Oh, let’s not always see the same hands. 

If you were a Democrat Party leader in this political environment, would you run out in front of large public crowds to answer for your performance? Well, few of our readers would count themselves among that crowd, but those who do have made themselves mighty scarce in this midterm cycle.

And the Washington Post would like to know why the public rhetoric from party leadership doesn’t match their public appearance schedules:

President Biden declared Saturday that the upcoming midterms are “the most important off-year election” the country has had since “[Franklin D.] Roosevelt’s time.” On Tuesday, discussing abortion rights, he upped the ante, proclaiming, “We’re only 22 days away from the most consequential election in our history.”

Yet Biden has not held a campaign rally since before Labor Day. He has largely shied away from appearing with candidates in the most competitive races, amid worries he will drag them down with his low approval ratings. And his most frequent campaign activity is raising money from high-dollar donors with no television cameras or photographers present.

The gap between his declaration that Nov. 8 is a pivotal moment in American history and a campaign schedule that hardly reflects that urgency is matched by other top Democrats who have also been scarce on the campaign trail. A big reason: From former president Bill Clinton to Vice President Harris to former nominee Hillary Clinton, few Democratic heavyweights are in demand in the political climate today.

“In demand” means no one’s asking them to show up — and they’re probably not inclined to do so anyway. It’s not just Joe Biden who’s not getting requests, in other words, but everyone associated with the Democrat establishment. In this political environment, where the progressive agenda that every party leader has endorsed and pushed is clearly backfiring on the party, the candidates want to get as much distance as possible from the establishment in order to argue for their own “moderate” creds.

However, Biden seems to be a bit sensitive to this point, and understandably so given his position as nominal party leader ex officio. When a reporter asked Biden why he’s not showing up in very many races this cycle, Biden angrily demeans the reporter for asking it:

"John Fetterman's gonna appear with you today in Pennsylvania, but there haven't been that many candidates campaigning with you —"

Biden, grabbing the reporter: "That's not true! There've been 15. COUNT KID, COUNT!" pic.twitter.com/Weg5WPHrSU

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) October 20, 2022

A whole fifteen campaign appearances, eh? Bear in mind that all 435 House seats are up for grabs in any election cycle; even if we only count competitive races, that’s somewhere in the 100-seat range, especially in this environment. We have 35 Senate seats up for election as well, and around half of the gubernatorial races too.

And Biden expects people to be impressed with fifteen campaign appearances in an election he’s hyping as the most important since FDR’s televised fireside chat during the 1929 Wall Street crash? Come on, man. Even the Washington Post ain’t buying that one.

Here’s the real reason that Democrat establishment figures — and especially Biden — have been persona non grata on the campaign trail this cycle:

That job approval firmly belongs to Biden, of course, but it goes well beyond him, too. Biden ran as a centrist and immediately betrayed his campaign promises by throwing in with the progressive establishment of the Democrat Party. This chart reflects the status of the entire establishment with voters in this environment, and they know it. So do their candidates, who are desperately trying to keep all politics local, even for elections to national office.

This again raises the question of why John Fetterman’s team linked him to Biden yesterday in Pennsylvania, where the president’s just as unpopular as his national status. Josh Shapiro was smart enough to keep the hell away from that event, and Biden’s incoherent performance there certainly vindicated that decision. Biden’s ego may have prompted him to campaign in Pennsylvania but Fetterman didn’t have to show up — especially since he refused to even engage with reporters or voters at his own joint event. The internal polls for Fetterman’s team must be brutal at the moment to take that risk.