He has slipped. He had distracting tics, taking off his baseball cap and rubbing his bald head constantly, then rolling up his sleeve and rubbing his forearm. The sound quality of the podcast with Kristol was fine, but James’ southern accent seems to have deepened. His speech was garbled at times. It was difficult to understand him.
Then there were the age quirks, sentences that meandered or went unfinished; thoughts that branched mid-sentence; he got facts wrong. He said, “Democrats haven’t lost since Kansas.” (?) When did we ever not lose Kansas. I replayed two or three times, turned on captions, got a transcript. Yep, that’s what he said. I then googled “Democrats Kansas”. “Democrats get clobbered in Kansas”, was one search result. Right. So what was he talking about? I listened to the context of the comment. He was talking about reproductive rights, abortion, birth control, IV, etc. “Did that issue lose in Kansas?”, to self. Looked it up. No, we WON. I remembered. Kansas was the first state to reject the MAGA Cult’s forced birth position. It was huge news because it was Kansas and Democrats never win anything in Kansas.
Kristol didn’t correct him. It was just the kind of mistake that a person 79 years-old, or one 77, or 82, makes. I projected onto President Biden and the Cult Leader. They have meandered, not finished thoughts, and gotten facts wrong, by inadvertence or intentionally. It was alarming.
President Biden needs to do rallies. Television ads do not fire up a base. Only hearing the man speak in person does that, and when Biden has done that, as candidate in 2020 and as president, he has lit blue fires. He needs to give the same speech over and over and over again. Repetition sets a message. Repetition keeps you from wandering. But age is inexorable and is undefeated. The president may not have the stamina.
