I previously predicted that Joe Biden will not run for re-election. My reasons revolved around the economy. Today young people are opposed to America’s support of Israel.
The turmoil we’re seeing on campuses today brings back memories of the widespread student protests of 1968 — a comparison that won’t be lost given that the Democratic National Convention this year will take place in Chicago. The 1968 Democratic Party convention was also held in Chicago.
On March 31, 1968, following the New Hampshire primary and Robert Kennedy’s entry into the election, the president made a televised speech to the nation and said that he was suspending all bombing of North Vietnam in favor of peace talks.
After concluding his speech, Johnson announced,
“With America’s sons in the fields far away, with America’s future under challenge right here at home, with our hopes and the world’s hopes for peace in the balance every day, I do not believe that I should devote an hour or a day of my time to any personal partisan causes or to any duties, other than the awesome duties of this office — the presidency of your country. Accordingly, I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President.”
After President Lyndon Johnson announced that he would not run for reelection, the party nominated his vice president, Hubert Humphrey. But Humphrey’s moment of coronation quickly turned into a moment of chaos. As Chicago police, unleashed by Mayor Richard Daley, confronted anti-Vietnam War protesters with tear gas and batons on the streets outside the convention, the televised images of violence greatly harmed Humphrey’s prospects in November.
President Joe Biden knows this history. The anti-war protests in the 1960s went on for years. Now, it remains unclear whether the protests — which are not yet nearly as large in scale or scope as were the anti-Vietnam protests — will continue to intensify or start to dissipate, especially as school lets out for the summer months. And in one recent Harvard Kennedy poll surveying young people between the ages of 18 and 29 in March, the findings showed the Israel/Palestine conflict ranked second-lowest in importance, coming in below gun violence as well as bread-and-butter issues such as inflation, health care and housing.
Will Biden’s belief that a Trump victory mean the end of the American democracy continue his run for re-election? I hope so when Trump says he will be a dictator on day one.
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