Joe’s Retirement Plan
So, Joe Biden finally read the room and folded his hand.
Uh, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but he may have been the only person left on the planet who thought a doddery old eightysomething with obvious memory and alertness issues was the ideal choice for America’s biggest job. Though it seems he’d got away with a multitude of ‘senior moments’ before his infamous performance at the CNN Debate, his luck finally ran out. In that Debate he showed the accumulated fatigue of every single one of his 29,990 days on this Earth, and afterwards the calls became deafening for the incumbent President to drop out of the US Election race in November.
The logic of course was that the Democrats just needed one person in America, a country with a population of around 330 million, capable of beating Donald Trump. It wasn’t a high bar – but Democrats being Democrats, they found themselves trying to back the only American who couldn’t. This was because, no matter how idiotic Donald Trump is, at least he can remember some names; has the ability to close his mouth when it’s not being used; and is dextrous enough to walk in a straight line unaided.
Sadly, all of the talents mentioned above are way beyond Joe now, so he had to go – leaving the door open for Kamala Harris to run against Donald Trump in his place. Hopefully the rest will be ‘history’!
So, what next for soon-to-be ex-President Joe Biden? Where he should go next to see out his remaining time drawing breath? We looked at some options for Joe’s handlers to consider:
Newton, Massachusetts, Lasell Village
This is an Ivory Tower retreat ideal for former Democratic Presidents featuring a university-like atmosphere complete with lecture halls, libraries, and daily faux intellectual tutorials to feed the delusion you’re still a brainiac.
Here, Joe can while away his autumn years sitting in a deckchair with a rug over his knees boasting of how he could’ve solved the world’s problems – instead of explaining why he didn’t actually solve them whilst he had the power to do so.
Los Angeles, California, The Village at the Motion Picture and Television Fund
Though Joe hasn’t been great at playing the role of a coherent President, he’s been superb at pretending he’s a blue-collar guy from Scranton, Pennsylvania for decades!
For that reason alone, this home for washed-up actors would welcome him with open arms. Allowing Joe to chum up with former Hollywood residents; Michael Douglas: the Democratic donor who shares Joe’s views on gun control and nuclear disarmament; and the original Lady Gaga: Shirley MacLaine. What better gal pal could Joe find to scamper off away with the fairies than this one-woman X-Files who believes in everything from reincarnation and UFOs through to mystic channelling?
President of the United States
But of course Joe might argue – if he were still capable of stringing sentences together – that the best retirement scheme for him would be to become President again. After all, he is certainly the most qualified for the position!
Once upon a time US Presidents were young, energetic men in their 40s like Teddy Roosevelt, JFK and Obama. All on a mission determined to guide their nation forward. But in recent years we’ve seen a change in the job description where ‘old is the new young’ and ‘senile is the new focussed’. Ronald Reagan was 77 and a disorientated old coot by the end of his presidency; crazy-mad uncle Donald Trump – if he wins – will be 78 and frothing-mad at the start of his second; and Sleepy Joe Biden of course will be 82 and completely catatonic come November. So, with all that age and senility on his side, Joe would contend that surely the job’s in his pocket. (Unless Jimmy Carter gazumps the field with a stunning comeback for his 100th birthday celebration of course!)
Unfortunately for Joe, those Americans polled this year didn’t agree – at all – so the option of becoming President again is completely off the table for him for next year. But it doesn’t really matter who it is; the Military/Industrial Complex long ago took over the role of actually running the United States leaving the POTUS gig largely ceremonial. This means the job itself is pretty cruisy: In Trump’s case; it just meant playing golf, meeting with despots, non-stop tweeting and coming up with ridiculous schemes his staff would simply ignore all day. For Joe, it just meant sleeping standing up, getting names wrong and avoiding everybody for four years.
Democratic voters have made it abundantly clear who they want as a candidate by flocking to Kamala as soon as she got the nod. So, it doesn’t really matter where Joe shuffles off with his Zimmer frame – as long as it’s out of sight.
US Supreme Court
Also a very tempting option for Joe must be a spot on the US Supreme Court. Here, he is guaranteed employment for rest of his life without needing to answer to anybody – and certainly not the public as the Court’s recent decision to overturn Roe vs Wade illustrated.
Plus, Joe wouldn’t have to face any more nasty questions about senility or – as Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas have clearly demonstrated – suffer even cursory glances at his rampant corruption!
True, Joe has no track record in law but the bar to entry has been lowered a great deal lately with recently appointed justice Amy Coney Barrett never even having previously served as a trial judge! What’s to stop the Supreme Court letting their admission requirements slip even further to allow Joe to stumble in onto a bench?
Nothing apparently.