was irresponsible to run an octogenarian who was clearly slowing down. And Emanuel said this in front of a hundred people in Aspen, Colorado. At a governors’ meeting in the White House the next year, Vice President Kamala Harris was told by the White House staff to be ready to help Biden if he lost his train of thought. Independent Counsel Robert Hur noted in his report about Biden, that he is an “elderly man with a poor memory”. Hur’s comment was dismissed as partisanship since Hur was a Republican. It should not have been. (Ibid, p. 16) At a small White House gathering on St. Patrick’s Day, Biden needed a teleprompter to talk to the guests. Former Clinton Chief of Staff Bill Daley was surprised. If Biden needed a teleprompter for that occasion, how could he survive the rigors of a campaign? In fact, Daley even asked Tom Donilon, a White House advisor, why Biden did not step aside and let someone else run? (Chris Whipple, Uncharted, p. 78)

When traveling to a G 7 Meeting In Italy in June, Biden was tired when he arrived and also during the session. To the point that the staff would worry on which day Biden would make a blatant faux pas. So they used preventive procedures to limit the opportunities for public failure. In the mornings they would try and connect with him from the White House for Zoom calls. The problem is Biden would have a make up artist meet him at 8 am to smooth out wrinkles and cover the liver spots on his face. While this was happening, in deference to the cosmetics, he would fail to connect on the Zoom calls. After all, BIden had invested in hair plugs and veneers to make him appear younger. (Allen and Parnes, p. 16)

The problem with Biden went deeper than hair plugs and veneers. And, as noted above, his personal staff had to have been aware of it. There were instances where, like Sen. Mitch McConnell, Biden would just freeze in public. One was at an LA fundraising rally featuring Barack Obama and Hollywood celebrities. After an interview with Jimmy Kimmel, Biden stopped for more than a minute on his way off stage. Obama had to walk over, take him by the wrist and lead him away. (Allen and Parnes, p. 18) Another similar instance happened in New York in June of 2023 before a group of Wall Street donors. A long-time acquaintance said, “It wasn’t just physical.” As this witness had seen it before. (ibid, p. 11) In fact, just hours before that, during an interview on MSNBC’s Deadline: White House, Biden had gotten up from his chair before host Nicolle Wallace could transition from the interview to a commercial break. A clip of this odd incident had racked up 2 million views on social media. (ibid)

So one would think that, if someone was in that condition, why would they agree to an early debate? Well, not only did they agree, it was the Biden camp’s idea. (Whipple, Uncharted, p. 69) But if one did so one would realize that, with this candidate, it would necessitate that the infirm Biden would practice extensively. And in fact, that is what was planned, to the point of building a replica of the debate stage at Camp David. And even enlisting help from director Steven Spielberg and producer Jeff Katzenberg. (Whipple, p. 83)

Ron Klain was the debate coach. At their first session, Biden excused himself about halfway through--he then went outside to sit by the pool. That evening, they sat around a table with advisors Steve Ricchetti, Bruce Reed and Donilon. In his hands, Biden had the written answers to questions on cards. But the president wanted to talk about his interactions with NATO leaders. They apparently never got to the stage replica. (Whipple, p. 84). Later in the week, they did get there but Klain called it off about 45 minutes into the 90 minute rehearsal. Klain’s second try was even worse: Biden begged off after 25 minutes.

This continued until debate night. Biden arrived just before the start time. He was asked if he wanted a walk through the set in order to check camera angles. He declined. Moments later, when asked about the deficit, “Biden gave the most incoherent answer ever uttered in a presidential debate. It ended with ‘We finally beat Medicare.’ “ (Whipple, p. 87)

This was the beginning of the end for both Biden and the Democratic party in 2024. And it was made clear by the focus groups Biden’s own camp had gathered to watch the debate. (Whipple, p. 89). But it was those same handlers who now went into denial about what had just happened. Ignoring all the evidence above, Ricchetti said that his boss just had a bad night. Anita Dunn felt that Biden had actually won the debate by the end. Long after Biden had dropped out Bruce Reed was still saying it was not his boss but the Democratic party. (Ibid, pp. 89-90)

Others were seeing things more objectively. Congressman Lloyd Doggett from Texas was the first Washington official to call for Biden to withdraw. The New York Times editorial board also called for Biden to get out of the race. Biden still resisted. And he had the delegates to officially stay in the race. And he was not budging.

