The con man v. The old man: America's choices in Trump, Biden are awful | Mike Kelly

Fifty-five years ago, Mickey Mantle, the star slugger of the New York Yankees, faced a painful question. Today, Joe Biden faces a similar predicament: When is it time to quit?

In 1969, after nearly two decades as a baseball star, Mantle, at 37, could still hit home runs – but not consistently. The magic was gone. As “The Mick” said when he formally retired on March 1, 1969: “I don’t hit the ball when I need to.”

Joe Biden, at 81, can’t hit when he needs to either. Yes, he can still blast a political home run now and then. His State of the Union speech in March is a recent example. But Biden’s consistency is uneven. One day, he’s presidential — down-to-earth, “Scranton Joe.” The next, he’s mumbling and fumbling like “Mister Magoo.” The magic is gone.

As America celebrates its independence, Joe Biden needs to take the independent step and drop out.

Biden clearly has more problems than just 'a bad night' at debate

I take no joy in writing this. In 2022 and again last year, I wrote columns urging Biden to run for president and to ignore those who said he was too old. If the Rolling Stones can still strut in their elder years, why can’t Joe? Or so I reasoned. But what happened during last week’s debate between Biden and Donald Trump clearly shows that something is now different.

It hardly matters that Biden was fighting a nagging cold during the debate — as his family claims. Nor does it matter, as his family also contends, that someone forgot to apply make-up to Biden and he looked too pale —day-old oatmeal compared to Trump’s tangerine-ness. And Biden's latest excuse -- that he was tired from traveling overseas -- doesn't make sense.

Biden’s decline in the debate was on display for all to see. He shuffle-walked to the podium. His answers ranged from blank stares to mumbled incoherencies, his mouth agape. His voice, seemingly tired and worn, sank to a whisper all too often. And in those rare moments when he seemed energized, his tone was not commanding or authoritative but more akin to a cranky guy telling kids to “get off my lawn.”

It was a sad night, for sure — and a sad aftermath for a good man as we all try to make sense of this moment in history. As I watched Biden, I wondered whether he had experienced some sort of sudden neurological set-back. Days later, America still has not heard a reasonable explanation from Biden’s circle, except that he had a “bad night.”

On that debate stage, Biden suddenly became the elderly grandparent many of us have dealt with — the one who can’t take the wheel of the car anymore, the one who needs help with the checkbook, the one who shouldn’t be around a gas stove, the one who needs to step back and let others take over.

But the grandparent comparison falls short actually. As president, Biden is different. Do we all need reminding that he is in charge of America’s nuclear codes? Even with only a slight cognitive decline — a “bad night” — he’s a potential security risk.

Democrats need to admit this. This isn’t a matter of politics that can be worked out and manipulated and put through the public relations spin cycle in the coming months. This is about America’s moment-by-moment security. There’s no delay switch that we can toggle in a crisis, no time-outs that we can take because someone is having a “bad night.”

After SCOTUS immunity ruling, GOP must face truths about Trump

Last Thursday’s debate was painful for another reason, however.  And, here, Republicans need to face their own uncomfortable truth about Donald Trump.

We all know the dismal Trumpian legacy.  The former president, despite Monday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity and its symbolic get-out-of-jail message, still faces federal charges of illegally trying to overturn an election. For America at large, Democrats and Republicans alike, such a reality is hugely consequential. How can this nation sleepwalk into a presidential election with a candidate whose role in an attempted coup is still unresolved? Trump wants to be president again, but we still don't know whether he broke the law the last time he ran for the White House.

Sadly, the U.S. Supreme Court’s majority does not seem to understand common sense. Instead of dealing with the obvious political and legal mess stemming from Trump’s alleged role in trying to overturn the 2020 election, the Court avoided the issue entirely.  It’s as if the Court, when faced with reports that a house was on fire, did not call the local fire department to deal with the problem at hand.  Instead, the Court opted instead to first conduct an intellectual analysis of whether this was, in fact, a legitimate fire and how it might be handled.

The point here is that the court faced a classic challenge of leadership. Instead of seeing the challenge for what it was, the Court ducked for cover under its own legal camouflage.

