“Look. I have a cognitive test every single day. Every day I have that test. Everything I do. You know, not only am I campaigning, but I’m running the world,” he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on Friday.
Stephanopoulos asked, three times, about a full neurological and cognitive examination. Three times the president demurred. “No one said I had to. No one said,” Biden offered. “They said I’m good.”
Would you accept this answer from your elderly parent facing similar circumstances — or would you press them to seek medical attention? Of course you would make sure they had a full workup, if only to ensure that they were receiving appropriate care. If Biden’s family is resisting this step, they are doing him a terrible disservice.
By the way, this would be a reasonable request of any individual seeking election at Biden’s age — or at Donald Trump’s, for that matter. The presidency is uniquely stressful. Biden would be 82 on being sworn into a second term, 86 on leaving office.
That’s old, and older people decline, cognitively and physically. This ineluctable fact requires additional safeguards before and after electing someone of that age to the presidency.
With the refusal to have a cognitive examination, Biden and his campaign are caught in a contradiction of their own making.
Before the debate disaster, Biden’s repeated retort to age-related concerns was simple: watch me. We did and what we saw was worrisome.
So, the campaign has effectively acknowledged that it now has the burden of demonstrating Biden’s fitness — but declined to take the most sensible step toward achieving that goal.
Why? What is the reasonable argument — other than avoiding politically inconvenient results — for not doing so? And declining to have testing is not like refusing to testify. It can and should be used against you in the court of public opinion.
A scant 22 minutes with Stephanopoulos doesn’t do it — and Stephanopoulos chose to limit his questions to the issues of Biden’s fitness and whether he would remain in the race. He didn’t probe — and there have been few other opportunities for interviewers to engage in rigorous questioning to test Biden’s ability to answer questions on economic policy, foreign affairs and other matters.
And though Biden’s performance wasn’t in any way disqualifying, it wasn’t exactly reassuring either. “I don’t think I did, no,” is not the optimal answer to the question of whether Biden had re-watched the debate.
And Biden’s answer to whether he grasped how badly it was going in real time — well, that could have been typical Biden rambling, something that those of us who have covered him have witnessed for years, or it could have been more.
Biden’s response, in its entirety: “The whole way I prepared, nobody’s fault, mine. Nobody’s fault but mine. I, uh — I prepared what I usually would do, sitting down as I did come back with foreign leaders or National Security Council for explicit detail. And I realized — about partway through that, you know, all — I get quoted, the New York Times had me down at 10 points before the debate, nine now, or whatever the hell it is. The fact of the matter is, what I looked at is that he also lied 28 times. I couldn’t — I mean, the way the debate ran, not — my fault, no one else’s fault, no one else’s fault.”
To be a politician, to run for and assume the presidency, is to inhabit a sphere of egocentrism and entitlement unfamiliar to most of us. There is an I-alone-can-fix-it aspect to every successful political figure.
Biden has been admirably clear about the enormity of the stakes in November, but he seemed resolutely unwilling to acknowledge the reality of his diminished capacities and the risks that presents. In Biden’s telling, polls aren’t as reliable as they used to be. Elected officials are always “a little worried.” For his part, Biden said, “I don’t think anybody’s more qualified to be president or win this race than me.”
If Biden remains on the ticket, as he vowed to do unless “the Lord Almighty came down and said ‘Joe, get out of the race,’” I will vote for Biden over Trump no matter what happens from now to Election Day. The risk of diminished Biden is far less than that of empowered and reelected Trump.
But many voters may be less certain than I about that choice. All of us deserve the fullest and most up-to-date information about the president’s health. His unwillingness to provide that speaks volumes.
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