Posted on 06/06/2019 3:15:34 PM PDT by Kaslin
Where in the world is Joe Biden? The 2020 Democratic primary frontrunner is missing out on all of the big parties. He was a no-show at the California Democratic convention and he’s also RSVP’d in the negative for some other major cattle calls. Rather than the early primary/caucus states, Joe is knocking around in the swing states. That’s prompting some people, like Seth Mclaughlin at the Washington Times to ask the question… is Biden hidin‘?
Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden has left his fellow 2020 presidential candidates and local party leaders in early voting states miffed with his light and strictly scripted campaign schedule.
His latest no-show will come this weekend where he’ll miss the first big Iowa cattle call of the 2020 presidential election, which 19 other Democrats will attend. Last weekend, he skipped out on California Democrats’ convention, where 14 rivals spoke.
Instead, Mr. Biden is dictating his own schedule, with an eye toward the general election rather than the primary schedule.
Rather than California, he was in Ohio last weekend, headlining a Human Rights Campaign gala.
Allow me to take a stab at Seth’s question. In terms of whether or not Uncle Joe is “hiding,” that depends on who you think he’s hiding from and who is doing the actual hiding.
Biden most likely isn’t attending any of these big events because both he and his advisors know that there’s no real upside to showing up. When you’re this far ahead in the polls, jumping into the scrum with all of the third tier candidates who are down in single digits is fruitless. It’s punching down. They have nothing to lose by going after him and has very little to gain. All he would be doing is setting himself up for another chance to stick his foot in his mouth. (Reference his recent Hyde Amendment mix-up.)
By staying in lower traffic (but still very important) states, Biden gets to keep the stage pretty much to himself. And by sticking to a carefully scripted message and not winging it too much, he can probably avoid too many own goal moments. In terms of tone, the goal here appears to be allowing the voters to see a guy who has already moved past the primary scuffle and is running against Donald Trump in the general election.
Of course, you can definitely overplay that hand if you’re not careful. In ignoring the rest of the field, he’s also ignoring the Democratic voters in some key early states. If he’s not willing to show up and play, they may start looking at other options. Also, Biden shouldn’t risk coming off too cocky, as if he’s already got this thing in the bag. Voters don’t tend to go in for smugness.
Biden will have to show up somewhere to mix it up, even if it’s not until the debates. He’s sitting on a double-digit lead over everyone else at the moment and that’s great news for him. But it’s still not nearly a majority, and when a bunch of the others start dropping out, support will begin to coalesce around some non-Biden candidate. He hasn’t won anything yet.
By election time he will be forgotten.
Joe doesn’t want to be seen emerging from the clown car at the various circuses. Smart move!
This loser has “Jeb Bush” written all over him.
Creepy Joe is hiding.
If the Democratic primary field hasn't substantially narrowed by that point, Biden is going have the non-freaky progressive lane all to himself. He could build up a huge mass of delegates before the freaks coalesce around a single candidate.
Biden can’t speak for 10 minutes without slurring his words and stuttering. He looks and sounds haggard.
Biden’s the perfect throw away candidate for the democrat establishment. The party bigwigs know their going to lose bis and they want to keep their best candidate to run in 2024. Problem for them is, the democrat rank and file voters don’t want to go backwards with Biden. They want new youngbloods to carry their party forward. Not an old fuddy duddy sick-egg pervert like Biden.
Biden is filling his coffers, and then will lose.
Joe will be the 2nd laziest candidate ever, right behind Hellary. I’ve never seen anyone the President’s age have the energy, determination, and sheer guts as him.
Good job.
The second mouse gets the cheese.
Hey joe where ya goin with that gun in your hand
A debate between Sleepy Joe & Dynamo Donald will be a rout
He could skip ahead even further to his dropping out of the race speech.
He can run but he cannot hide.
Never underestimate Biden.
When it comes time to vote, the RATS will vote for ANYONE who has a “D” in front of their name.
And he knows it.
All he needs to do is pull a Clinton and destroy the rest.
If he is the front runner he has nothing to gain and much to lose going to these cattle calls. They will do nothing but attack him. And it’s still very early.
These events are all full of the most vocal and radical on the left, hardly Biden supporters. From his perspective, he’s doing the right thing. He should let all these 1% ranked people fight it out among themselves.
Understandable but losing strategy for Ol’ Joe. His name recognition and status as former VP has given him a poll lead that he mistakenly equates to front-runner status. He thinks he can play it safe and run out the clock. The problem for him, though, is that he’s not actually building up any level of enthusiasm for his candidacy among their voter base. When actual primary votes start being counted, don’t be surprised to see his lead fade quickly.
Sure the Dems will vote for anyone with a D after their name but the Independents won’t.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
