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Oh, the memes! President Joe Biden needed to swing for the fences and hit one out of the park. He swung a lot, hit maybe a seeing eye infield single, tried to steal second, and we’ll see if he’s thrown out. But the memes!

Of course Biden was 90 minutes late getting there, or 2 1/2 hours if you include the original 5:00 p.m. start that was changed to 6:00 p.m. When he arrived at the podium, the president spoke for about six minutes giving his prepared remarks, mostly about Ukraine and the history of NATO. He speaks well from a teleprompter, so nobody was expecting any major gaffes. He then offered to take questions from a prepared list of reporters. Biden stayed lucid and took a good number of questions, so that goes in his column. 

First question (paraphrase for length), Jeff Mason from Reuters: some people think you should step aside; what concerns do you have about Vice President Harris beating Trump, if she were at the top of the ticket? Biden: I would not have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president, if she’s not qualified to be president…let’s start right there.” Oh no.

Trump was watching.

And the memes!

Just before the presser, Biden stood on a stage and introduced Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy: “ladies and gentlemen, President Putin.”

President Biden was not a drooling, blithering idiot. He did not freeze up. He did not speak in riddles or spout complete nonsense. He (mostly) kept to the topics of the questions. He trained himself to say “anyway…” when he was tempted to stray (his aides must have conditioned him like the North Koreans did to Raymond Shaw). Another meme.

Sarah Isgur, who co-hosts the Advisory Opinions podcast with David French, tweeted“This isn’t perfect but it is more than enough to keep him in the race.” It’s very sad that the bar to keep the sitting president in the race for his own re-election as an incumbent is to stand on a stage and not fall over or go glassy-eyed. But here we are.

Reporters generally didn’t hold their powder, firing questions about Biden’s ability to function as president, to beat Trump, and to continue for another term. The president insisted that he is ready. Reality insists a bit differently.

But to me, the ultimate moment of the night was when Biden set the conditions of his own surrender. When asked what it would take for him to step aside, if he was shown data that indicated other candidates might do better against Trump, he answered that he would step aside if he was shown data that he had no chance of winning.

The Democrats who want Biden to yield have their task cut out for them. They need to let Trump romp to the point where Biden’s own campaign team—already brushing up their resumes and writing their candidate’s political obituary—convinces him and his family that there’s no path to victory.

This might not be as difficult as some might think. The Republican National Convention fires up on Monday, and Trump will be the center of attention as he picks his Vice President.

Trump could not remain silent about tonight.

You may think Biden should get out of the race. You may think the best chance of beating Trump is for Biden to stay in. When asked about Trump’s mocking as he was leaving the stage, Biden remarked—with no lack of disgust—“Listen to him!” And he walked off.

One thing we learned tonight is that Biden has set the conditions of his exit. Perversely, Biden’s own party has to convince him that he has no hope of beating Trump. The key to Biden staying in might be how nuts, Fascist, illiberal, or gibberish-spouting Trump sounds next week. But listening to Trump could also seal Biden’s fate.

I can’t imagine a worse torture for President Biden than having his own political future determined by Donald J. Trump. Can you?

Follow Steve on Twitter @stevengberman.

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