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'We can't catch a break.' How the Biden crisis looks from the inside
NPR ^ | July 18, 2024 | Tamara Keith

Posted on 07/19/2024 4:06:21 AM PDT by DoodleBob

Hit by a rolling series of punches — the turmoil after President Biden's disastrous debate, the drip-drip-drip of damaging leaks from congressional allies, and now a campaign-stalling case of COVID — people who work inside the Biden campaign are discouraged and uncertain about what lies ahead.

Harris hits the campaign trail in North Carolina as Biden isolates for COVID "We can't catch a break,” a Biden adviser said, speaking on condition of anonymity to frankly describe private conversations.

Ever since Biden faltered in his debate three weeks ago against former President Donald Trump, the bad news just keeps coming — much of it from unnamed sources who are supposed to be allies of their team, the adviser said.

Not enough momentum 'to get us back on solid footing'

While there have been some positive moments for the president since the debate, “They haven't been enough to get us back on solid footing," the adviser said.

Biden had been gaining a bit of a momentum, giving energetic rallies in three "Blue Wall" states, culminating in a fired-up retooled stump speech in Detroit on Friday, where supporters chanted, "Don't you quit!"

But Biden's private meetings with top congressional leaders last week were sobering, and then there were the leaks from gatherings with rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers worried that Biden’s political woes will be toxic for their own races.

"In moments of crisis, you really get to know a lot about people," the adviser said.

Biden, a long-time senator, is pragmatic about the political calculations that lawmakers are making, the adviser said.

Top Democrats in Washington are carefully avoiding denying reports that they have called for President Biden to step aside as the party's nominee for president.

But the president bristled in one meeting last weekend when Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo., suggested, in a respectful tone, that Americans were losing sleep because they were worried about the national security risks associated with an aging president.

Biden replied: "'Listen: if you have to come out against me, do whatever you need to do. But don't you dare say that Americans don't feel safe because of this,’" the adviser recounted.

This adviser said Biden showed no signs during that meeting and others of any cracks in his resolve to stay in the race — and said it’s not yet clear whether the pile-up of woes has reached a tipping point for the president.

In a July 6 letter, obtained by NPR on Thursday, Rep. Jamie Raskin recounted Biden's achievements, and used a metaphor about a 2003 baseball loss faced by Red Sox pitcher Pedro Martinez when he stayed in the game too long.

“There is no shame in taking a well-deserved bow to the overflowing appreciation of the crowd when your arm is tired out, and there is real danger for the team in ignoring the statistics," Raskin warned.

'What campaign team is going to rise from the ashes?'

Perhaps there is still a way for Democrats to unite behind a concise message, and Biden, the adviser said. But now, even Democrats who back Biden find themselves parsing his speeches and interviews for trips and flubs. His trademark gaffes are now are seen in a new light.

But if Biden drops out, that opens the door to a compressed “Hunger Games” race within the party for choosing a new leader, the adviser said. There's little time, and will be little organization.

While the adviser sees strong future candidates on the Democratic bench, they have not been battle-tested. The adviser noted that some of the best and brightest Republican prospects fell flat when they went against Trump.

"What campaign team is going to rise from the ashes?" the adviser asked.

“It's gonna be ugly. it's gonna be dirty. It's gonna be messy.”


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: biden; despair; potus2024
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1 posted on 07/19/2024 4:06:21 AM PDT by DoodleBob
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To: DoodleBob

NPR...National Propaganda Radio

Democrat Hunger Games?? Well, may the odds be NEVER in your favor!!


2 posted on 07/19/2024 4:14:52 AM PDT by arazitjh (Like Bannon says: See What You See)
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To: DoodleBob

He’s been a lying narcissistic POS for 50+ years. Anyone with a brain knows that so that tells you who voted for the idiot.

If I had to guess, he doesn’t have covid but has an excuse to get out.


3 posted on 07/19/2024 4:14:55 AM PDT by maddog55 (The only thing systemic in America is the left's hatred of it!)
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To: DoodleBob

The whole reason they decided to go along with trying to run Biden again is that every alternative in the Democrat party polled WORSE than Biden did in the Midwest.

However deluded we know they are, there is a cohort of working class Boomers in the Midwest who bought into the whole “working class Joe from Scranton” BS and actually still believe it. They definitely do not believe in Gavin Newsome or Heels Up Harris or Gestapo Gretchen or anybody else the Democrats might want to parachute in. Then there is the whole campaign cash problem as well as potentially pissing off Black Females if they try to run anybody but Heels Up Harris.


4 posted on 07/19/2024 4:15:14 AM PDT by FLT-bird
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To: DoodleBob
Hit by a rolling series of punches — the turmoil after President Biden's disastrous debate, the drip-drip-drip of damaging leaks from congressional allies, and now a campaign-stalling case of COVID

The author failed to mention to biggest gut punch of them all: God's intervention in the Democrats' failed assassination attempt of a political rival.

5 posted on 07/19/2024 4:15:24 AM PDT by Right_Wing_Madman
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To: DoodleBob
While there have been some positive moments for the president since the debate...

Yeah, like the few times he didn't fall down. Or asleep.
6 posted on 07/19/2024 4:16:17 AM PDT by ComputerGuy (Heavily-medicated for your protection)
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To: DoodleBob

All the trouble the dems are having now are self induced. They ran a con and got caught. Now they are in disarray. It’s amazing to watch.