Two things happened to change the tide. Nancy Pelosi went on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and said the following: “It’s up to the president to decide if he is going to run. We’re all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short.” If that was not a big enough hint then the following exchange sealed it. The interviewer replied with, “He has said firmly this week he is going to run. Do you want him to run?” Pelosi answered the question with this, “ I want him to do whatever he decides to do.” (Whipple, p. 97)

The meaning was clear. Biden had already decided he was not getting out. In sign language, Pelosi was pushing him to do so. The second stab was by actor George Clooney. In an opinion piece for the New York Times, he went even further than Pelosi. He said that the Joe Biden he met with in LA a few weeks previous was not the man he knew in 2010, or even 2020. He was the man America saw at the debate. It then got worse:

Most of our members of congress are opting to wait and see if the dam breaks. But the dam has broken. We can put our heads in the sand and pray for a miracle in November or was can speak the truth. Joe Biden is a hero; he saved democracy in 2020, We need him to do it again in 2024.

The rumor was that Obama had put Clooney up to writing it. Something that actually got on the air on Morning Joe and which the actor firmly denied.

An advisor to Trump, Paul Manafort, thought it was all too exquisite. The clear implication was that the Democratic higher ups had to know that Biden was not what he was, that he was on the decline. And yet they all kept quiet about it until the bubble burst during the debate. And yet Biden was still at the top of the ticket.(Whipple, p. 103).

But Clooney’s editorial, and the rumor that it came from Obama, began the avalanche. Manafort predicted that Biden would be out by July 21st. Which ended up being the case. If Hunter Biden had not been involved, it might have been sooner. (Allen and Parnes, p. 62)

I have always wondered how Kamala Harris ended up being Joe Biden’s Vice-President. After all, she ran an inept presidential campaign in 2020. She literally never got out of the gate. In doing some research for this article I found out how it happened. It turns out that Donna Brazile and Minyon Moore were part of a group termed the Colored Girls. I don’t have to explain who Brazile is. Moore worked for President Bill Clinton for two years. It was this group that convinced Biden to pick an African American woman as his VP. (Allen and Parnes, p. 129)

Moore had worked for Hillary Clinton for years. Whereas Barack Obama had tried to sidestep the Democratic National Committee, the Colored Girls—and former Vice-President Biden-- were trying to rebuild it. The effort was in large part about stopping the left from taking control i.e. the Bernie Sanders followers. One way they did this was to install loyalists on national and state committees. (ibid, p. 71, p. 130). Moore was in charge of the convention, which was in late August. She had helped change the primary schedule to favor Biden. That scheme was now going up in smoke.

Both Obama and Pelosi knew that, for the good of the party, Biden had to go. But here was the problem: Obama did not want Kamala Harris to be the nominee. He thought she would lose to Trump. Pelosi also had doubts, but not quite as strong as Obama’s. (Allen and Parnes, p. 73) When senators like Patty Murray agreed with Pelosi, and the donors began to hold out—a not so subtle jab for him to leave—Biden now began to get the message. And Pelosi was apparently influenced by Obama. On a conference call with California representatives she insisted on an open process to choose the new nominee. She reportedly said, “He goes. She goes.” (ibid)

What Pelosi apparently did not know was that by about late in the third week of July even Biden backers like Brazile and James Clyburn—the man who won it for Biden in 2020-- had realized what was inevitable. But unlike Obama and Pelosi, they wanted Harris as the new nominee. (Allen and Parnes, pp. 131-134). For whatever reason, Biden went along with them. When he called Harris on July 21^st and told her he was leaving he asked her to step up. She replied yes-- as long as she had his support. Which he agreed to.

As some have said, this was Biden giving the middle finger to both Pelosi and Obama. (Ibid, p. 144) But especially to Obama since Biden thought he had hung him out to dry in 2016, in favor of Hillary Clinton. Clyburn had worked to arrange Harris’ appointment on phone calls with both Biden and Obama. He did not want an open primary—which Biden had all but eliminated by waiting so long. Nor did he want an open convention.

Nancy Pelosi was not aware that once Harris got the phone call from Biden, she set up a war room to start sweeping up his delegates. This ended up being a success. But the problem with Harris is that she could not separate herself from Biden. Therefore, as Obama predicted, Trump could now set himself up as the “change candidate”. And when the Clintons now endorsed Harris, she was even more portrayed as the status quo nominee.

Let me quote Wiles view of what happened with Harris: “She was so underexposed and controlled, and people like realism. Voters want authenticity, and they didn’t get that from her.” About Harris on the campaign trail, she said, “We couldn’t believe how bad she was.” (Whipple, p. 198)

About Harris’ infamous appearance on The View where she was asked if she had any differences with Biden and she could not mention one; Wiles had this to say about that disastrous moment: “The only thing I can conclude is they didn’t think she could deliver.”

Cruel but true, because she didn’t. Let us hope that the reaction to Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez all over the country to what happened as a result of the Biden-Harris union will now vault that wing of the party to the forefront. I appreciate the fact that Clinton advisor James Carville does not like their ascendancy. (Fox News, 4/26/25, story by Marc Tamasco)

In my ideal world, there would never be another Democratic convention which features Biden, Harris, the Clintons or the Obamas.