Opinion
THE CONVERSATION
Joe Biden Is Wondering Why John Bolton Suddenly Likes Him
Definitely won’t be the vice-presidential pick, though.
By Gail Collins and Bret Stephens
Ms. Collins and Mr. Stephens are opinion columnists. They converse every week.
June 23, 2020
Bret Stephens: Gail, the good news is that the last few days have been filled with bad news for Donald Trump. His Tulsa rally was a total fizzle. A judge ruled that the publication of John Bolton’s tell-all memoir can proceed this week. Joe Biden is ahead of him by 12 percentage points — and that’s in the Fox News poll.
Is it safe to assume that our long national nightmare may soon be at an end?
Gail Collins: Have to admit that last weekend when Trump told his rally he wanted less testing for coronavirus so the statistics wouldn’t look so bad — I thought, wow, it’s only June and it’s so disastrous. Things can’t possibly stay this bad until November. This must be a plot to put us off our guard.
Think I’m getting paranoid?
Bret: I wish Hillary Clinton’s campaign managers had been a little more paranoid.
It really is a low point for Trump. The country is indignant, anxious, angry, untethered and unled. The president has met his moment of crisis and failed. His handling of the coronavirus was incompetent. His handling of the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing was atrocious. (Or is it the other way around?)
Gail: I think you’ve got it right — coronavirus incompetence, handling racial issues atrocious. Unless you want a worse word.
Bret: What’s the antonym of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious?
Yet for all of this, it reminds me of where the Trump campaign was this time four years ago — way behind in the polls and all-but written off by the pundits — and I fear he’s going to stage a comeback. Biden has basically been in hiding but will almost certainly have his own major stumbles. The economy could stage a V-shaped recovery and be in much better condition by November. The radicalism coming from the far left, especially the Abolish-the-Police faction, is going to turn off a lot of middle-of-the-road voters.
In short, this is going to be one of those horror movies when the villain you think is dead, isn’t. Tell me how Democrats prevent a redo of 2016?
Gail: Well I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about Biden failing to campaign in Wisconsin. And all Trump’s “Sleepy Joe” jibes may boomerang. What this country really wants now may be a president who stays out of their face and takes lots of naps.
Bret: Warren Harding campaigned from his front porch. Maybe Joe Biden can campaign from his hammock.
Gail: That said, it’s hard to get overconfident when you have a Democratic nominee with this bad a history in trying to get elected president.
Anything you’d advise Biden to do?
Bret: His campaign needs to work hard to avoid unscripted moments. Give him a teleprompter whenever possible. Center the campaign around a handful of well-prepared events where he can deliver well-written speeches centered on the themes of a return to human decency and democratic dignity.
Gail: Hey, we’ve been talking for … minutes without mentioning the veepstakes.
Bret: As for a running mate, I know much of the betting money is on Kamala Harris, because she ticks the boxes as a woman, a person of color, a senior legislator. But someone needs to recall that she ran a dismal campaign, didn’t seem to know what policies she stood for, attacked Biden as an apologist for segregation, and fell as quickly as she rose. I think she’s a potentially disastrous pick.
Gail: I share some of the same worries. I found her personally pleasant whenever I met her but her campaign was really disappointing, both organizationally and message-wise.
I guess the question is whether after Trump, America just wants some people who won’t make you cringe whenever they show up on TV.
Bret: For my money, the best choice is Michelle Obama. If I were Biden, I’d crawl a mile on my knees to beg her to say yes in the name of rescuing the country from its downward spiral.
Gail: I think you’d have to crawl more than a mile. I remember interviewing her back at the very beginning of the Obama presidential run. I have never seen anybody in politics so uncomfortable with the whole scene.
Obviously she’s used to being a public person now. But still very hard for me to imagine her giving up her life of family, writing and promoting her own causes to go back on the trail campaigning for another guy.
Bret: Isn’t that precisely what recommends her? It’s proverbial that those most fit to rule are those who least wish to do so.
Gail: We’ve seen a lot of other very impressive women suddenly pop up in the Mentioning Machine. The governor of Michigan, the mayor of Atlanta, the governor of New Mexico. Val Demings, the congresswoman who used to be a police chief. Of course none of them have a whole lot of national experience.
Any of them on your mind at this moment? Have to sadly admit that I think it’s time for us to bid a fond (at least for me) farewell to Elizabeth Warren as a potential veep.
Bret: Last I heard, Warren hadn’t ruled herself out, though you know I wouldn’t be sorry if she did. Of the others you mentioned, Demings strikes me as the best choice. Her law-enforcement background and record of publicly defending police will blunt the inevitable G.O.P. attack that Democrats are soft on crime. She did well as an impeachment manager and has national stature. Her story of rising from deep poverty in the segregated south is inspiring. And she can help deliver Florida — a state that, unlike Warren’s Massachusetts or Harris’s California, is still up for grabs, and without whose electoral votes Trump probably can’t win.
Gail: Yeah, those of us who live in super-Democratic states are used to being ignored and taken for granted. If I’d wanted anyone to actually campaign for my vote, I should never have left Ohio.
Bret: But I know we’ll get to pick over the veepstakes in coming weeks. I’m curious to know if you watched the Bolton interview the other night? Anything in particular surprise you?
Gail: Well, we’re certainly living through a new minute of history when the former national security adviser to a sitting president describes him in terms you’d use for a delinquent toddler. But no, I just wanted to yell: “A little late to be taking a principled stand here, John.”
How about you?
Bret: The cliché about a day late and a dollar short never seemed more apropos. Had he testified late last year, he might have swung at least a couple more Republicans, besides Mitt Romney, to vote to convict. And the whole notion of a former adviser writing a tell-all while the president is still in office just seems utterly distasteful.
Then again, it says something when arguably the most conservative member of the Trump White House goes on national TV to denounce the president and sounds a lot like … Nancy Pelosi. The world seems to be made these days for strange bedfellows, Gail.
Gail Collins is an Op-Ed columnist and a former member of the editorial board, and was the first woman to serve as the Times editorial page editor, from 2001 to 2007. @GailCollins • Facebook
Bret L. Stephens has been an Opinion columnist with The Times since April 2017. He won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary at The Wall Street Journal in 2013 and was previously editor in chief of The Jerusalem Post. Facebook
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