7 posted on 07/19/2024 4:16:54 AM PDT by Dutch Boy (The only thing worse than having something taken from you is to have it returned broken. )
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To: maddog55

Yes


8 posted on 07/19/2024 4:24:24 AM PDT by PGalt (Past Peak Civilization?)
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To: DoodleBob

Their assassin missed Trump.

It’s been just terrible over there.


9 posted on 07/19/2024 4:24:43 AM PDT by WeaslesRippedMyFlesh
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To: All
"We can't catch a break,” a Biden adviser said

Welcome to Biden’s America pal.
10 posted on 07/19/2024 4:24:56 AM PDT by mmichaels1970
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To: DoodleBob

karma’s a bitch


11 posted on 07/19/2024 4:26:50 AM PDT by ronnie raygun
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To: DoodleBob

when you build a house of cards...


12 posted on 07/19/2024 4:32:48 AM PDT by avital2
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To: arazitjh
If you believe the stories about the final month in the Trump Admin, the push and pull behind Biden dropping out becomes clear - some of the Biden retinue won’t have jobs, some will, and that fractured career path is causing a lockup.

I was confident the election had been hacked. I told him, “We think there is a much shorter route through all of this than your team is pursuing,” I closed saying, “But Sir, entrepreneur to entrepreneur, I feel I must mention something. As you may know, I have been swimming around the outside of your administration for a couple months now, and I must tell you, I do not think you are being well-served by many people in the White House. I can bring in young staffers who will tell you that some of your senior leadership don’t want you to win. They want you to concede.”

The President raised his eyebrows at my frankness. Then, like a man who knew the answer, he asked quietly, “Why?”

“I’m not sure,” I said, “but I hear people are getting signals that if they’re good boys and get you out the door, there will be jobs waiting for them. But if they don’t, they won’t be getting offers from the right law firms, they won’t be getting invitations from the right country clubs, they won’t be getting invited to the socialite parties on Manhattan…” Trump grimaced, and we moved on.

13 posted on 07/19/2024 4:36:45 AM PDT by DoodleBob (Gravity's waiting period is about 9.8 m/s²)
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To: DoodleBob

The man obviously can’t speak well. Attempts to show otherwise will only stress him out and make the problem appear to be worse.

There are standardized tests that can be administered to test and verify his other abilities.


14 posted on 07/19/2024 4:40:45 AM PDT by Brian Griffin (*** Help Trump, fund Republican candidates: https://ballotpedia.org/U.S._House_battlegrounds,_2024)
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To: DoodleBob

Seems like he’s having that “bad week” he promised Trump.


15 posted on 07/19/2024 4:45:33 AM PDT by rottweiller_inc (inter canem et lupum)
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To: DoodleBob

Nor does the regime now squatting in the Oval Office even DESERVE to catch a break. They have maintained position in deceit, dishonesty, and a slavish devotion to to an agenda that frankly, has no redeeming social or economic benefit for the United States at all.

To an outsider, much of what they have accomplished through extralegal means borders on treason, if not simply bare-faced criminal activity, misusing the legal system, slow-walking responses to criticism (well deserved criticism, too, in almost every instance), and gaslighting the public, all the while trying to project THEIR shortcomings and shameful deeds on the opposition.

They have failed in one very basic duty - to protect the integrity and good faith in the Great American Experiment, an ongoing program of distribution of OPPORTUNITY to every American citizen regardless of color, creed or previous ancestry. By a combination of guile, false promises and poorly designed and administered assistance programs, they have tried to break the will of American citizens, reducing them to subjects, and given out reward and punishment on the basis of loyalty to the regime, with no consideration for merit or justice.

We, as Americans are and should be mad as hell, and we should not take it any more.


16 posted on 07/19/2024 4:46:58 AM PDT by alloysteel (Most people slog through life without ever knowing the wonders of true insanity.)
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To: DoodleBob

Calling Lloyd Austin “that black man” would have been enough to doom any conservative candidate.


17 posted on 07/19/2024 4:48:39 AM PDT by The Duke (Not without incident)
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To: FLT-bird

“Heels Up Harris”

Someone stated yesterday:

“Harris has no base of support in the black community.
1) She’s not really black
2) She married a Jew
3) She got her start sending brothers up for weed”


18 posted on 07/19/2024 4:50:35 AM PDT by Brian Griffin (*** Help Trump, fund Republican candidates: https://ballotpedia.org/U.S._House_battlegrounds,_2024)
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To: DoodleBob

Maybe you RATs have your chickens coming home to roost. You chose to steal and election in 2020 running that old coot. You colluded with globalists who conspire to destroy our country.

Maybe it isn’t that you can’t get a break, it is that you don’t deserve one. Payback is a bitch no matter where it comes from.


19 posted on 07/19/2024 4:51:27 AM PDT by dforest
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To: Dutch Boy

“I belong to no organized political party. I am a Democrat.”

Attributed to a philosopher, Will Rogers, in the early years of the New Deal under FDR.


20 posted on 07/19/2024 4:52:32 AM PDT by alloysteel (Most people slog through life without ever knowing the wonders of true insanity.)
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