General Discussion

I have an incredible amount of respect for Biden, but what made me change my mind about his running came about a week after the debate after I saw a video of his meeting with the new Labour Prime Minister of the UK. The minister is in his early 50s, and looked fit and healthy. Biden ... did not. He looked like he was seated, looked wan and exhausted, and even his response was spoken in a wavery voice. Was he cognitively challenged? No - I do a lot of work with Cognitive development and it was clear that he was fully cognizant. However, it was also clear that the demands of the office were becoming harder and harder for him to meet.

At 61, I've "aged out" of a field that is dominated by people in their 20s and 30s. There's a reason for that - at 60, your brain simply does not learn things as fast, and the foundational work that you grew up (and in some cases helped develop) is no longer as comprehensive as you need to keep up with the changes in the field. Consequently, I'm somewhat involuntarily semi-retired, and spend most of my time lately writing books, where I can work at my pace. I've seen people that were in their late 70s and 80s that were still programming, but I also have noticed that most of them are increasingly unable to deal with the changes around them, and can often hold back a development team because the development team is having to appease them while still getting work done.

So when he announced that he was not going to continue to pursue a second term in favor of Kamala Harris, I was elated. It's also worth noting since then that Biden has become far more quiet, and increasingly is letting Harris dictate both foreign and domestic policy (as I've noted elsewhere in this thread). We've not had a successful transition from one democratic administration to another since 1856, when James Buchanen succeeded Franklin Pierce. By all indications, should Harris win, this is likely to be the smoothest transition in history because Democrats understand succession planning, even if they don't get a chance to practice it.

So, no, I'd argue that this is not agism but simply an assessment of capabilities. I think that Biden had to be talked out of retirement, and he's in a superb position to become a Senior Statesman, a very exclusive club that only a few dozen people can legitimately claim.