You’ve no doubt heard of the headlines which emerged from from this train wreck, but a couple of answers from the president made me wonder if he’s actually able to form consent, as in the informed consent we are all entitled to before a medical procedure.

For expediency’s sake, we’ll refer to George Stephanopoulos as “GS” and President Biden as “PB.”

The interview opens with GS* asking the now infamous Nancy Pelosi question:  Was the debate indicative of an episode or a condition?  PB sticks with the (episode) “bad night” answer and tries, once again, to ascribe his performance to a combination of jet lag and a cold.  Here’s where it gets interesting: 

GS:  You know, you say you were exhausted [snip]… But you came home from Europe about 11 or 12 days before the debate, spent six days in Camp David. Why wasn't that enough rest time, enough recovery time?

PB:  Because I was sick. I was feeling terrible. Matter of fact, the docs with me. I asked if they did a COVID test because they’re trying to figure out what was wrong. They did a test to see whether or not I had some infection, you know, a virus. I didn't. I just had a really bad cold.

In what scenario does a doctor do a COVID test and not announce before hand, “Sir, I’d like to do a COVID test. Do I have your permission?”

Why didn’t the president know he was being tested for COVID before he was tested for COVID?  Why did the president ask afterwards if he’d had it?  There are any number of reasons someone may not want the test, and it’s the patient’s right to refuse it. 

What other tests were done?  Does he know?  Was he asked for his consent before a swab was taken or a needle pierced his flesh? And if he wasn’t asked, why not?  See, this is where not having the White House physician come out and take questions the way the previous president did is so damaging.  One is left scrambling for clarity in the fog of these answers.

And speaking of fog, what kind of answer is this to the very next question?

GS:  And-- did you ever watch the debate afterwards?

PB:  I don't think I did, no.

He doesn’t think so?  He doesn’t think so???  This is a simple yes or no answer.  He either did or he didn’t. He doesn’t think so?????

So right out of the gate, we have two of his three answers to the first three questions filled with some kind of brain fog.  Answers which beg more questions. The very next question, so we’re only on question four here, is whether or not the president knew, during the debate, how badly it was going for him.  Oh my goodness the word salad answer:

PB:  Yeah, look. The whole way I prepared, nobody's fault, mine. Nobody's fault but mine. I, uh-- I prepared what I usually would do sittin' down as I did come back with foreign leaders or National Security Council for explicit detail. And I realized--bout partway through that, you know, all-- I get quoted the New York Times had me down, at ten points before the debate, nine now, or whatever the hell it is. The fact of the matter is, what I looked at is that he also lied 28 times. I couldn't-- I mean, the way the debate ran, not-- my fault, no one else's fault, no one else's fault.

Huh?

Then, to his credit, GS says it seemed he was having trouble from the start of the debate, not merely after Trump “lied twenty-eight times,” and PB once again reiterates it was just a bad night.  Once again, to his credit, GS reminds PB of his 2020 challenge to “watch me” when he was then asked about his fitness for office.  Biden talks about the “large crowds” he got in post-debate rallies in North Carolina and that day in Wisconsin.*  There were maybe two hundred people, including press, at the Wisconsin event, so, okay.  We now have a baseline for what PB defines as an “overwhelming response.”

We’re now up only to question eight, and it’s as though PB is describing emerging from a dream.

GS : [How quickly] did it come to you that you were having that bad night?

PB: Well, it came to me I was havin' a bad night when I realized that even when I was answering a question, even though they turned his mic off, he was still shouting. And I-- I let it distract me. I-- I'm not blaming it on that, but I realized that I just wasn't in control.

This guy’s been in politics for nearly five decades and he talks about debates like he’s never been in one before.

Question nine is about whether or not PB is “the same guy” who took office in January 2020 and PB does a fairly good job of reciting his talking points about his record.  Question ten asks what all that has cost him “physically, mentally, emotionally?” PB again does a fairly good job reciting his talking points about what he hopes to accomplish in a second term.  GS pushes him again on his decline.

GS: I-- I-- I understand that, and I'm not disputing that. What I'm asking you is-- about your personal situation. Do you dispute that there have been more lapses, especially in the last several months?

PB:  Can I run the 100 in 10 flat? No. But I'm still in good shape.

GS: Are you more frail?

PB: No.

There’s then a lot of back and forth about whether or not PB has had, would have, did have a full neurological workup and PB’s answer is that everyday is a neurological test and he’s passing it simply by doing his job.

O.K.

GS then asks him if he really believes he can serve another full four year term.  PB rambles incoherently about how he “shut Putin down” and “got Japanese to expand their budget” and about chips, “the little chip, the computer chip. It's in everything from cell phone to weapons” but he doesn’t want to “take too much credit” for the CHIPS act, which is so riddled with DEI requirements that it’s had the opposite effect; it’s moved what little chip production we have even more offshore, but he points to his “great staff” for making that all happen.

GS continues to push the matter of his “mental and physical capacity to do it for another four years” to which PB replies, inexplicably, that

...the decision recently made by the Supreme Court on immunity, you know, the next President of the United States, it's not just about whether he or she knows what they're doin'.

It's-- it's-- it's not-- not about a con-- a conglomerate of people making decisions. It's about the character of the President. The character of the President's gonna determine whether or not this Constitution is employed the right way.

The “next” president could be a “she”?  The “next”?  In what world is that true?  Why would he say that?  There are only men* in this race for the election in November and that’s Joe Biden and Donald Trump.  Who is this “she”?

And what is this “conglomerate of people making decisions”?  Is that a tell?  Is he telling us that that’s exactly what’s going on right now? Because if he’s meant to put all of our imaginations to rest about what’s really going on in that White House, that’s unhelpful in the extreme.

GS then challenges him on whether or not he’s kidding himself, whether or not he’s being “honest” with himself about his polling.  He even points out, much to the mysterious “she’s” chagrin, no doubt, that “it’s been a two man race for several months.”  PB then asks GS “Do you think polling data as accurate as it used to be?”  So the president is in complete denial about the months and months of trends favoring his opponent.  And to be clear, “the trend is your friend” is absolutely true.  Anyone can look at any one poll as an outlier, and while they are certainly not determinative of actual outcome, to deny a clear trend is simply magical thinking. Trends are what they are.  It is what it is.  And they have most definitely favored PB’s opponent.  Again, however it turns out, that’s where we are.

PB then goes on to exhort GS to:

...remember 2024-- 2020, the red wave was coming. Before the vote, I said, ‘That's not gonna happen. We're gonna win.’ We did better in an off-year than almost any incumbent President ever has done. They said in 2023, (STATIC) all the tough (UNINTEL) we're not gonna win. I went into all those areas and all those-- all those districts, and we won.

Not once here did the president get the years right.  He had to correct himself first, then got the off-year wrong. Not knowing what year it is is a classic sign that something has gone terribly wrong.  If this interview was meant to reassure, this passage alone scuttled that.

And we’re only at the half way point now with the questions.  We’re just half way through this mess and already it’s a disaster.

Image: Screen shot from shareable ABC News video, via YouTube

*Corrections: An earlier version of this piece has been corrected.