If you had told me in 2016 that John Bolton would declare himself for Joe Biden for president in 2020, I would have had to sit don’t and think for a good long while. My imagination would have gone wild trying to conjure up a set of circumstances so fucked up that it would turn Bolton into a Democrat. Most likely, I would have guessed that something major had happened internationally, perhaps the onset of a hugely mass casualty war. Short of that, I might have envisioned a failure by Trump to protect the country or maintain our alliances that was so grievous that all the country’s foreign policy hands had to agree that the president needed to go.
While we have experienced the totally unexpected Covid-19 catastrophe, that doesn’t seem to have much to do with Bolton’s thinking. He just came to the conclusion that Trump is too stupid, too corrupt, too self-centered, and too incompetent to be entrusted with running the country. He had the benefit of working with Trump closely, so that helped him realize this.
I don’t think Bolton’s endorsement is going to carry a lot of weight. I’m not sure how Biden intends to utilize it, because for a lot of the left, getting approval from Bolton is a mark against him. Some people might even see it as a point if favor of Trump that Neo-cons like Bolton and Bill Kristol and David Frum, are all supporting Biden this time around.
I don’t really see it that way. In my mind, it shows just how bad Trump is that even people who are conservative on almost every issue are willing and eager to see a Democratic president replace him.
These folks can be somewhat valuable during the campaign, but Biden doesn’t want to depend on them going forward or worry about keeping them on board for his reelection bid. They’re not reliable allies, and they’re often catastrophically wrong on foreign policy. Most of them will become harsh critics of Biden’s presidency even before he can be inaugurated.
There are some Republicans though, even if their number is not large, who can be convinced to vote for Biden precisely because someone like Bolton is warning them about Trump. Biden as a safe harbor for Republicans is an asset he brought to the table in a way that his opponents could not match. It should help him pad his numbers somewhat, and that’s fine as long as he doesn’t reward them with positions of responsibility.
Since you wrote your piece, the Axios article has been updated to say that Bolton will not be voting for Biden:
After the Telegraph reported on Sunday afternoon that Bolton told the paper that he would vote for Biden, Bolton spokesperson Sarah Tinsley said in a statement to Axios, “This statement is incorrect. The Ambassador never said he planned to vote for Joe Biden.
Oh well easy come easy go. Whatever shall we do?
I would think that the most likely result is that some Republicans stay home or cast symbolic votes for minor candidates. This is Bolton’s own position.
I frankly don’t understand this – if you don’t want Trump (not just “I don’t care which”), then logically you must prefer Biden.
But people don’t vote logically.
I hope Joe stops this “when they go low, we go high” b/s. Joe could say here “I dont want Bolton’s vote because he has always been a disaster for our country. And what does it say about Donald Trump that even an extremist warmonger like JB won’t support him ?”