I thought President Joe Biden was, well, good in his press conference on Thursday night.
Yes, he called Kamala Harris “Vice President Trump” and made several other verbal slips and mistakes. And, yes, that will absolutely provide fodder for his critics — Democrats and Republicans — who say he is just too old to do this again.
But Biden also delivered an extended riff on geopolitics that demonstrated both his deep knowledge of the subject and his ability to command facts in a live setting.
These events have become Rorschach tests: You see what you want to see. If you are looking for evidence Biden had one bad night at the debate and he is fine to keep running, last night’s press conference had that. If you are convinced he is too old to do the job, the press conference had that too.
Rather than debate how good or bad he was, I wanted to highlight a key moment in the press conference, which, weirdly, came on the last question Biden was asked.
Here was the exchange:
Reporter: If your team came back and showed you data that she would fare better against former President Donald Trump, would you reconsider your decision to stay in the race?
Biden: No, unless they came back and said, there's no way you can win, me. No one's saying that. No poll says that.
That’s interesting. Because Democrats have said for the last 18 months that the only thing that matters is beating Trump because he represents an existential threat to democracy. And that they HAVE to nominate the candidate who gives them the best chance to do that.
Here Biden is saying he’s fine with staying in the race even if he’s not the strongest candidate to beat Trump — as long as the polling shows he has a chance.
Which is, um, a decision.
Much more on all of this in today’s edition of The Morning. This is always a free post. But I hope you consider showing your support for this sort of work by becoming a paid subscriber. It’s $6 a month or $60 for the year
The Morning: The single most important moment of the Biden presser