The median age for Americans is almost 39, according to the U.S. census.
Which might be surprising — we feel like a much older nation, and for good reason. Look at our leaders. President Joe Biden is 80. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is 72, and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is 81. The oldest senator, Dianne Feinstein, is 90.
To ask if that is “too old” is to ask the wrong question. Of course, people can be busy and productive to a very old age — we just visited Edith Renfrow Smith, making jelly at 109.
But things happen. Feinstein has struggled to do her job. McConnell froze in the middle of a news conference Wednesday, standing silent and stricken until he was led away. He returned later and declared himself fine. Maybe he is fine. But the writing is on the wall. As I like to say, you can ignore facts but that doesn’t mean facts ignore you. As Francis Hopkinson Smith once said, the claw of the sea-puss gets us all in the end. Sooner or later, the strong riptide drags us out to that cold, dark ocean from whence none returns.
No wonder we cling to the dry shore. Nobody wants to leave the party. But is that a smart governmental strategy? The McConnell episode is a reminder that anything can happen at any time. It can come for you in the middle of a news conference. And the older you are, the closer you are to whatever is going to eventually come and get you.
That’s why those handicapping the 2024 election are deluding themselves. The life expectancy of an 80-year-old man is seven years, meaning that should Biden be reelected, the oldest president ever, he’d be pushing his luck to reach the end of his term.
Right now, Biden gives very few news conferences and hasn’t sat down at all with a reporter from a major newspaper. He walks stiffly, speaks awkwardly, was at a loss to say how many grandchildren he has or what his favorite movie is.
Sixty-seven percent of Americans — including half of Democrats — think Biden is too old to run. I am among them.
It isn’t that he hasn’t been an effective president, from marshaling European support for Ukraine to his infrastructure bill. The question is: Will he remain so until he’s 86? Are we willing to bet our country on it?
This is where his probable opponent comes in.
Donald Trump is no spring chicken either at 77 and has more health concerns — he weighs 250 pounds and was seen having trouble lifting a glass of water to his lips.
Ego is a curse at any age or party. Our leaders aren’t doing what’s best for the country, but what’s best for them. No one wants to surrender their prerogatives. If it’s a struggle to get Dad to give up the car keys, imagine how hard it would be to pry him off Air Force One.
All things being equal, I believe in perseverance. “I will be conquered,” the great Samuel Johnson said. “I will not capitulate.”
But does that mean we all must keep doing what we do, forever? An esteemed colleague, a few years older than myself, just walked away. Went on a safari. No announcement. No curtain clutching. That struck me as the path of the hero. Because if I’ve learned one thing about life, it’s this: It isn’t about me. Or you. We are all replaceable. And we’re all going to be replaced.
There’s a beautiful, brief poem by Jennifer Michael Hecht with the cumbersome title, “On the Strength of All Conviction and the Stamina of Love.”
It begins:
Sometimes I think
we could have gone on.
All of us. Trying. Forever.
We could; but we don’t:
But they didn’t fill
the deserts with pyramids.
They just built some. Some.
Then they stopped.
They’re not still out there,
building them now. Everyone,
everywhere, gets up, and goes home.
Or drops dead. Eventually. I’m sorry that Joe Biden can’t see his way to tap out in favor of, oh, Gavin Newsom. He has a choice. We don’t.
