Thoughts On An Open Democratic Convention

---

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

(Please read the whole thing before commenting fury at me.)

I am not committed to replacing Biden. However, I think the debate around the idea is productive because Biden quite plainly owes Democratic voters the reassurance that he isn’t as vacant all the time as he seemed on live television during the debate.

I do think a candidate better at cogently reminding voters how shitty Trump is would be better for this election. Biden was utterly incapable of doing that at the debate. Literally incapable. He didn’t really make a case against Trump, he bungled all his policy ideas and pre-planned lines, and he looked too tired to repudiate Trump and everything a second Trump term would be about.

Don’t get me wrong, I will be voting for and supporting Biden if he stays in the race, even if he died today and was just a pile of bones on election day. His administration has been competent and put America on a much better track than Trump was taking us. From the infrastructure spending to the anti-inflation measures, the stimulus on technology and energy to the deft foreign policy reinforcing our alliances against Russian and Chinese attacks on the rules-based order, the Biden team has accomplished more than I thought was politically possible. So if Biden is the candidate, he absolutely has my vote.

But so does whoever the Democrats put up. I feel like this, more than any other election in our history except maybe 1860, is going to be a straight-ticket vote, and I am confident the anti-Trump coalition will not collapse because Democrats decide to go with a much younger, bolder, more alive candidate than Biden. Outrage over Republican positions on abortion, taxes, Putin, and Project 25 have hopefully locked in an 8th out of 9 popular vote victories for Democrats, and I, like most Democrats, will do what I can to ensure the swing states break for Democrats. And maybe that means replacing Biden, who is currently bringing Democrats down in the nation’s closest, most important swing states and districts.

(Reminder that most of the Supreme Court majority was appointed by presidents who hadn’t won the popular vote. It’s bad enough the Electoral College allows presidential representation that didn’t win the popular vote, our judicial representation on the highest court has opinions on the Constitution, regulations, and policy that lost a vote already. Our Supreme Court is a judicial coup of minority rule. So if you’re liberal at all and sitting out the election because the Democrats aren’t unelectably liberal, and you give Republicans another 4 years to replace Supreme Court vacancies making America less liberal… you’re so bad at politics just quit sharing your opinions until you commit to doing something productive for making America incrementally more liberal instead of actively obstructing liberal progress and virtue-signaling about it because you can’t get it all at once.)

There are many benefits to having an open convention. I feel like Democrats hosting an open convention to replace Biden would be the most televised event of the election by far. It would be enjoyable to see Trump for the first time in his life not get all the attention and airtime. The nation would be glued to the DNC’s livestream in the biggest free campaign ad for Democrats ever. I understand the opposition some feel about this considering we already had a primary, and Biden unofficially-so-far won it, but this is the way political nominations used to be decided, and 2024 is not a normal election year.

If Trump’s presidency and winning polls prove anything, it’s that the American people love a spectacle and a show, and a real convention of political sausage-making would mean quite literally a billion dollars of free airtime. Imagine speeches by every major Democrat all laying out the case for why Trump must be defeated and uniting behind a new consensus candidate rather than America just tuning in to see Biden’s acceptance speech… which could turn into an embarrassing, old man pity hour just as easily as his debate performance.

Also, Democrats and the voting populace at large deserve to know ASAP if Biden’s team is actually hiding his infirmities from the country. If Biden keeps control of the party, and gets nominated, and then he powers down again at the last debate, it will not have been patriotic or strategic for Biden and his team to have put the party in that position.

But if Biden is not up for the job, maybe let’s put in Josh Shapiro, or Gretchen Whitmer, or Gavin Newsom, or Pete Buttigieg. Maybe Kamala Harris, but I’m not sure she has much enthusiasm behind her. Democrats can get someone who will almost halve the age of the candidate, and who will be capable of reminding voters ceaselessly with articulate vigor that Donald Trump is a conning, raping, traitor to American values, interests, security, allies, and ideals.

I also think it’s a solid idea to suddenly have a new candidate who hasn’t endured literally 6+ years of constant negative attacks from the conservative media echo chamber. Conservatives’ opinions on Joe Biden have broken away from reality believing all kinds of objectively inaccurate things about the economy, crime, the border, Biden’s family, and having Josh Shapiro all of a sudden tap Biden out would derail the GOP’s messaging and framing of the whole election.

I’m using Shapiro as an example, not out of personal endorsement, as I don’t claim to know who would be the best replacement for the party standard-bearer, but, having a quiet, politically methodical guy like Shapiro, who just put on a masterclass of impressive political skill with his response to the I-95 bridge collapse, would make for quite a contrast with wild, deranged Trump.

We would do well with a competent current governor kind of president. Shapiro and Gretchen Whitmer both have swing state gravitas, and Pete Buttigieg’s technocratic attention to detail is a great sell. J.B. Pritzker in Illinois and Gavin Newsom in California are experienced champions of liberalism in their states, and politically savvy enough to jump in and take on Trump.

This is the responsibility of the party: to settle on the best possible candidate, and win the election. Right now Biden is behind Trump in the swing state polls, he’s being outperformed by Democratic Congressional candidates, he’s losing key blocs of voters including young voters and men of color, and he just put on the worst presidential debate performance anyone alive has seen. Is he the best candidate?

Trump and the GOP are so adamant on destroying the public bureaucracy that Democrats need to have a qualified, capable chief executive argue how and why our country will prosper more if we don’t let the GOP tear down all our democratic institutions.

Quick sidenote to the recent UK Election:

There was a great landslide result for Labour in Britain. What I would give to have a landslide election that big in America to kick out all the brainlessly antagonistic bomb-throwers and MAGA saboteurs of our democracy in one election. The Tories were exhausted and out of ideas, having forced the UK through Brexit despite all the post-EU negative doomcasting coming true, and now the country’s economic stagnation problems have only gotten worse. This should be a warning for American conservatives that letting Trump help dismantle NATO, start trade disputes with the EU, tell our military allies like South Korea, Japan, and Europe to “pay up or fuck off,” deport a bunch of immigrants, etc. will not help the economic stresses and fears of MAGA voters. The GOP is lucky independent and apathetic voters don’t realize that Republicans are just as out of touch, out of ideas, and rudderless as the Tories.

---

Enjoy my comedy? Buy me a coffee!

Follow me on Twitter, Threads, Bluesky, or Spoutible to interrupt your daily doomscrolling with Dada news, and follow me here on Substack!

Also check out my book “Satire In The Trump Years: The Best Of The Halfway Post,” available on Barnes & Noble and Amazon.

Check out my poetry book Cabaret No Stare, available in print and on Kindle.