When I woke up this morning, the first thing I thought of was my latest deadline which is, as I write, precisely thirteen hours. I’m not known for being ahead of the game in that regard. Far better to wait until the last possible few hours, just in case, as Dickens’ Mr Micawber was known to say “something’s bound to turn up”. And thankfully, when I dipped in to read the news this morning, bingo. Joe Biden had at last turned up his hearing aid, and heard what his advisers, many of his supporters, and every one with a smidgeon of common sense across the globe had been saying for months; that it was time for him to remove himself from the race to become the Democratic nominee for the 2024 USA election.

Of course, there had always been doubts about his candidacy this time round given his age, and the fact that he would be 85 years old at the end of the next presidential term. But there were also persistent and damaging noises being made about his ability to focus and remain sharp in the face of the unrelenting and poisonous untruths being spouted by Trump and his circus. Sorry, campaign. No, I’m not sorry, Trump’s a clown, so circus it is.

As the campaign unfolded, Trump and his acolytes were finding it increasingly easy to focus simply on Biden’s age, his cognitive ability, and most damagingly, his influence on the world stage as he stumbled along on the trail. Although Trump is only three years younger than Biden, he does appear to be more physically robust, and his no detail, deranged, and dangerous rhetoric sounds convincing to his base and some of those beyond because it is delivered in the hectoring style of a fairground barker hawking snake oil cures. The more deluded and messianic he becomes, so the greater the number of idiots in the cult fainting at his feet.

If Biden was up against it for most of the early days of the campaign, two events threw tons more coal into the slowly rumbling train of fear and panic amongst his supporters until it became a runaway.

First of all, the initial, live television debate between him and Trump. In his pomp, Biden would have been doing Ali shuffles off-stage while preparing for such a debate given the chasm of intellectual ability and political nous that would have existed between the two at that time. But what we saw was an old man, who had given every fibre of his being to distinguished public service, now struggling to finish sentences and looking dazed and confused under the lights.

It wasn’t that Trump was a better, faster and more agile contender than Biden. He was simply a bludgeoning George Foreman, swinging wildly while spouting the same rubbish about building walls and millions of immigrants swamping the country. While such swings miss the target and gather no points, Biden simply wasn’t sharp enough or fast enough on his feet to effectively counter them. It was a severely bruising technical knockout.

The second event was the assassination attempt on Trump. Early on in his campaign, Trump declared himself God’s candidate, sinking so low as to hawk bibles at $60 dollars a pop to boost campaign funds.

Forget the fact that Biden is the more overtly religious man, a lifelong practising Catholic who has always found it difficult to reconcile his views on abortion and women’s rights with his faith. Trump’s hypnotised congregation simply went nuts for them.

It all played neatly into the sinister movement of the Republican party to the extreme right, and to their desire to engineer the first steps of a dangerous and despotic theocracy’s march on the White House. And then, the ultimate deification. Trump survived the attempt on his life.

For the snake oil imbibers, this could only have been achieved by divine intervention. God had waved his hand and the bullet only took off a bit of Trump’s ear so of course, God was a republican. And crucially, the polls started to widen.

For Biden it was over. The noises grew louder, from his aides, his supporters, and most likely his family. He had to stand down. In recent days, it has been reported that he has contracted Covid which only increased the noises from his opponents that he is vulnerable and weak. For a man who has given his life to the cause, it may appear to be a sad ending, but by standing down he has shown that he still knows when to do the right thing.

It appears likely that Kamala Harris, his Vice President, will now win the Democratic nomination. If so, it will be an embarrassingly huge intellectual mismatch between her and Trump.

But the bible belt has been roused.

God save us. ■