A convention fight is a pure pundit’s fantasy

A snarky aside from a Republican special counsel, lackluster presidential poll numbers and a pass on a Super Bowl interview have plunged certain pundits into full-blown, sweaty-palmed panic.

Ezra Klein of the Times, Damon Linker of The Atlantic, and Substacker Nate Silver say president Joe Biden should refuse to seek a second term despite his outstanding record in office because … he seems kind of old.

Klein and Linker propose instead that Biden release the delegates he wins in the primary to choose the Democratic nominee at the party’s convention in late August. This proposal is madness. If punditry had standards, it would be malpractice.

A new poll released Friday by Emerson College showed Biden trailing Trump by one point with 11 percent of voters still undecided. The same poll had Trump beating vice president Kamala Harris by three points, California Governor Gavin Newsom by 10 points, and Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer by 12 points. This is in line with the rest of the polling. All of the most bruited alternative candidates poll worse than Biden in a head-to-head with Trump. So why are we having this discussion?

A convention fight is a pure pundit’s fantasy. First off, it’s predicated on Biden voluntarily stepping aside, which is not going to happen. Although Linker’s not above a little light blackmail to try to force the issue:

“For starters, every major figure in the party prevailing on Biden to drop out. That can be done behind the scenes at first, out of respect for the president. But if he refuses to budge, then it will be time for embarrassing leaks to the press. I would like to think that Biden will see the only way to preserve his reputation, record, and self-respect is by announcing, somewhat as Lyndon B. Johnson did in March 1968, that he’s withdrawing from the race.”

Moreover, a brokered convention is a unicorn, a beguiling chimera that gets conjured by nerds every cycle but never materializes in the modern world because its existence is incompatible with real life.

Klein breezes past the fact that the last contested Democratic convention was a disaster of epic proportions. In 1968, the deeply unpopular incumbent, Lyndon Johnson, dropped out and threw his support behind his vice president, Hubert Humphrey. The convention became a flashpoint for intraparty conflict so fierce that newsman Dan Rather was beaten by police on the convention floor. Humphrey prevailed, but Democrats were in disarray for real. Richard Nixon won the general election.

In 2024, a contested convention would become an arena to settle every score from Gaza to Medicare for All. A free-for-all would shatter the fragile Democratic coalition that Joe Biden so carefully knit together. If Kamala Harris won, people would complain that Joe Biden put his thumb on the scale, even if he didn’t. If Harris didn’t win, an equal and opposite faction would be furious that she was passed over. We have no idea who would win this hypothetical battle royale. We don’t even know who might enter. Virtually any Democrat over 35 could throw their hat in the ring. Klein rattled off a list of fourteen potential contenders. A chaotic and crowded race would increase the odds that someone completely unvetted got the top spot.

By then it would be late August and the Democratic party would have about two months to refocus on beating Trump with whatever nominee came out on top.

But given that party elites picked the nominee, there’d be no guarantee that the rank-and-file would accept their choice. The pundits are asking a couple thousand Biden delegates to pick the future leader of the free world. They’re also asking Biden to disregard the will of the Democratic primary voters who pulled the lever for him. This is profoundly undemocratic and unlikely to play well in a party where there are still people fuming about the superdelegates of 2016.

Klein and Linker are well aware that a contested convention would be risky.

“Could it go badly? Sure. But that doesn’t mean it will go badly,” Klein writes, “It could make the Democrats into the most exciting political show on earth.”

The absolute last thing the Democratic Party needs is to be the greatest show on earth.

Joe Biden’s polling isn’t where it needs to be. That should scare everyone who enjoys living in a democracy.

That anxiety is eating at us all, but pundits should not be dangling the false hope that some mystery candidate will solve Joe Biden’s electoral problems. This is a binary choice between Joseph R. Biden and Donald J. Trump. Period. One is rated by historians as the 14th-best president of all time, the other is a proven rapist and fraudster with 91 indictments and a failed coup under his belt.

It’s time to shelve the childish fantasies and focus on the task at hand: Supporting Joe Biden to defeat Donald Trump. He’s done it before. He can do it again, but he needs our help.