Trust Joe Biden to beat Donald Trump

I watched the Biden-Trump debate in horror, like millions of moderates. Here was a slick conman with a national bullhorn — sans fact checking — next to a decent man who tells the truth but can’t get his words out. Even Republicans know Trump’s performance last week was a firehose of lies, but after-the-fact fact-checking is just background noise, irrelevant to all but political junkies. (We know who we are.) Trump’s base also knows he is a serial liar, which they consider a feature, not a bug. Whattaya do with that?The sad reality is that facts vs. lies and the grave geopolitical risks facing us have now been upstaged by Biden’s pauses, weak voice and halting delivery, all of which seemed to confirm supporters’ fears about Biden’s age — he’s 81 — and fitness for serving out a second term, when he’d be 86. Why, oh why, didn’t Biden open with, “Folks, I have a cold, bear with me, my voice is rough, but we’ll get through it...”? Instead, his voice gravelly and barely audible, he bumbled, even though most facts were on his side. Biden, far more forceful at a North Carolina rally right after debate, freely admits he stumbled. “I don’t debate as well as I used to,” he said, but “I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong.” ALSO READ: How The Onion’s founding editor finds humor in the dismal age of TrumpBiden’s style, rather than the substance delivered by either Biden or Trump, has nevertheless dominated headlines. Too many Democrats are now calling for Biden to leave the race, without considering that Vice President Kamala Harris often polls worse than Biden, and picking someone else to top the 2024 Democratic presidential ticket would alienate black, young and many female voters — and rightly so. As I see it, if Biden demures, Harris must either forcefully decline her candidacy — forcefully enough that her supporters would believe she’s doing it of her own volition — or, if she is ready to run and inside data show her path to victory, Biden should resign the presidency now so that she has four months as an incumbent.Here’s a better option: Biden quadruples down. He marches toward the presidency in a fashion even Trump — who himself faced Republican calls to step down after his “Access Hollywood” debacle in October 2016 — couldn’t match. He lives the line of a poem he once quoted to a friend: “Rage, rage against the dying of the light."What Biden has done in office in nearly four year years counts far, far more than a bad 90-minute “debate.” As Harris said in her post-debate interview, “I got the point that you're making about a one-and-a-half-hour debate tonight. I'm talking about three-and-a-half years of performance in work that has been historic ...” And she’s right: If this is a contest on the merits, on substance, Biden wins hands down. Pundits don’t really know what’s nextThe whole debate cringe fest was a Fox News fantasy come to life. I cried for my country, popped an Ambien and went to bed. I realize, at this point, pundits are just echoing each other. No one really knows what the fallout will be, or how the undecideds felt about the debate. I have some shred of hope that Americans are smart enough to cut through the slick lies vs. bumbling truth and consider what both men actually said. ALSO READ: Marjorie Taylor Greene buys condo in 'crime ridden hell hole'But honestly, MAGA exists because about 30 percent believe violence and retribution are sexier than competent policy. Every. Single. Time. Also, low information voters get juiced by hate, which stimulates the brain like an opioid. Hate is the brain’s most powerful motivator — right up there with fear — which means hate-filled people tend to vote in higher numbers than complacent moderates. This, very simply, is why the stupidest 20 percent of the United States has been able to impose minority rule, supported by the morbidly rich seeking to avoid regulations and taxes. It’s also why Trump keeps trashing our country and lying about crime — it’s an opioid pump for his base. Darwin suggests we get real serious about real education, real fast.The gaslighting got upstaged, but it was masterclassDuring the debate, Trump’s gaslighting on foreign policy was astounding, even for Trump.When Trump said Hamas attacked Israel and Putin attacked Ukraine because Biden is weak, I worried, because many voters won’t think this through. No one should need any spin; Putin himself has said his invasion goes back to the 17th century, Peter the Great and his personal power-lust for restoring the Soviet Empire. Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the CNN Presidential Debate at the CNN Studios on June 27, 2024 in Atlanta, Ga. