Sorry, progressives, but I never made you any promises. Sure, I may have endorsed the Green New Deal, single-payer healthcare, and decriminalizing border-crossings. But after a lot of soul-searching, and significantly more poll-testing, it turns out that I am a centrist in the mold of Joe Biden. Amazing timing, right?
For a while there I wasn’t sure if I was a male Liz Warren, a quiet Bernie Sanders, or maybe an articulate Steve Bullock. Nope. After looking deep in my heart, and paying a bunch of consultants gazillions of dollars, I’ve realized that I just happen to be exactly the kind of middle-of-the-road candidate so many Americans are clamoring for. Only less handsy, better at social media, and lucid.
Yup, just think of me as a young, hip, multilingual Uncle Joe, with more gun selfies, fewer teeth, and none of the baggage/experience. Biden has a bad habit of speaking from the heart, which is why he’s always rambling on about cereal. I’m far more calculating — everything I say has been run through an algorithm, focus-grouped by boomers, and rehearsed with Mark Zuckerberg. Isn’t that reassuring?
Now, it seems to rankle my opponents that I spent the past year speaking in riddles and ducking fundamental policy questions before finally generating my platform via McKinsey’s Palatable EThos Emulator (PETE)®. One of Beto O’Rourke’s aides even described me as a “human weather vane,” which is an outrageous comparison because most weather vanes are made out of steel, while I am made out of steel-cut oatmeal.
I don’t need lessons from Beto on courage — political, personal, or musical. What’s more courageous than exploiting a vulnerable 77-year-old man for the good of the country? Or accepting millions of dollars from lobbyists and bankers when I know I’ll take a little friendly fire for it? Or doing the “High Hopes” dance in public, when, again, friendly fire is imminent? (Lighten up, folks! Who doesn’t love Chaos! At the Arcade?)
Heck, I know I’ll take some heat at the debates, but not because of my policies (which barely exist), my résumé (ditto), or the fact that I’m a wealthy white guy from Harvard who feels that this moment “calls for someone like me.” No, it’s because this primary is getting to be a two-way race between myself and Elizabeth Warren. Hey, quit laughing.
Oh, you think it’s between Warren and Biden? This is Biden 2.0, baby, and it’s only a matter of time before I make the beta version obsolete. They’re not saying “Let’s go, Joe!” at the bingo halls in Iowa. They’re saying, “Peeeeeeeeeete!” and then, about me, I think, “BINGO!” I’m almost as popular in Iowa as I am in the New York Times’ Opinion section, so I must be doing something right.
If it’s easier, though, you can just think of me as an elfin Michael Bloomberg, or a Republican.