This should come as no surprise to anyone who isn't living in a cardboard box or reporting for MSNBC, but Joe Biden is losing it. His poll numbers are cratering and he trots out some new embarrassment in almost every public appearance.

Now, from The Messenger scribe Albert R. Hunt asserts the perfect reason for Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race: to help Hunter.

President Biden has the perfect reason to bow out of the presidential race: to come to the aid of his troubled son, Hunter, who was just indicted for tax evasion.

This would merge two realities. Since his wife and young daughter died in a car accident more than 50 years ago, Biden has been a caring and concerned father. And the 81-year-old incumbent is in real danger of losing the 2024 election to Donald Trump.

The speech he could give would be simple and sincere and could sound something like this:

“Folks, I deeply love this country and hoped to build on all our accomplishments, serving you for four more years. I also deeply love my son, who faces additional legal charges. While I am convinced that he is innocent, I want to be there for him. That would be almost impossible if, in addition to being president, I were engaged in what promises to be a vicious campaign.

“Therefore, I will not run for reelection.

Let's not forget about that car accident - the one Joe Biden has been lying about ever since. We should never downplay the tragedy of the Bidens losing Neilia and Naomi in that traffic accident in 1972, but that doesn't excuse the claim Joe Biden has made many times since that Curtis Dunn, who was the other driver involved, was driving drunk; he wasn't, and that is a detestable, deliberate lie that arguably damaged Curtis Dunn's life and reputation. 

But then, lying is something of a habit for Joe Biden.

It is perhaps belaboring the obvious to point out that Joe Biden's primary achievements have been influence-peddling and self-enrichment, and we can add self-deluding to that if he said "...I am convinced that he is innocent." While Hunter Biden, like any citizen, is entitled to a presumption of innocence, there's just an awful lot of smoke for there not to be a fire there someplace. And there are other factors, including the person who is very likely serving as Edith Wilson to Joe's Woodrow, who enjoys the trappings of power and wishes to stay there.

Here, though, is where Mr. Hunt goes off the rails in his proposed speech.

“I would not take this step if I weren't convinced that we have many talented candidates who will defeat Donald Trump, an existential threat to our American way of life. 

“There still are many challenges, foreign and domestic, that we are meeting. The added burden of an ugly presidential campaign — which I have no doubt I would have won, as in 2020 — would make it impossible to devote the attention my family needs from me at this time.”

First, whatever you think of Donald Trump, the claim that he is an "...existential threat to our American way of life" is a real howler. We are a nation born in bloody revolution; we have survived a civil war that threatened to tear the republic asunder, two world wars, a major depression, and political scandals galore, not the least of which is old Joe's involvement with his son's shady business dealings. Honestly, this is just histrionics; Donald Trump, we might note, isn't coming into this a blank slate. Assuming he gains the GOP nomination and goes on to win the election - and polling sure seems to be going his way - we can look at a second Trump and note that the country survived his first, and one might ask Mr. Hunt how a second Trump term could possibly endanger the republic when the first clearly did not.

It's easy to understand Mr. Hunt's concern. Joe Biden is arguably now unfit for the Presidency. He ignores issues he (or, likely, his handlers) find uncomfortable. His approval numbers have hit a floor, there being a percentage of Democrat loyalists who will uptick a stuffed armadillo if it has a "D" behind its name (to be fair, the GOP has a similar polling floor) and it's looking more and more unlikely that, barring some disaster on the GOP side, he can't win re-election.

But bowing out to defend his son? Joe Biden stepped aside in 2016, citing the recent death of his son Beau and the need to be with his family. That was believable, even though that action led to the nomination of Hillary Clinton and her catastrophic campaign. But trying to repeat this kind of family-oriented claim for a son who, unlike Beau, is an addict, an influence-peddler, who ignores the daughter he fathered with a stripper, and whose primary achievement in life appears to be producing high-priced daubs?

That's stretching credulity a bit too far, even for liberals.