Wall Street Journal reporter Reid Epstein has tweeted that Joe Biden has described Mike Pence as “a decent guy, our vice president.”
That’s it! Biden is done, finito, over and out. In this highly charged, intensely contrarian atmosphere, a possible Democratic presidential candidate cannot be exuding collegial, business-as-usual, hail-fellow-well-met vibes about a culturally ass-backwards, white-haired rightwing fiend who’s stood foursquare behind our mafia-crime-boss President, and who once ratted out his fraternity brothers for having a beer keg.
There’s no room for that kind of casually jocular, country-club, “Mike has his flaws but he’s an okay guy” attitude. Forget it!
On top of which Epstein and Janet Hook have filed a WSJ piece about how Democratic leaders in Iowa “are hungry for a young standard-bearer who will usher in generational change,” which is basically a “not now, too late, you’ve missed your chance” message aimed at Biden, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
The Pence quote plus that 1.23 N.Y. Times story about Biden accepting a $200K speaking fee from the Economic Club of Southwestern Michigan weeks before the November 2018 election, and during his speech supporting Representative Fred Upton, a long-serving Republican ‘who in 2017 helped craft a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act'”…that’s it.
Biden is toast — he will not make it through the Democratic primary process.
The likeliest Democratic nominees are now Beto O’Rourke (who will be announcing within a few days) or Kamala Harris, and at the end of the day O’Rourke will probably be the victor.