I always assumed he was only running for 1 term. The pandemic unfortunately gave the Party elites full justification to hide the extent of Biden's decline from the public by giving a legitimate reason for him to not campaign. Campaigns are exhausting endeavors, and in the past have served as an informal filter to identify those who lack the physical and mental stamina to do the job.

I used to do work in the Center for American Progress on a weekly basis. I know a lot of folks high up in the party (I did a lot of work for Obama's campaigns in 2008 and 2012), and let me be clear: NONE OF THEM think he's running again. And I'm talking about over a dozen people I know. If he runs again, it will be a shock to me. They were saying this before he even got elected. In the eyes of the Dem machine, he was always a one term option. They couldn't tell the public that, because like all party machines, they don't like or respect the voters.

Veering way off topic now, but Biden's only hope IMO is if the GOP runs Trump again. The Democrats may coalesce around hate for Trump, but otherwise will likely be crushed in 2024.

Also agree with your point about incestuous nature and quite frankly the self-owns Democrats do. Attacking other democrats who aren't woke enough, while the GOP is masterful at uniting the voter base around a couple key issues like abortion and guns (though the GOP has seen a bit of internal divide with Trump). Biden had an EV summit and only invited the top UAW staffed companies leaving out TSLA. Think what you want about TSLAs valuation and Elon, but how can anyone in the US have an EV summit and leave them out? Stuff like this is what sours middle of the road democrat voters. It's like the democrats want to lose elections.

Well... the Republicans are also doing self-owns rather a lot lately. It's almost like both sides are trying to lose. (Or maybe it's like both sides have drunk their own kool-aid.)

>>though the GOP has seen a bit of internal divide with Trump

Not really, the "Never Trumpers" in the past were called RINO's by most of the base anyway, they did not see eye to eye on most issues with the conservative base of the republican party.

Infact I would say post trump the RINO / neocon wing if the Republican party LOST power, not gained any, as many of the would get an assist from libertarians that vote with republicans, however that wing of the part lost most of them as well.

GOP is probably more unified today than it has been in a long time from what I can see

The "Never Trumpers" in the GOP also include all of the remaining people on planet earth who still, to this day, think the Iraq war was a good idea. Not exactly convincing spokesmen.