Analysis: Delusion versus conspiracy
The book has revived the conversation about how Democrats put a declining Joe Biden on the ballot — and how the media blew the story. There were a lot of bad moments in public, including one I wrote about in 2023 at the White House holiday party . But I also talked to sources I trusted and who spent time with Biden, and they would candidly assure me that he was, mostly, fine. So what happened here? There was, as the book shows, an extended effort to conceal Biden's infirmity. But I think for many people in Washington, it was also, as Orwell wrote, hard to see what's in front of your nose.
You can see this (if, I suppose, you want to see it) in an unusual exchange on Mark Halperin's the other day, as a former top Biden aide (and unnamed source for the book, by his account), Rufus Gifford, wrestled with this question. 'My brain is doing somersaults, and has been for the last eight months, on this very topic, because I was certainly not with him every day, but I was with him a lot, and this whole thing is very hard for someone like me,' he said. 'I can guarantee you there was no cover-up on my part, but I wish I had a better sense of everything.'
Gifford's evidence for delusion over conspiracy: He and other aides were eager to put Biden on a debate stage. 'I could not have been more excited about that debate. I thought the president was going to kill it. That is where my mind was.' An unsatisfying answer, perhaps, and nobody on social media's going to buy it! But the most obvious fact about today's hyper-polarized environment is that people can convince themselves of anything.
Gifford also sent me a brief video of what proved a decisive moment, an encounter in which George Clooney says Biden didn't recognize him — the true original sin. Gifford says Clooney's name was called out just before the meeting, and so he doesn't think this makes sense. I don't actually think the video resolves much — but take a look for yourself here.
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