But the questions of Trump’s alleged machinations in the wake of the 2020 presidential election are not the only problem facing voters that has not been cleared up. Consider Trump’s alleged efforts, as a former president charged with protecting the nation, to hide top-secret military plans after security officials demanded he return them? Or Trump’s behavior as commander-in-chief in refusing to protect the U.S. Capitol after it was attacked by his supporters on Jan. 6, 2021? The question is complicated even more as Trump continues to falsely blame House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the lack of protection at the Capitol and now promises to pardon hundreds who have been convicted of crimes related to the attack.

Consider, finally, the very real court judgments against Trump. He is a convicted felon who was scheduled to be sentenced next week in New York City after a jury pronounced him guilty of cooking his books to hide a hush-money payment to a porn star who claims to have had sex with him. Thanks to the Supreme Court's ruling, that sentence has been postponed until mid-September. As if this legal jumble isn't complicated enough, Trump also faces fines of nearly half-a-billion dollars after judges in two other cases ruled that he routinely cheated in his businesses and assaulted and defamed a woman.

America was brought face-to-face with a terrible choice on that debate stage last week — the con man versus the old man. Neither is acceptable. America does not need another “Saturday Night Live” skit to tell us how absurd this situation has become.

And yet, what to do?

Republicans, now grooving on the jive talk of Jim Jordan, Steve Bannon and Majorie Taylor Greene, won’t face up to the reality of Trump. Anyone in the party who calls out Trump for his behavior meets the same fate as Liz Cheney. Meanwhile, Trump, if we believe what he said on the debate stage, won’t even promise to accept the results of this November’s election.

But Democrats also seem unwilling to face their own dismal reality. If Democrats ride with Biden, they will likely lose. And even if they win, Democrats need to face the fact that they will have elected a president whose cognitive skills are fading all too fast.

Will Biden become another Woodrow Wilson or FDR whose once-bright lights dimmed dramatically in the final days of their presidencies? You don’t need a doctorate in history to understand the implications of that question.

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How can Democrats move forward with a new nominee?

So here’s a plan, drawn from other proposals by historians and an analysis of Democratic party rules:

• First, Biden needs to drop out — hopefully by July 14.

• Second, Biden needs to step back from the temptation to endorse his vice president, Kamala Harris. He now controls nearly 3,900 of almost 5,000 delegates and alternate delegates to the Democratic nominating convention, scheduled for Aug. 19-22. He can release them. With Independence Day comes freedom.

• Third, the Democratic Party, with its nearly 5,000 suddenly uncommitted delegates and alternates, has to act like a political party again and actually stage a nominating convention. What this means is that the party has to quickly solicit potential presidential candidates — say, by requiring each to have signatures of 1,000 delegates to make the initial cut. That's a heavy lift, for sure. But requiring 1,000 delegates' signatures will eliminate the fringe players quickly.

• Fourth, on Aug. 1, take a vote of all 5,000 delegates and alternates (electronically) on potential candidates.  The aim here is to reduce the field to half-a dozen finalists.

• Fifth, during the two weeks leading up to the Democratic convention, hold a series of six debates by the candidates — all of them televised. No cheering sections. No silly gotcha questions. Just a solid back-and-forth on policy. One debate could focus on foreign affairs. Another on the economy. Another on immigration. Another on education. Another on climate change. Another on health care and Social Security. And so on. We might even need more debates.

• Sixth, turn the Democrats’ gathering on Aug. 19-22 in Chicago into a modern-day version of a political party convention, with speeches by candidates and a roll call vote by delegates to pick the presidential and vice presidential ticket. Let Biden give a keynote address. He deserves as much.

Yes, there would be some old-fashioned, back-room political deal making. But so what? In a way, this is how politics works, from small towns to Congress. It’s about people talking to people and compromising to find common ground. 

Is this a rushed process? Absolutely. Is it imperfect? Of course. But if Democrats can keep it transparent — and, that’s a big question — it just might be the best plan in this uniquely desperate moment of history.

When the convention ends, the real presidential campaign begins — sometime around Labor Day. Just like the old days.

Who knows, Democrats might actually stage a real campaign.

They might even win.

Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed nonfiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kellym@northjersey.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Joe Biden debate shows 2024 election choices are awful