NYT’s Mara Gay: If You Listen to Biden’s Speeches, He’s Been a Very Effective President; ‘There’s a Lot of Ageism There’

Wallace: “It’s such a good point. I mean, I guess the — the piece of it and — and watch out, we’ve got two whole hours every day — is, you know, maybe it’s time to do an anatomy of a speech. I’m just thinking out loud here, but maybe it’s time to take this speech that I — I was tipped off on Sunday that Fox hadn’t aired it and he’d been particularly incoherent. We went and looked for it. It was not carried on Fox. We couldn’t find anyone that aired it in its entirety. The chunks I’ve seen are actually hard to find. They’re chunks. But maybe it’s time to do an anatomy of a Trump speech, you know, and proportion it out. I guess it would be — it would look like, like how much retribution, how much incoherence, how much other, how much — I mean, it really is important for people to understand why Trump talks about, every fourth day about his own ‘acing’ of a screen meant to screen out and give families and individuals some information if they’re worried about sort of the dementia category of diseases.”

GAY: “I think that’s right. But I also think, to back up for a moment, that, you know, I’ve been talking to voters across the country the past six months. I think we need to acknowledge that while it may not be fair, the majority of Americans are telling us in polls and interviews they are deeply disappointed with both of these candidates. They’re both deeply unlikable, and there’s a lot of disappointment that they are both older. And I think that we could go a long way to just acknowledging that Biden isn’t as young as he wasn’t — as he once was. And I think that is actually the acknowledgment that then allows you to differentiate between someone being older and someone being unfit. And I don’t understand why we haven’t seen more distinction in that. Yeah, he’s older. That doesn’t mean that he is unfit. In fact, if you actually listen to his speeches and you look at his record, he’s been a very effective president. And there’s a lot of ageism there. And you know, rather than saying, yeah, maybe, you know, next time we want more Democratic candidates or more candidates that are younger, fine. But I have experience. Here’s what I’ve done.”

Wallace: “So hang a lantern around a political vulnerability that everyone [inaudible].”

GAY: “That’s right. But then when you contrast that, then you bring out Donald Trump and you see, first of all, they’re both old. Secondly —“

Wallace: “I think they’re separated by, like, 33 months.”

GAY: “Right, and one of them is unfit. And so I think that distinction has not been made.”