by Paul Goldman
After the stories about Senator Mark Warner trying to be the John Hancock of the revolution against President Joe Biden hit the national news wires, a leading member of the Congressional Black Caucus called me on my cell phone.
“Is this Warner the guy who the Virginia Democratic Party claims ran Doug Wilder’s campaigns?” he asked. “How could a guy who ran Doug Wilder campaign be so brain dead about Black politics?”
Then he asked, “Paul, are you sure you told the truth about Warner in your book Remaking Virginia Politics?“
I did what I could to defend Mark whom I consider a friend of many years. But it was of course clear to me he had made a terrible blunder in thinking he could be the face of any coup against President Joe Biden. And, yes, the attempt by Warner, the nation’s media and the Hollywood elites to drive Joe Biden off the Democratic ticket is the first presidential nomination coup in American history.
Even Republicans back in the Watergate scandal days treated President Richard Nixon better than Democratic lawmakers are treating Joe Biden. Mr. Biden’s detractors in one breath praise him for his policies, and then in the next publicly humiliate him by saying he lacks the mental and physical ability to run a presidential campaign much less serve in the Oval Office four more years. So, yes, the CBC member has a legitimate question: what the hell was Mark Warner thinking and why did he think it?
Let’s understand the rationale given by Mr. Warner and his coconspirators. To save our democracy, the Democratic Party elites, led by Democratic Virginia Senator Mark Warner, the left-leaning cable news commentariat, and the nation’s leading Democratic editorial pages and columnists, say a coup is justified against sitting Democratic President Joe Biden. As the president himself noted today, he won the nomination by a vote of the people in an open process that Mr. Warner and others at all times could have joined. But they lacked the guts to do it.
In 1968, youngsters like me got behind anti-war candidates challenging President Lyndon B. Johnson for the Democratic presidential nomination. We were vilified by the establishment. But at least we had the courage of our convictions.
If you listen to do those trying to coup President Biden, they claim they’re doing this as great patriots and at a great sacrifice in order to save our democracy from the man who would be King. This leads to the obvious question: Why would Mark Warner think he was a greater patriot than the commander in chief?
Let’s cut to the chase: Mark Warner made terrible miscalculation. His public rationale and sneaky approach can only hurt Biden and help Donald Trump. It’s difficult for me or anyone else knowledgeable in politics to believe Mark and his anti-Biden cohorts failed to understand this reality.
So you ask: Why did he do it?
My answer: Governor Warner would never have made such a blunder.
But Senator Warner, the product of the better part of two decades in Washington politics, is a different politician now. He no longer listens to the people, but rather the donors. It reminds me of the great scene in the movie, “Charlie Wilson‘s War,” when the former Texas congressman, played by Tom Hanks, was asked about his reputation on Capitol Hill.
“I’m considered one of Israel’s top people in Congress,“ said Hanks.
“But you don’t hardly have any Jews in your district,“ was the response. or words to that effect.
“Members of Congress don’t represent people,” said Hanks, “We represent donors. My donors come from New York, Miami, and Hollywood,” he said, not his rural Texas constituency.
Given the comedic strain in the movie, of course the lines were not intended to be taken literally. But they were effective because they spoke to what Americans increasingly believe: In Washington, money talks, and the big donors talk the loudest. They surely talk loud enough to drown out the voice of the people.
Just today, famed Hollywood icon Rob Reiner called on President Biden to drop out of the presidential race. Like Senator Warner, he didn’t do it because he lacked affection for Mr. Biden or disagreed with his policies on the whole.
Donald Trump has gone out of his way for months now to tell Democrats that if he gets back to the White House, he will use all the powers of the presidency and all the institutions of government to seek revenge against those he considers his enemies. Yesterday, Florida GOP Senator Rubio told the American people not to take Mr. Trump‘s threat literally. Trump, he said, doesn’t keep an enemies list like Richard Nixon. I don’t know anybody who believes a word of that. Steve Bannon is going to spend his next four months in prison compiling the list.
So, I get it: Senator Warner, Mr. Reiner and the other elites in the Democratic Party feel they will be a target should Trump return to the Oval office. Senator Warner knows how to read a poll. The polling data is not favorable to Joe Biden at the present moment. On an historical basis, no incumbent with President Biden’s anemic approval rating has ever been reelected.
David Axelrod, the CNN commentator who ran Barack Obama’s two successful presidential campaigns, is saying he believes there’s a good chance Biden will lose in a landslide. Warner knows that should this happen, the Republicans are likely to win majority control of the Senate. Even if the Democrats would regain a majority in the House of Representatives, a GOP Senate majority would have the constitutional authority to the pack the judiciary for life with Trump appointees.
Accordingly, I’m willing to give Mark the benefit of the doubt in terms of his passion to save a Democratic Senate Majority being overwhelmed by a brain cramp. But unlike Joe Biden‘s detractors, I’m not going to ask Mark to take a cognitive test to see whether he still has the mental abilities to be United States Senator.
He did something politically stupid. I’ve been in politics long enough to say I’ve done some dumb stuff myself. Not this dumb but dumb enough. He and the others have hurt President Biden’s chances of winning, they can’t deny that, and they can’t deny they knew that when they did it.
But more importantly, we need to understand why the blunder was made. This would never have happened if we Democrats remembered we are supposed to be the party of the people and not the Hollywood donor elite. President Biden made that very point today.
This never would have happened if Warner and others accepted the fact they needed to talk to everyone, particularly black voters who are the most loyal Democrats, before presuming to speak for the people.
So yes, the member of the CBC is correct. No one who really ran Doug Wilder’s campaign could’ve ever made such a blunder. Other blunders perhaps but not this one.
However, what is done is done. President Biden has been damaged. There’s nothing any of the elites can do to take it back. That’s reality.
Is it a fatal blow in the final analysis? In all candor, it’s not possible to know at the present time. We can presume the upcoming Republican National Convention will feature Senator Warner, and the others in their new role as Fox News’ favorite Democrats.
We should get a better read on what damage has been done to Joe Biden in the polling done in the aftermath of the GOP convention. It could be substantial. Democrats need to brace for that.
President Biden is a fighter. He has been knocked down more than most people who have ever managed to become President. Fair or not, the comments of folks like Senator Warner cannot be wished way by the White House. They will need to be addressed.
President Biden is going to need to show the American people that Warner and others are rival politicians who had a political motive to say what they said.
Let’s be clear on this: As much as I admire President Biden, and as much as I enjoyed playing a role in helping to turn around his campaign in South Carolina four years ago, I’m quite clear eyed at the challenge facing Democrats right now.
Former President Harry Truman was right. He advised those in national politics who thought they needed a friend to get a dog.
I suspect the 2024 president campaign — as nasty as it has been to date — may very well get exponentially nastier in the coming months. I see there are no guard rails anymore.
And in all honesty, if President Biden would say in a couple of weeks from now that he’s talked it over with his family, and they simply are so sick of the damn thing they are just going to enjoy the rest of their lives out of the public eye, I wouldn’t blame him one bit.
I’m running for city council in Richmond, and already I’m being warned that the Mayor’s pro-Casino forces who smeared me with anti-Semitic comments for leading the winning fight against them and all the Democrats that trashed me over the years because I’ve stood up to the establishment, are going do everything they can to defeat me. And I’m just running for city Council!
I agree with my friend Senator Tim Kaine: Joe Biden‘s a good man, he’s a great patriot, he brought America back from a pandemic depression and we know he’s going do the right thing for our country.
Paul Goldman is former Chair of the VA Democratic Party, a candidate for mayor of the City of Richmond, and author of “Remaking Virginia Politics.”