The writers of ‘The West Wing’ may see a spike in their residuals in the next few weeks as the repercussions of Joe Biden‘s mental decline and prostate cancer diagnosis become clearer.
Fans of the 1999-2006 TV drama about the two-term fictional Democratic Party administration may remember that President Josiah Bartlet’s secret battle with multiple sclerosis was a major plotline.
The revered TV commander-in-chief‘s integrity was called into question after it emerged that he kept his debilitating illness under wraps during his successful campaign for the White House.
It doesn’t take much imagination to see the resonance in Joe Biden’s rumored cognitive decline and the extent to which that was hidden from the country during his time in the Oval Office.
There is no evidence that Biden knew he had prostate cancer before last Friday, and, indeed, his team insists that was the very first time he was aware of it. However, the aggressive nature of his condition suggests the questions will continue to plague him in the months to come.
In writer Aaron Sorkin‘s fictional White House, Martin Sheen’s Bartlet came to regret keeping his illness a secret. It hurt his wife, his staff, and his supporters.
It also hurt those who sought to succeed him.
This will be the season the likes of Pete Buttigieg, Tim Walz, JB Pritzker, Cory Booker, AOC, and even/especially Kamala Harris will be fast-forwarding to on Hulu or Amazon Prime this Memorial weekend.
They may find it hauntingly prescient.
For in the Hollywoodized version of the health dilemma, Republicans harped on about the MS deception during the ensuing (2006) presidential campaign, with (make-believe) vice presidential nominee and attack dog Ray Sullivan repeatedly alluding to it in his speech at the Republican National Convention.
In the real-life race for the Democrats’ next nominee, which has effectively already started, Republicans in every hue of red will be doing the same.
“This is going to be the first real test of the 2028 campaign,” David Axelrod, the former Obama strategist, told NPR. “Anybody closely aligned with the Biden decision-making structure in 2024 will be asked to explain how we got here.”
Former ‘Meet the Press’ moderator Chuck Todd said on his podcast that it will be the first “question anybody who worked directly for Biden” will face in any future presidential campaign.
Of the early frontrunners to fight a primary battle for the 2028 Democratic Party nominee, Harris and Buttigieg are the most blighted by Biden. They both supported his decision to campaign for re-election and served closely with him as vice president and transportation secretary.
“Every time I needed something from him from the West Wing, I got it,” Buttigieg says now, sidestepping questions about how much he knew of the president’s mental acuity and urging people to look forward and not back.
But that’s not going to happen. Not even in his own party.
“Of course, all of the people who never said anything—now Pete Buttigieg is saying, ‘Well, it would have been better if he hadn’t run for reelection,’” James Carville said on the ‘Politics War Room’ podcast. “Well, f—, say something when it meant something,” he added.
And this is a Democratic strategist.
Harris never managed to separate herself from her president, even when she was leading the ship for 107 ultimately doomed days.
“I have spent hours upon hours with him, be it in the Oval Office or the Situation Room. He has the intelligence, the commitment, and the judgment and disposition that I think the American people rightly deserve in their president,” she said.
Expect that quote to be thrown at her time and again in any upcoming presidential campaign. She was the vice president. The assumption is that she knew everything going on behind doors in the real West Wing. Even if she didn’t.
Ditto for Tim Walz. Even though he didn’t seem to know much about what was going on in Harris’s campaign, let alone Biden’s.’
And Gina Raimondo, Biden’s Commerce Secretary, was inside the circle. The GOP wolves will be circling.
Hotel billionaire Governor J.B. Pritzker can at least claim his Illinois base as a buffer from Biden. The same goes for Gov. Andy Beshear in Kentucky and Gov. Wes Moore in Maryland. And AOC was never going to be popping in for tea at the Oval. But that will not stop the inevitable questions from any future Republican opponents.
A little over half of America voted for Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, knowing that he was almost 78 years old. This is not an age when an uncomfortable prognosis comes as a major surprise.
Donald Trump will be in his eighties by the time his second term nears an end. It is very possible he will face the same kind of dilemma as Josiah Bartlet and Joe Biden.
Will the current president ever admit his health is anything less than “perfect?”
Don’t bet on it.
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