“Butter My Butt and Call Me a Biscuit.” This Southern colloquialism hit me between the eyes about 30 minutes after the Biden-Trump debate on Thursday. What is going on? As an observer of the Big Picture, I thought I was reasonably savvy and attuned to how the Democrats play the long game.

But the debates turned that on its head. Here are the cognitive dissonance parts that struck me:

First, I believed it insane that Biden would agree to debate Trump, and this was proven beyond doubt by his debate performance.

Why did he do it? A few thoughts. First, with the narrow and restrictive rules on CNN, with the hosts clearly known to be anti-Trump, maybe Democrats thought Trump would refuse to participate, seeing a trap. But Trump ‘trumped’ this move by accepting, and Biden fell into his own trap.

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Second, most pundits predicted (as I did) that Jake Tapper and Dana Bash would run interference for Biden by jumping in to rescue him if things were going badly. There is a history of that in previous debates, with Candy Crowley in the Romney-Obama debates being an egregious example. But not this time, for which they deserve credit.

Third, I expected unbalanced questions. Softballs for Biden, while Trump would get hard-hitting questions, which would include working disproven lies such as the Charlottesville “fine people on both sides” hoax disinformation worked into the question, or using the “as a convicted felon. . .” lead-ins whenever possible. That didn’t happen, though. To my surprise, Tapper and Bash played it right down the fairway.

That fairness alone should have tipped me off to what was really happening. And if that wasn’t the giveaway, the very different Fox and CNN after-debate panels revealed the Democrats’ long game. Fox quickly became boring because they were stating the obvious about how the debate benefitted Trump.

Shockingly, though, the CNN panel, with such luminaries as David Axelrod, Van Jones, John King, and Chris Wallace, all said the debate was a train wreck and that Biden had lost. Then, they asked the real question: “What should the Democrats do?” They made no attempt to put lipstick on the pig.

So, in this alternate universe, just what is going on? Some thoughts:

Because Biden controls the Democrat delegates, only he can remove himself from the race at this stage. Ice Queen Jill will go to the mat to keep her exalted position, so don’t expect her to break free from her “Weekend at Bernie’s” and Edith Wilson posture to keep the con going. It’s unclear what, if anything, the Democrats can offer her to make Biden voluntarily go away. Democrats, having long ago boxed themselves into a situation where they had no other candidates to step in if he’s unable or unwilling to run in 2024, might have hoped that Biden’s inevitable collapse on the stage would finally force Biden out.

After all, the entire Democrat machine, including its partners in the media (CNN, MSNBC, NYT, NPR, etc.), all recognized in the past few months that Biden’s decline was so steep that his reelection was in danger, much less his continuing to govern if he won. What we may have seen was the machine turning the tables on Biden (and Jilly). Set him up in a debate, figuring that he would fail, as he did. And they’d be in total alignment in calling the crash.

Democrats are not stupid. They don’t act like a stumbling drunk with a gun, spraying bullets randomly. Even steps seen as mistakes are orchestrated. It is all lining up.

The only question is, who will replace him? My money is still on Michelle (as I predicted last September here), the most beloved First Lady in history (just ask them), and the only one who has a chance of beating Trump now.

Lewis Dovland is a passionate observer of America’s future direction with a focus on exposing the “Big Picture” end goals of the progressive Marxist movement and how we can prevail. Email at Lewis.Dovland@gmail.com.