We Will Be Biden

Americans are stuck with this decision: Do we want the guy who can’t tell right from wrong or the guy who can’t tell Monday from Tuesday?

Pres. Joe Biden’s meltdown at last week’s debate was painful to watch. In the flood of news stories, social media posts and opinion pieces that followed, one comment stood out for me. It came from James Carville, who said, “This only goes in one direction.”

Well, it does, of course. But it goes in that direction at varying speeds. Nancy Pelosi is 84. Bernie Sanders is 82. Either one of them would have absolutely wiped the floor with Donald Trump. If you’ve heard Brewers’ broadcaster Bob Ueker this season you’ll note that, at 90, he sounds as good as ever. Even Ueker, steeped in baseball, not politics, would have destroyed Trump. And he’s an intensely likable sort of guy. Trump is not. So, it’s unfortunate that Biden isn’t just 81, but he’s old for his age.

I don’t think it’s impossible to have an octogenarian president who functions at a high level. It’s just that Biden isn’t it. If he were as sharp as Pelosi, Sanders or Ueker I’d be cheering him on because he’d represent not just the best hope of beating Trump, but he’d be an example of what someone even at that advanced age can accomplish.

All this brings to mind the broader issue of aging in America. In the last half century the median age of an American has gone from 30-years old to almost 40-years old. By the time I’m 80 (I hope to be 80 someday as I don’t like the alternative) in 2039, fully one in five Americans will be over 65 and the population of my fellow octogenarians will have quadrupled since the start of the century.

So we have a responsibility to keep ourselves as healthy as possible so as not to overburden the health care system. And we should try to be productive in some way. That could be a job or volunteering or doing anything that contributes. (I struggle to fit blog writing into this category.)

So the fact that Biden is still struggling to contribute at a high level is admirable in a sense. But it’s also important to recognize our limitations. You would not want me on a firefighting crew because I just don’t have the strength and stamina I once had and I’d present a danger to my crew mates. In the same way, I wish Biden would be honest with himself and admit that he’s simply not up to this job anymore and that he actually presents a danger to the country.

It’s a tricky thing, deciding when to keep at it and when to get the heck out of the way. But the focus needs to be on what’s best for the greater good.

And it’s not like Biden has to just disappear. Death is inevitable but decline is selective. I’ll never win a marathon, but I can still run. I’ll never win the Pulitzer Prize, but I can still write a book. I’ll never win the Masters, but I can still improve my scores. The point is to not accept decline in all things, and to actually work to get better at things where we can — while recognizing our limitations in other matters.

Joe Biden claimed the other night that he was an eight handicap, unless it was six. He should spend more time trying to get that number down. He should write his memoirs. He should spend time doing some deep thinking and writing about international affairs, his career-long passion. He can be the quintessential elder statesman. He can reinvent himself even now. He was the man who gave up a job he loved and the power that went with it to help save his country.

There’s still more he can do. This thing goes in one direction, but not in a straight line.