U.S. President Joe Biden reacts as he attends a press conference during NATO's 75th anniversary summit, in Washington on July 11.Leah Millis/Reuters
This has become the Democrats’ Rashomon summer.
The term, derived from the 1950 Japanese film of that name, speaks to how events can be viewed differently by different people, and it may be the key to understanding American politics at this fraught juncture. It helps explain the controversy surrounding Joe Biden and it illuminates the curiously similar way the President has adapted one of Donald Trump’s key memes – a word the two elderly pugilists never encountered in their youths – as the campaign enters its critical midsummer convention season.
In the fortnight following Mr. Biden’s unsettling performance in his debate with the former president, the Rashomon reaction has been dramatic. White House insiders and key allies of Mr. Biden have insisted that his performances in an ABC television interview and Thursday night’s news conference after the NATO summit demonstrated the President’s command of facts, his mastery of complicated global issues and his mental sharpness.
But those who are skeptical that Mr. Biden possesses the mental acuity to undertake a demanding campaign and, even more critically, to exercise the powers of the presidency, believe just the opposite.
And though there are faint signs that some presidential aides have concluded that Mr. Biden should be edged out of the campaign – the argument is that a withdrawal would enhance the Democrats’ chances of defeating Mr. Trump – the views of the two conflicting sides remain firm and, in some cases, may have hardened.
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This phenomenon has occurred as a Democratic member of the House of Representatives, Mike Levin of California, told Mr. Biden directly on a Zoom call to stand down and as major Democratic donors have indicated that they will suspend their contributions, accounting for as much as $90 million, as long as Mr Biden remains in the race. Money talks in American politics, but this is an important test of how loudly.
These two conflicting views – that Mr. Biden is fit for office on the one steady hand, or that he is too infirm to campaign and govern on the other shaky hand – are not unusual in cases involving aging people.
“If you see someone who is on the decline every day you might unconsciously rationalize what you see,” said Janet Taylor, a psychologist who was a consultant for the American Association of Retired People. “But when someone comes along who hasn’t seen that all the time they will say: ‘Oh my gosh.’ A new lens can decipher things that others may not see.”
The contretemps over Mr. Biden’s cognitive health underlines the different responses that older people have to aging.
“Cognitive change in older people is a worry for 100 per cent of people over 80,” said Bill Thomas, who runs Changing Aging, a group dedicated to changing public perceptions of aging. “Their friends and family members know they are changing. The people who are experiencing really significant cognitive decline often don’t worry about it as much as the people who are cognitively well.”
The perception of aging is itself a changing phenomenon, especially in politics.
In 1960, when Governor Nelson Rockefeller of New York was calculating his chances in seeking the Republican presidential nomination, his age (51 in 1959) was a factor. “If he did not move in 1960, and if the succeeding Republican president held a normal two terms,” Theodore H. White wrote in his classic The Making of the President 1960, “he would be 60 in 1968, too old.”
Two decades after the age-related ruminations of Mr. Rockefeller, who eventually did run but was defeated by Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan was elected president. He was 69.
Colliding views of aging are not the only clash of perceptions shaping the 2024 campaign. Indeed, American politics is stalled at Perception Junction.
For years, Mr. Trump has railed against the “elites,” whom he blames for shaping the culture and economy to their desires and interests. Now Mr. Biden, who as recently as last month arguably was a favourite of American elites, is playing the same card.
He is arguing that the elites – especially in the press, and specifically in The New York Times – are mounting a campaign to drive him from the presidential race. Donald Trump Jr., perhaps in a great feint designed to keep a weak candidate as his opponent, has taken the part of his father’s rival, contending that the President should continue his candidacy.
“Both sides are willing to adopt these anti-elite tactics rather than solve serious problems,” said Frank Luntz, a veteran Republican pollster and strategist. “Politicians do this because they get applause, they get emails, they get texts. As Americans we need someone to blame. This was not part of our culture 50 year ago. We were not a blame culture. We were a responsibility culture.”