One week after Biden’s wobbly debate debacle, the White House attempted a comeback, offering an enfeebled president to Americans in the friendly hands of ABC’s George Stephanopoulos.
Crafted to be Biden’s ricochet moment, the interview would be his second chance to come across to voters as the White House had hoped he might in the June 27 debate with Trump.
The interview was Biden’s opportunity to bounce back after the debate, Dr. Jill gingerly guiding him to the bottom of the stage’s steps before treating him like a child, gushing over his victory by virtue of having “answered all the questions.”
At the bottom of those steps, though, Biden surely experienced the dismal feeling of having missed a golden opportunity, a feeling the French call, l’esprit de l’escalier (The Wit of the Staircase).
Imagine yourself in a conversation with someone of different political opinion, a friendly debate at the end of which you felt you didn’t do your best. You felt prepared going in to the conversation, having memorized the precise words to make your argument persuasive, rehearsing them over and over in your mind.
The words, though, just when you needed them, seemed intent mischievously to frolic, playing “Hide and Seek.” You searched for them, but they were too elusive. Debate over, you leave the room knowing you had not been at your best.
Then, suddenly, reaching the bottom of the exit steps, the words come flooding back. You want to march right back up the steps for a do-over, but it’s too late.
That’s l’esprit de l’escalier (the Wit of the Staircase), the frustrating feeling at the bottom of the staircase knowing that, in a moment calling for you to shine, you faded.
That was Joe Biden on June 27. The Stephanopoulos interview the following week would be his opportunity to recover a bit of sparkle in eyes that had seemed glazed over.
Biden’s recovery attempt with Stephanopoulos failed, miserably. Even George acknowledged as much (to the chagrin of ABC execs), affirming that four more years for Biden is out of the question.
With Biden’s embarrassing miscues in Thursday’s “Big Boy” press conference, calling Kamala Harris “Vice President Trump” and, earlier, calling Zelensky “President Putin,” opportunities for Biden to come off the stage experiencing l’esprit de l’escalier mount. Also mounting are the calls from Democrat Party leaders for Biden to drop out of the race.
In truth, there was never a chance for the Stephanopoulos interview to accomplish the White House’s goal, since his debate embarrassment, and yesterday’s subsequent gaffes, cannot be explained by having had a “bad night” due to a cold or jet lag, but are evermore clearly signs of cognitive decline.
After the Stephanopoulos interview with Biden, I thought of the former Clinton man’s 2016 interview with Trump, on Oct. 26, 2016, two weeks prior to his stunning victory over Clinton.
Closing that interview, Stephanopoulos asked Trump if he felt any regrets. Few imagined at that moment that Trump had even a sliver of a chance to win. A CNN poll three days earlier showed Clinton with a 12-point lead among likely voters. With Obama in the White House, Democrats and the regime media had no reason to panic.
With no hint of concern and the Clinton victory seemingly inevitable, a kindly Stephanopoulos asked, “When you look back over the sweep of this campaign going back to – to last June, is there anything you regret?”
Trump’s calm and confident “I-did-it-my-way” response could have been accompanied by a Frank Sinatra soundtrack, singing, “Regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention.”
Trump answered the “regret” question: “Oh absolutely. I’d love to have done certain things over. But you can’t. You can’t. But that’s, George, life. I’d love to have – have done in life certain things over, I guess. And you would have too. … There are things I would’ve rather, you know, not happen. But, George, all you can do is you put your head down and you have to go forward.”
I find Trump’s calm response to be that of a healthy, self-confident competitor who, while realizing that he had blown it on occasion, offered a prescription for what to do after a faux pas: “All you can do is put your head down and you have to go forward.”
The way Stephanopoulos framed the regret question took Trump back to June 2015, announcing his candidacy at the bottom of the Golden Escalator. I find it fascinating that, within the French, l’esprit de l’escalier (the Wit of the Staircase), is easily seen, “The Spirit (l’esprit) of the Escalator (de l’escalier).”
With the emergence of Donald Trump as a political force, leading a consequential political movement, I like that translation better: “The Spirit of the Escalator.”
So, I wonder. When Trump went back up the escalator, did he have any regrets about the words he had used to announce his candidacy? Knowing the press would skew his words, particularly about immigration, I wonder if Trump felt any sense l’esprit de l’escalier? Did he think, “I wish I had said that differently?”
I think it likely that he did that day, and often since, experience l’esprit de l’escalier. Anyone in public life intimately knows that feeling.
As a pastor and a teacher, I call it the Wit of the Parking Lot. Having offered a message in the pulpit, or a lecture at the lectern, when I make my way to my car in the parking lot it often occurs to me how I could have phrased my words in a more impactful way.
What, then, is the healthy response of a public person to the unavoidable feeling of l’esprit de l’escalier?
Trump nailed it: “All you can do is put your head down and you have to go forward.”
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