A Brief Note on the Week That Was a Decade

I had queued up a post on the dizzying oscillation between “It is so over” and “We are so back” that occurred this week on the subject of whether Joe Biden would stay in the race or step aside in favor of his more capable VP (or, because nothing can ever be easy, an open convention).

I said last week, and I still believe, that Biden needed to build up the confidence of his supporters, and the country, before it would be appropriate for him to decide that he will carry out his term while his deputy wages her own campaign for the White House. He held a press conference that demonstrated he’s still got a substantive command of the issues that comprise his day job, but he made a few verbal flubs that reinforced the idea that the rest of this campaign would be defined by his suboptimal skills as an orator.

That halted the calls for him to step aside...briefly. Then, the private leaks and the public spats started anew, only to once again hit a wall when a good Marist poll came out for the President showing him up 2 as he read a rousing speech off the prompter in Michigan.

At some point in there, and to be perfectly honest, I’ve completely lost track of the timeline even though all of this was in the last 96 hours, George Clooney chimed in to let everyone know that Biden’s debate performance was not a one-off and that he behaved similarly at their glitzy mega-fundraiser in June. Word traveled fast that Barack Obama knew about, or maybe even blessed, the A+-lister’s attempt to sway the tides.

So, you know, I woke up today feeling like Fred Durst: everything is fucked, everybody sucks. Maybe there was still a chance for the Democrats to zoom out and make rational, coordinated decisions. Or maybe the sudden flood of Meidas Touch liberals deciding to rally around Biden was the rocket fuel they needed to justify taking the Fyre Fest approach to this election: Who cares about polls? Who cares about running a campaign that meets the moment and clearly defines what’s at stake? Let’s just do it and be legends.

Either way, it became clear that no matter what happens, if Democrats lose to Trump again, no one will accept responsibility. The Biden dead-enders would blame Jon, Jon, Jonny, and John from Pod Save America, and the folks who think the nominee shouldn’t say he “beat Medicare” would blame so-called “Blue MAGA” for becoming so defensive they stopped being able to see what was right in front of them.

Then I went to go see “Longlegs” and came out of the theater to 100+ text messages and no fewer than 12 missed calls. Someone tried to shoot Donald Trump? He responded by pumping his fist in the air in triumph?

Okay!

The Solid Purple forecast does not have a quantitative variable for assassination attempts or interparty strife over whether or not literally everyone thinks their candidate is too old. I will continue feeding it inputs that it can digest, and whatever the model says will be what it says. But this election forecast, or any forecast really, is built upon the assumption that things are happening in a normal, predictable environment, and I think it’s safe to say nothing is normal or predictable right now.

If we weren’t already “confidently uncertain” before, we certainly fucking are now!

Model update on Sunday night/Monday morning, not like any poll conducted up to this point tells us very much about *points in every direction*.

...oh, and the RNC is this week!