The co-hosts of the liberal podcast “Pod Save America” melted down over President Joe Biden’s disastrous performance during Thursday night’s debate.
The hosts, like many other Democrats and liberal pundits, panicked over Biden’s raspy voice and inability to complete a sentence on the debate stage. Jon Favreau, a previous head speechwriter for former President Barack Obama, called the debate a “fucking disaster” and the “worst” he had ever witnessed.
“You don’t listen to us to sugarcoat anything, I think it was a fucking disaster,” Favreau said. “I think it was like the worst debate I’d ever seen in my entire life. Donald Trump is a threat to democracy, Donald Trump is just a despicable human being, he should not be president. We have to do literally everything we possibly can to make sure he is not president again and that is why it was so fucking awful because Joe Biden just in every single way failed at that debate. And, I don’t know what else to say there … but it was a disaster.”
Tommy Viator said Biden “exacerbated” concerns about his age and mental capacity, pointing to the “failure” of Biden to show he is capable of serving another four years.
“And I believe that tonight’s performance is not a reflection on the type of president that he is. But it is a very concerning piece of evidence about the kind of candidate he will be in this race. Because you need to ultimately be able to defend your record and make the case against Trump,” host Dan Pfeiffer said. (RELATED: Joy Reid Says Democrats Are ‘Approaching Panic’ By Biden’s ‘Extremely Weak’ Debate Performance)
“The most important job that Joe Biden has as President of the United States is to beat Donald Trump and unfortunately, he went into this debate, he was behind. His job was to overcome that dynamic and change it,” Jon Lovett, a former speechwriter, said.
“He emphasized it, and for the same sense of decency, and empathy and patriotism that led Joe Biden to run, I believe this is a moment to at least have a big, open conversation about the best thing he can do for America is to end his presidency as the success it deserves to be on whether or not he should step aside and already … because the stakes are so high, you see people afraid to have that conversation, and fine. But what I don’t appreciate is people immediately saying well, we know Joe Biden won’t step aside. We know Joe Biden won’t do this, won’t do that. I don’t know what Joe Biden’s gonna do.”
The debate placed Democrats in an aggressive panic as his performance reflected the worries of voters regarding Biden’s mental acuity. A CBS News/YouGov poll found 26% believe Biden has the “mental and cognitive health” to serve a second term, while 43% said the same about former President Donald Trump. A WSJ poll found 36% of registered voters believe Biden is “mentally up for the job,” and 49% said the same about Trump.
Two aides for Biden rushed to the president’s defense by claiming he was suffering from a cold. His campaign did not mention his alleged cold before the debate began.
Special Counsel Robert Hur described Biden as a “well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory” in his report following an investigation into whether he ought to have been prosecuted for mishandling classified documents. An ABC News poll found 86% of voters believe Biden is “too old” to run again following the damning report.
