Subject: Re: Julian Epstein...
No, there isn't. There's not enough time for anyone else to spin up a presidential campaign. And neither party's convention is institutionally set up to choose a nominee other than the person who received the most delegates.

You are 100% correct in terms of the mechanics of a Presidential Campaign.

If Biden withdraws, the Democrats cannot pick a replacement candidate in anything other than a chaotic - and almost certainly hotly disputed - fustercluck. Which is why Biden will not choose to withdraw. Even if he were a heavy underdog to win the general, the party's got a better chance with him than with the chaos that his withdrawal would create.

It depends.
The hilarity of the current campaign is that...all those criminal charges against Trump? They're actually helping him. But not in the way that people think.

By being in court all the time and not able to let his Trump Freak Flag Fly, Trump is basically forced to adopt the 2020 Biden Basement Strategy of letting your opponent do all the talking.

Biden is the President now. He can't campaign from his basement this time. He can't hide behind the press and pretend he doesn't have an actual record. He HAS to do the one thing that Joe Biden isn't really capable of doing: coherently arguing a vision for the nation based on a sterling set of accomplishments.

Trump, by being UNABLE to run his mouth...is NOT doing the one thing that DOOMED his campaign last time: Saying off the cuff extemporaneous things that would remind the public what a chaotic and emotionally draining Presidency he had.

Which leads me to this - the dems' real nightmare of a scenario. It would play out like this:

1. Trump essentially is off the campaign trail all the way through June due to his various court cases
2. The public forgets about his stupid Tweets, dumb insults and Way Out There brash New Yorker behavior
3. The democrats make him a martyr in the eyes of millions of voters
4. Because of 1-3, Trump cruises through the primaries without having to exert much effort or spend much money and exits with an extremely solid base who can't be convinced to vote any other way.

Now, then. If that happens then Biden will be in the vicious circle position of having to go out there MORE and talk MORE about why he's a better alternative...thus doing That One Thing he really sucks at. And That One Thing that his increasing frailty won't allow for.

And then we arrive at the convention, where a potentially desperate democrat party is faced with 3 options:

a) Ride or die with Biden, who's not up to it
b) Promote Harris to the top of the ticket
c) Get someone else

The option c) "someone else" is clearly Gavin Newsom. Option b) is a non starter because Harris would hurt more than she would help. The delicious part there is that if they dump her or sideline her they will pay the intersectionality toll.

Chicago...what a fun time it will be.