Dick Morris: Joe Biden Is Becoming Unelectable
A politician who is falling in the polls goes through a progression.
First, the public comes to feel that problems such as the economy are getting worse, but they still do not blame him.
Then, they come to blame him for the failure, and his job approval goes down — but he still retains his personal favorability or popularity.
Finally, his personal favorability drops to match his job ratings as voters decide they just don’t like him.
This is the story of Joe Biden’s presidency since the November midterm elections.
Biden was saved in November by what turned out to be a purely transitory improvement in his job approval. Impelled by what appeared to be congressional action in the passage of the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act of the summer of ’22, the president’s job approval, which had been languishing at 36 percent, rose to 42 percent.
Since then, more and more Americans have learned they were fooled and there was no real economic progress at all.
Biden’s job approval began its descent to 40 percent in January, 35 percent in May and 32 percent now (according to CNN).
The sunny summer of ’22, when Biden peaked, got him through the midterm elections with only limited damage — no red wave.
As reality set in, his job approval fell rapidly. But his personal favorability or popularity remained higher than his job approval. People liked him even if they disapproved of his performance in office.
Now, however, the revelations of accusations of bribery, the Hunter Biden scandals, the 80-year-old president’s increasingly evident physical problems and his obvious mental inability to cope with today’s problems are taking their toll on his personal popularity.
In this month’s poll by McLaughlin and Associates, Biden sank to all-time lows in both job approval and personal favorability.
A politician can recover from bad job ratings — he can always do a better job. But once the job disapproval has crept into his personal favorability, it is hard to recover.
It’s easier to convince people that your job performance has improved than it is to tell them that you have become a better man.
So Biden’s political troubles are mounting to a point where he cannot redeem himself. He is becoming unelectable.
However, in an act that can only be compared to ritual suicide, the Democratic Party remains wed to him. It is not prepared to drop him. Unless something changes, its stubbornness will rank among history’s grossest examples of political stupidity.
Put the last few weeks in perspective. Former President Donald Trump — the leading 2024 Republican candidate — was indicted in two separate jurisdictions and his ratings improved. Biden is still immune from censure by his biased Justice Department, but his numbers have dropped.
There is a God.
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