Two years have passed, but what the nation lived through during the final days of President Biden’s 2024 re-election bid still haunts the collective consciousness. How Biden and his inner circle then behaved revealed something very unseemly about the Democratic establishment. Who can forget seeing the president, spewing nonsense during a live debate and wrapped in a cluelessness that ruled out his becoming the Democratic nominee?
Yet, for four long weeks after that debacle, Biden held out, defying every form of authority within his party. A parade of Democratic officials entreated him to bow out of the race, in vain. Millions of voters watched helplessly and with sinking hearts, as Biden hewed to his own interests at the expense of theirs. His reluctance to relinquish his ambition for the sake of the nation left many Americans lastingly betrayed, for it exposed something deeply undemocratic in the Democratic Party. Where we might have hoped to see a humble deference to the needs of the nation, self-interest reigned.
The peculiar forces that ended up shaping the nation’s destiny bore an uncanny resemblance to William Wyler’s 1950 gothic masterpiece, Sunset Boulevard. Gloria Swanson plays a faded movie star, Norma Desmond, who’s a total has-been, a relic of the silent-screen era, living in seclusion in a big ol’ house. She’s a recluse, and a terribly deluded one, who believes the public still loves her and that Hollywood is clamoring for her return to the screen. Ministering to her is her ex-husband, Max, reduced to the ignominious status of a manservant, who stokes Norma’s delusions out of misguided love. He feeds her false information and soothes her ego, vigilantly protecting her from any hint of the truth: the unflattering, ego-shattering truth about her inconsequence and bleak prospects in the outside world.
William Holden plays a broke young writer, Joe Gillis, who stumbles into Desmond’s hermetic theater and tries to go along with her to get what he needs. He plays into her dangerous fantasy, thinking it’s harmless, and hoping to use her glamour to shore up his own precarious position in Hollywood. But Gilles becomes fatally enmeshed with Desmond; he can’t escape. The Venus fly-trap on Sunset Boulevard is deadly. When Gilles attacks Norma with the truth she becomes enraged, and Max, her faithful defender, shoots Gillis dead rather than let him flee. With Joe’s corpse floating face down in her swimming pool, Norma glides down the stairs for her famous “close-up,” and a police squad hauls her off to where she truly belongs.
Sunset Boulevard captures the essence of the bizarre political drama that unfolded at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in the pivotal weeks following Biden’s collapse. Instead of bowing out, the president forged ahead as if everything were fine. His staff pushed him back onto the stage, telling him what to say and where to stand. His unfitness was irrelevant, because a small group of insiders decided to perpetuate his delusions and shield him from the “intrusion” of reality. While the rest of us masticated over the truth, Biden’s camp peddled a false narrative and pushed him ahead.
The small circle around Biden didn’t represent the public or a political party. The handlers, the spouse, and the campaign manager were hangers-on who owed their status to Biden’s high position. The First Family ignored the citizens’ primacy. Living and working in the White House was comfy. Remaining there was a functional necessity for the incumbents, outweighing the needs of the nation or any other noble consideration. Instead of regarding Biden as a Democratic standard-bearer who could be replaced, his loyalists behaved as though his delusion were true: that he, and he alone, could save the nation from Trump, that he alone had the talents and abilities to see it through.
The voting public had to watch helplessly, until a movie star, George Clooney, interjected his “authority,” sounded the alarm about Biden’s decrepitude, and finally broke the spell. Biden belatedly withdrew, upending the customary nomination process, and leaving those of us who wanted to save the nation from Trump to fend for ourselves. Biden’s feckless conduct placed Trump in a superior position, leaving the Democrats leaderless and in disarray at a critical time. Far from promoting the general welfare, Biden left the US more vulnerable to destruction than ever before.
Since then, little has been done to mitigate the widespread disillusionment this grotesque charade caused. The Democratic Party has shown itself incapable of compelling obedience its principles. It has yet to call out Biden or acknowledge what his behavior cost the nation. Nor did the Party insist on a democratic process in choosing a successor. To this day, the Democratic National Committee has shied away from candidly admitting what went wrong: witness its ludicrous “autopsy report.” The DNC has yet to delegate meaningful power back to the rank and file.
Until the structural problems of the Democratic Party are acknowledged, anti-party feeling will continue to run high. This in turn will dim the prospects of the American republic. The body of the electorate floats face down in the pool.
Images: screenshots from Sunset Boulevard.