How high are the stakes of the 2024 election, really?

If the stakes really are that high, the people warning us should behave in a much more sober, focused and serious manner.

If Joe Biden is re-elected, we will not have a country any more and he will continue transforming these United States into a third world nation.

If Donald Trump is re-elected, he will destroy our democracy and implement a tyrannical autocracy with him at the head of it. He admires dictators and aspires to be one.

OK, all of that is awesome, very dramatic, and very convincing. We need to vote for Biden/Trump in order to save the very future of our country from the truly frightening threat of Trump/Biden and the corrupt administration he brings with him. It is absolutely critical that he is not re-elected! The stakes could not be higher. The future of not only our country, but the entire world is at stake.

Vote or die!

So if all of that is true, if "the other guy" represents an existential threat to democracy itself, then why are our political leaders not acting like it? Why are they not taking this election seriously? Why are they not taking critical debates over public policy seriously? Why are we not taking anything seriously, and behaving in the sober-minded and serious manner that is appropriate for the most important election in world history?

We have the former President talking about making illegal aliens fight in UFC. No, he was not serious, but that is my point. He was not serious. This shows a concerning lack of focus and professionalism. If the stakes of the 2024 election really are as high as Trump claims, then he should act like it and not make silly jokes that drive people into a tizzy.

On the other side of things, Joe Biden is simply not with it anymore. Biden was clearly slipping 18 months ago. If the stakes of the 2024 election really are as high as Democrats claim they are, and Trump really is that big of a threat, then they should act like it. This means Biden should have announced in early 2023 that he was not running. With less than four months to go until the general election, replacing Biden would throw the election into chaos and severely limit campaign spending while giving Trump free reign.

It goes all the way down. You have two members of Congress squabbling in a Congressional hearing, with one Congresswoman mocking someone's looks and mocking hurt feelings, while the other Congresswoman responds with "Oh baby girl, don't even play!" Truly scintillating wit on display here, along with command of policy and data. We have a very un-serious political class.

The politicians keep telling us that the other side is terrible and dangerous. They will destroy the country as we know it. But if the stakes really are that high, the people warning us should behave in a much more sober, focused and serious manner. This does not mean there is no room for jokes or levity. But we need to take the business of governing the nation (or state, or city, or county, or township) seriously. If we are going to be catastrophizing the opposition, how can anyone take those warning seriously when the people issuing the warnings do not take their own rhetoric seriously?

This is not to say there are not real dangers and real consequences of policy. But serious issues require serious people. We have turned our politics into a combination of a clown show and a blood sport, but very few people are actually interested in developing serious and detailed policy. No, it is much easier to post memes, especially for people with a 30 second attention span. That is why, ultimately, we cannot blame the politicians. We have to blame the voters, on both sides.