What Biden Won

September 30, 2020

Debate 1 ends, cue commentators.

Stunned silence.

It is hard to list all the ways that The Donald’s performance was embarrassing, ignorant, obnoxious, insufferable, and humiliating for our nation. It may be more important to make clear what Joe Biden gained.

We tend to focus on The Donald’s “base” which I define as lower-middle income, angry (with justification), anti-elitists. They are the workers raised in the 1960s and 1970s to believe that, if they work hard they will achieve reasonable economic comfort by the time they are in their 40s or 50s. They got to the 21st century and realized they had not increased their standard of living, that they were still living paycheck to paycheck and they got mad. They are disillusioned with all institutions, from governments to corporations to unions to religions.

In 2016, The Donald gave them a candidate who looked like he would shake up the system, stick it to “the man.” The fact that The Donald is a billionaire (maybe) New York real estate investor who inherited a fortune may make that image a joke, but it was the image that The Donald sold.

But that group is not large enough to elect a President. It is large enough to make difference, but in pure numbers he needed more to win.

The additional votes came from the core Republican constituency. These are the Republicans and independents who voted for Romney, Bushes, Dole, McCain and Reagan. They routinely vote Republican for Governor, Senator, Congress, and the local school board.

Some of these Republicans were appalled by The Donald in 2016, but most assumed that he would revert to standard conservative policies and normative behavior once in office. They glanced away from their neighbors and friends and voted for him despite their reservations.

I have to believe that The Donald lost a significant percentage of that vote last night. I thought that Biden needed to reach out to The Donald’s base to win this year (check my post last October), but the first debate may have given him an alternative path to the Presidency.

If a significant part of the Romney/Reagan Republicans either vote for Biden or just stay home, Biden has can win all or most of the swing states, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina, Nevada, Minnesota, and Colorado.

That bodes of both a numerical and electoral landslide for Biden.