Major Democrat party figures and media pundits are openly acknowledging that Biden clearly cannot run for President after the latest CNN Biden-Trump presidential debate on June 27. Biden mumbled, displayed erratic speech, and clearly lost his train of thought a number of times – in other words, behaved as an elderly man who should be retired. It is all news in the journalist sense, but nothing of that is really new; it is just this time the spotlight was really on.

Remarkably, 4 days ago, the New York Times’ editorial board itself called on Biden to drop out. This conversation is emerging a little late in fact. Back in 2022, The Independent, for instance, reported (see video here) that Biden appeared “confused” as he exited a UN event. In 2021, Sky News described Biden as “mumbling incoherently”. This has been the US President’s standard behavior for a while. Such episodes, as well as his “gaffes” have prompted countless internet memes and tweets. It seems the incumbent administration simply tried to “manage” the situation and kept going, out of inertia, just hoping things will somehow work out.

This is not the only source of embarrassment, though: as far back as 2007, Biden “complimented” Obama thusly: “I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that’s a storybook, man”. At the time, a largely sympathetic American media could describe such manners as mere “gaffes” (with ABC talking about a “foot in mouth” problem also back in 2007) instead of denouncing an obvious instance of racism – not mention lack of self-control, after all, basic values aside, it would not be politically expedient to display such opinions, considering the man’s political base.

But it gets worse, behaviorally-wise. Back in 2019, NBC News was wondering whether Biden’s “touchiness” was out of place, while ABC News reported he was being accused of “inappropriate touching”. The issue was taking more seriously by this Business Inside story, which includes allegations of sexual assault (which is the proper way of naming it). Male politicians harassing or abusing women is unfortunately nothing unheard of, but groping little girls even in front of the cameras (and there are countless compilation of such videos) could be indicative of a declining mental health. Gaslighting the public audience into thinking they are all being delusional and claiming all such clips are “cheap-fakes” (some are, but most aren’t) has been the modus operandi of most of the corporate media in the US since 2019 at least. At some point it might get just too hard to be managed, though.

Shortly after the first Trump-Biden debate, David Axelrod, a long-time Democrat operator and US political analyst and consultant (who was former US President Barack Obama chief presidential campaign strategist and Senior Advisor), said that “there are going to be discussions about whether he should continue.” However, on X social media (formerly Twitter) Axelrod has also described all talk about replacing Biden at the top of the Democrat ticket as irrelevant, the situation being a done deal.

Likewise, Ian Bremmer notes in a video for GZERO Media that Biden would need to decide to step down, something he “certainly is not prepared to do.” Bremmer is a political scientist, who is also the author of several books on US foreign policy, and the president and founder of the Eurasia Group. According to this expert, Biden’s had a very loyal and committed team for decades, and such people are “very unwilling to challenge him [Biden], particularly when he feels strongly about an outcome”. Bremmer does not say that, but one can also assume that the fact that a large part of those individuals would lose their job (in case Biden steps down) can also be weighed as a factor.

Interestingly, in the same take, Bremmer says this same pattern occurred with regards to the issue of Ukraine: “we’ve seen this play out on Russia-Ukraine: Biden was unwilling to talk about moving towards a negotiated settlement”, as the Ukrainians were “doing better and better” (in the American President’s view). Biden’s advisors thus “weren’t having the difficult decision because no one was willing to really challenge it”, and, he adds, “then the situation for the Ukrainians started getting worse”, and these people would still maintain that “they’ll [the Ukrainians] manage reasonably well.” This means the issue can have global and tragic consequences.

Any “solution” would require a lot of political maneuvering and institutional creativity, with some legal “hacking”, and a little dose of palace intrigue – all of which can only further weaken the public credibility of US American institutions and the political system. The aforementioned assumption however raises some serious questions: if Biden is really unable to run as the nominee (or even to take part in a debate normally or to find his way out of a room by himself in public), then how on earth can he govern? Moreover, how come has he been governing thus far or rather who has been doing all the governing?

This is a question that, strangely, is not being asked by many commentators and experts. It may sound “conspiratorial”, but is indeed the most logical one to be raised, all things considered. A good guess would be that the so-called “secret government” (as the  Boston Globe called it in 2014) has just been run on “auto-pilot”. Michael J. Glennon, international law  scholar, has named this state of affairs a “double government”, with an almost self-governing defense and national security apparatus operating without much accountability.

To sum it up, Biden is 81-year-old, and Trump in turn is 78. Although only about three years younger, the latter is obviously in a much better shape. However, Trump himself could be in a place very similar to Biden’s pretty soon. Biden may be the oldest President in American history, but if Trump wins, then he would surpass Joe Biden as the oldest person ever elected President. This is about being realistic on the biological limitations inherent to mortal beings such as humans and has nothing whatsoever to do with gerontophobia. Older people (typically males) have often ruled countries, but usually not that old.

The whole “emperor’s clothes” imbroglio pertaining to Biden’s senility (while ignoring his aforementioned racism and tendency to “inappropriately” touch women and little girls) epitomizes quite well the “late-imperial” condition of the United States. Albeit a young nation, it’s already a declining superpower: the regime and the Democrat Party political machinery cannot even replace a senile ruler in a proper democratic way, and worse: there seem to be no other politically viable alternative. The Republican Party in turn faces a similar situation.  Trump and Biden are all you got. US democracy has clearly short-circuited.

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