" To serve his country, President Biden should leave the race ": this is the title of the editorial of the New York Times board after the disastrous performance of the Democratic candidate for the White House in the TV duel with Donald Trump. «Biden - we read in the fund - stated that he is the candidate with the best chance of facing this threat of tyranny and defeating it. His argument is largely based on the fact that he beat Trump in 2020. But that is no longer sufficient motivation to explain why Biden should be the Democratic nominee this year.”
«In Thursday's debate – we read – the president needed to convince the American public that he was up to the formidable demands of the office he is trying to fill for another term. However, voters cannot be expected to ignore what was evident: Biden is no longer the man he was four years ago ."
On Thursday evening, writes the NYT, «the president appeared like the shadow of a great public servant. He struggled to explain what he would accomplish in a second term. He struggled to respond to Trump's provocations. He has struggled to hold Trump to account for his lies, his failures and his chilling plans. More than once he struggled to get to the end of a sentence ." The conclusion: "The greatest service he can render now is to announce that he will not continue to race."
The president's performance, the NYT argues, «cannot be dismissed as a bad evening (as Obama said, ed.) or attributed to an alleged cold, because it confirms concerns that have been growing for months or even years. Even when Biden tried to present his policy proposals, he stumbled . It cannot be offset by other public appearances because he has limited and carefully controlled his public appearances. The truth Biden must face now is that he has failed his own test ."
THE PERFORMANCE
Hoarse voice, blank stare, disjointed sentences, rigidity in movements. The performance of 81-year-old Joe Biden in the first TV duel against Donald Trump was , so much so that it obscured the numerous lies of his rival and threw the Democrats into panic, forcing them to question the opportunity of seek an alternative in what would be a race against time in an unprecedented open convention.
