'24 Game Theory, the D.C. Media Curse, and 11 More Hollywood Predictions You Can Take to the Bank

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Today, Peter Hamby examines the Biden-Harris succession question overhanging the White House—and previews the crowded, chaotic stock-car primary that is likely to ensue if the president declines to run in 2024. 

Then, below the fold: Will Ryan Coogler outgross James Cameron? Can NFTs go mainstream? And does Major League Baseball have a streaming problem? Matt Belloni returns with Part Two of his smartest, boldest, totally unpredictable (but 100 percent probable) predictions for the entertainment-media industry in 2022. 

Biden’s Succession Calculus

Notes and inside reporting on the president’s 2024 thinking, the Kamala curse, and the limitations of the Youngkin-McCormick playbook during the Trump interregnum.

It’s the first week of a midterm election year—the prelude, as always, to a presidential media-election cycle that never really stops. Here at Puck, I’ve already begun reporting on the succession question overhanging the White House: Is Joe Biden too old to run again, or is the D.C. political media skepticism out of touch with America? Is Kamala Harris the ultimate lame-duck vice president? What will Democrats do if Biden can’t or won’t run again, and can they count on Gen Z to forestall another four years of Donald Trump?

Thanks to all of the readers who wrote in with feedback about those recent columns. Today, I’m opening my notebook to respond to some of the questions in my inbox (and on my mind) about what’s next for Biden, Harris, and the post-Trump G.O.P. in 2022, before the ‘24 political-media narrative begins to take form.

Peter, you reported on Biden’s Gen Z problem. But what isn’t his problem these days?! Now he’s saying his re-election bid is conditioned on his health, which seems like the beginning of a potential walk back. Can you unfurl his political calculus for us?

I actually think Biden’s calculus when it comes to running in 2024 has always been about his health, and not much else. I mentioned this in a piece I wrote in November about Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party’s succession question, that Biden’s decision whether to run a second term will come this time next year, made over the holidays in consultation with his family. If Biden genuinely believes that he can mentally and physically endure the rigors of another national campaign while also running the country at age 81, then he will. But Biden won’t just step aside because of bad poll numbers, hostile media coverage or pressure from Democrats to make room for the “next in line,” in part because no such person exists. Only Bernie Sanders commands similar attention—but he’s just as old and won’t primary the sitting president. There’s no one else in the Democratic Party who has proven himself or herself worth calling up from the jayvee squad—which is precisely why Biden won the Democratic nomination in 2020. In that sense, he would feel an obligation to run—especially in a rematch against Donald Trump. 

Biden also agrees with what Hillary Clinton said last week, “that it is a time for some careful thinking about what wins elections, and not just in deep blue districts where a Democrat and a liberal Democrat or a so-called progressive Democrat is going to win.” The president’s political antenna is always pointed in the direction of the independent voters who decide elections, not just MSNBC viewers and Twitter addicts...

FOUR STORIES WE'RE TALKING ABOUT