Joseph Sabino Mistick: Now it's the Democrats who are energized

When Frank Sinatra sang, “You’re riding high in April, shot down in May” — a lyric from his 1966 hit song “That’s Life” — he was describing the sudden ups and downs of life. In politics, as we have seen in the past few weeks, fortunes can change even faster than that.

It has been a month since President Joe Biden’s performance in the presidential debate suddenly caused many Democrats to doubt his ability to win reelection. There were growing concerns that a Biden defeat would have negative coattails that would drag down his party’s congressional candidates. Democrats were dejected.

A little more than two weeks later, Donald Trump narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in Butler. His defiant response galvanized his supporters and injected a new enthusiasm and confidence into his campaign. Trump even vowed momentarily to change his harsh ways after his brush with death. Republicans were energized.

Then, it all turned.

As Tim Alberta wrote for The Atlantic, President Biden’s decision to drop out of the race capped “a frenetic four-month stretch in which Trump’s campaign went from cocky about Biden’s deficiencies to fearful of his ouster to stunned at the sudden letter from Biden doing the thing Republicans thought he’d never do.”

But, as Biden explained in his address to the nation on Wednesday, “There is a time and place for long years of experience in public life. There’s also a time and place for new voices, fresh voices, yes, younger voices. And that time and place is now.”

Saying that “the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation,” Biden praised Vice President Kamala Harris — calling her experienced, tough and capable. Harris is a Black and South Asian woman whom voters have chosen to be district attorney, attorney general of California, United States senator and vice president of the United States.

And she has shown that she is a worthy presidential candidate by swiftly wrapping up the delegate votes that she needs for the presidential nomination and raising over $100 million in two days. Now, Democrats are energized.

Trump and his most toxic supporters immediately misplayed their hand. Some resorted to the gutter talk about women that Trump sanctioned with his “Access Hollywood” remarks back in 2016. Vulgar and obscene memes of the vice president surfaced overnight along with racist insults — not disguised at all.

Realizing that this is exactly the wrong approach for Republicans, Speaker Mike Johnson held a closed-door meeting to tell certain GOP lawmakers — these are adults serving in Congress — to stop the attacks on the vice president’s race and gender. Good luck with that.

But gender generally is something that Trump should be worried about. He takes personal credit for the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs decision, taking away the right of American women to make their own health care decisions.

At a Fox News town hall and elsewhere, Trump bragged, “I did it. And I’m proud to have done it.”

Men get to make their own health care decisions. Women do not. And where that has been on the ballot in various elections across the country, voters have sided with Democrats and personal freedom every time.

With women voting at higher rates than men in every presidential election since 1980, we will see how Trump tries to back away from this one.