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)The complexities of the Israel-Hamas war are even deeper. They far exceed Trump’s cranial capacity, going back decades, marginally beginning with Hitler’s atrocities. Israel’s history exceeds most voters’ attention spans, including mine. Biden has walked a tightrope, empathizing with suffering on both Israeli and Palestinian sides. He has forcefully denounced and criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cruelty, and he immediately denounced the naked brutality of Hamas. No one alive could do a better job navigating Israel’s scorching complexity. Suffering Palestinians deserve all the aid, support and compassion they are getting – far more – student protesters on the left are right in that regard. But where they’re wrong is in failing to understand that if Biden cut off support to Israel, Trump would collect tens of millions of dollars in donations overnight and storm back into power, and few people would ever hear or care about Palestinian suffering again.Those who worked with Trump are warning usTrump’s mendacity was unprecedented in U.S. presidential history, even before the Supreme Court ruled he was above the law. The damage he has already caused will linger for decades. His offenses are too numerous to list, including nominating Supreme Court justices who helped end the federal right to abortion, adding $8 trillion to the deficit, lavishing billionaires with tax cuts, selling the climate to big oil ... blah blah blah. It’s redundant already.Biden is running for reelection not to stay out of prison or engage in retribution, but to save America from Trump and his army of sycophants addicted to power. They are dangerous.During his awful debate performance, Biden managed to reference — albeit far too softly — that a national study conducted by the University of Houston and Coastal Carolina University rated Trump the worst president in the history of the United States. Ever. According to America’s apolitical historians. Don’t trust your own instincts after the debate? Let that sink in. Not enough? Consider that Trump’s closest military and domestic advisers have warned us how dangerous it would be to return him to power. While most Trump toadies are too afraid of Trump to disagree with him, these are statements made on the record by Trump advisers, as CNN reported:1. His vice president, Mike Pence: “The American people deserve to know that President Trump asked me to put him over my oath to the Constitution. ... Anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be president of the United States.” 2. His second attorney general, Bill Barr: “Someone who engaged in that kind of bullying about a process that is fundamental to our system and to our self-government shouldn’t be anywhere near the Oval Office.”3. His first secretary of defense, James Mattis: “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people – does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us.”4. His second secretary of defense, Mark Esper: “I think he’s unfit for office. ... He puts himself before country. His actions are all about him and not about the country. And then, of course, I believe he has integrity and character issues as well.”5. His chairman of the joint chiefs, retired Gen. Mark Milley: “We don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator. We take an oath to the Constitution and we take an oath to the idea that is America – and we’re willing to die to protect it.”6. His first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson: “(Trump’s) understanding of global events, his understanding of global history, his understanding of U.S. history was really limited. It’s really hard to have a conversation with someone who doesn’t even understand the concept for why we’re talking about this.”Dozens of other professionals who worked alongside Trump until they realized what he really was have issued similarly dire warnings.Biden may not be as physically or mentally robust as he was 20 or 30 years ago- few are. But I will take this old man over a con man any day of the week, because Biden is a better man. Always has been, always will be. And he still has time to prove to America that he’s the right choice — and he is — in November.I’ll close with Robert DeNiro’s words because I really can’t top them. Here’s what he just wrote in a post-debate email: "Over the years, I’ve played my share of vicious, low-life characters. I’ve spent a lot of time studying bad men. I’ve examined their characteristics, their mannerisms, and the utter banality of their cruelty. Donald Trump is a wannabe tough guy with no morals or ethics who will do whatever he can to obtain power. As an actor, I could never play him. There’s not a shred of humanity to hang on to. I strongly support Joe Biden. He’s a lifelong public servant with great personal integrity. I trust him completely to run the country. He puts you first. Trump cares only about himself."Sabrina Haake is a columnist and 25 year litigator specializing in 1st and 14th Amendment defense. Her Substack, The Haake Take, is free.