John Stoehr: Betting On Biden

Sometimes it seems as though Democrats are more determined to "fall in love" than to win elections. Lately I've been hearing, from both pundits and friends, that Joe Biden is simply too old to run for reelection. This week on Sea Change Radio, we hear from John Stoehr, the Editor and Founder of The Editorial Board, to get his insights into the 2024 presidential election. We look at some of the calls from media members like Ezra Klein and Nate Silver for Biden to step aside, discuss how Republicans are taking a much bigger leap of faith by re-nominating Donald Trump, and counter some of the critics with practical arguments for why the Democrats might want to stick with Joe Biden as their nominee in August. Narrator | 00:02 - This is Sea Change Radio covering the shift to sustainability. I'm Alex Wise. John Stoehr (JS) | 00:17 - We already have a consensus candidate. Joe Biden was the consensus candidate of 2020. He is the consensus candidate Now as the incumbent. You don't need to ditch the consensus candidate to come up with another consensus candidate. It doesn't make any sense. Narrator | 00:35 - Sometimes it seems as though Democrats are more determined to "fall in love" than to win elections. Lately I've been hearing, from both pundits and friends, that Joe Biden is simply too old to run for reelection. This week on Sea Change Radio, we hear from John Stoehr, the Editor and Founder of The Editorial Board, to get his insights into the 2024 presidential election. We look at some of the calls from media members like Ezra Klein and Nate Silver for Biden to step aside, discuss how Republicans are taking a much bigger leap of faith by re-nominating Donald Trump, and counter some of the critics with practical arguments for why the Democrats might want to stick with Joe Biden as their nominee in August. Alex Wise (AW) | 01:28 - I'm joined now on Sea Change Radio by John Storr. He is the editor and founder of The Editorial Board. John, welcome back to Sea Change Radio. John Stoehr (JS) | 01:42 - Thanks for having me back. Alex. Alex Wise (AW) | 01:44 - Always a pleasure to talk to you, my friend. You wrote a piece that was a perfect response to the many people who've spoken to me over the last few months, clutching their pearls. Very concerned that Joe Biden is not going to be the nominee, or needs to not be the nominee. Many variations on this, and this all came to a head recently when Ezra Klein wrote an op-Ed for the New York Times, as well as putting it on his podcast, a special monologue where he laid out his plan for Joe Biden to step aside, be a hero, do the right thing, and, and let somebody else run against Donald Trump. You wrote a piece in The Editorial Board entitled Critics Calling on Biden to Drop Out are not thinking it through. So let's go down this path together and make a collective case for these people who want to discuss the possibility of Joe Biden Stepping Aside. JS | 02:44 - Right. So we're to begin with this, um, I think it's one. Okay. So we begin with why are people worried? Right? And people are worried because, uh, there are many polls, poll after poll that suggest that Biden is quote unquote losing or trailing to Donald Trump. AW | 03:07 - And similar polls, I don't know how they phrase them, phrase the questions, but often say, is Joe Biden too old for president? And 86% will say “Yes,” et cetera. JS | 03:19 - Yes. Right. And so let's take, let's take those two questions. Here's what we do know is that these two questions seem to be related. Uh, so people seem to say that Biden's too old, and so therefore he shouldn't run for president, or he's too old and that's why he's trailing Donald Trump. However, those two questions are not empirically linked because they can't be. It's a leap of logic. AW | 03:40 - Yes. Explain that a little bit more. You break that down in your piece quite well.  JS | 03:44 - Yeah. I mean, it's just a matter,