Joe Biden’s Final Two Years

Joe Biden’s Final Two Years

It is over, Joe. Please give up any hope right now of running for reelection in 2024. Your popularity, effectiveness, and persuasiveness are zilch, and they are not coming back anytime soon. The only possible way you could win the presidency again is if the Republicans make the biggest political mistake of all time in who they nominate. In these bleak circumstances, even you running for reelection would be bad for America. With the name Biden on the ballot, voters will be forced to rehash the political horrors of recent years.*

*Similarly, nor would it be good for America to see on the presidential ballots anyone named Trump, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Pence, Harris, Sanders, Warren, Pelosi, or McConnell. Our nation needs a fresh start with a fresh approach.

We tell it to you straight like this, President Biden, because we see you as a reasonable person who wants what is best for America. You have served the country now for five decades. Well done, good and faithful servant. But all things must come to an end. It is time.

An Open Door

When one door closes, another opens. In 1605, Cervantes penned that line in Don Quixote, and other famous people like Helen Keller and Alexander Graham Bell have used it ever since. It is so true, and it can be true for you today, Mr. President.

Announcing your retirement long in advance will allow you the freedom to spend your final two years in the Oval Office doing what you promised you intended to do originally.

The premise on which you were elected was that America was fed up with the past partisanship, the polarization, the meanness. You were to be a uniter. Based on your decades in the U.S. Senate and your history of reaching across the aisle there, you were to restore order, professionalism, and good government. Based on your experience and maturity, we elected you to be a caretaker, literally an adult who would take good care of America and Americans. You also were to be a healer. And, we counted on you to help America regain the trust lost at home and abroad.

So far, unity, healing, and trust have continued to elude America. Now, by announcing your retirement date, you can begin to accomplish your original purpose. Let us explain.

First, you no longer would feel compelled to please the radicals in your own party. Until now, you have been between a rock and a hard place, because you cannot compromise to get Republican support without losing support of the far left. But, if you please the far left, you lose the support of the vast majority of Americans, including nearly all Republicans. If you are not running for reelection, you can stop caring about your popularity within your own party. You can do what you know is best and exemplify the principles of honesty, integrity, and transparency.

Second, if you are not seeking another term, you actually can start to build bipartisan support. Right now, Republicans are unwilling even to compromise with you, in part because they want your presidency to fail so they can beat you in 2024. If you are not running, that motive evaporates. Turning in your notice of retirement should stop attacks from the right, just as from the left.

You also would being doing America a service by setting an example for other politicians to ignore their reelection hopes and lead in a way that is best for America, regardless of the electoral consequences.

Finally, taking yourself out of the 2024 race now will allow you to lead America toward a unified path of federal policies. You can do this by incorporating the best ideas of the reasonable Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike, building a consensus around our national core values and principles. There are many, big-picture, consensus-building issues available.

These are the doors that will open for you. Do it for America, Joe.

Use the Time to Clean Up Messes

Announcing your retirement will allow you to speak directly and forthrightly with nothing to lose in the election. Issues begging to be tackled in this nonpartisan way include saving Social Security and Medicare, reducing the national debt, resolving the immigration crisis, taxing the proper people the proper amounts, dealing with Russia and China, shoring up our defense budgets, ending dependency on government, and heading off climate change. You can do all of those things better without running for a Democratic nomination, let alone trying to defeat a Republican nominee.

Please do not leave this agenda for the next president, Joe. Spend all of your remaining time cleaning up America’s messes with the freedom that not running again provides.

Written by Quentin R. Wittrock, founder of Principle Based Politics. 

Look for his posts each week, as this blog will explore and promote the idea of principle in politics, both as to individual elected leaders and our federal government as an institution.

1 Comment
  • Willie Hampton
    Posted at 13:01h, 27 May

    Why are we complaining?
    We put a person in office to do his best for America.
    When a person shows you who they are in office.
    Why did you vote to put them back in office.

    For the same fell policies and belief’s.

    We would rather destroy our country then make a change.