President Biden held a rare news conference before leaving Japan, and despite his advisers’ obvious strategy of largely shielding him from the media, he basically did fine. 

Most of the questions were about the debt-ceiling showdown that prompted him to leave the G-7 gathering early, and Biden threw a hard punch. He said some MAGA Republicans would welcome a government default "because I am president, and presidents are responsible for everything, Biden would take the blame. And that’s the one way to make sure Biden’s not reelected."

Whether that’s a smart strategy, as he’s trying to hammer out a compromise with Kevin McCarthy, is debatable. What’s not up for debate is that people got to watch their president take questions and appear knowledgeable about the issues, including at a separate appearance with Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Biden sometimes stumbles through these Q-and-A sessions – even then they’re worth doing – and there’s often a sense of anticipation: Is he going to botch someone’s name, have a memory lapse or say something that has to be walked back?

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In other words, will he act like an 80-year-old president?

While he seems like a lock for the Democratic nomination, there’s growing concern from liberals that Biden’s mental acuity, or physical stamina, might worsen.

And hovering over the 2024 landscape is, in their view, the dark prospect of a second Trump presidency.

One longtime voice on the left is that of Ruy Teixeira, who’s been a truth-telling analyst and writer for decades. While he’s a senior fellow at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute, he’s also the co-founder of the Liberal Patriot blog.

And Teixeira sees Biden as "an extraordinarily weak candidate," stuck polling in the low 40s and not likely to move up much. 

Democrats are underestimating the former president: "There’s no question that Trump has a lot of baggage, including his incessant dwelling on the ‘stolen’ 2020 election, that should weaken him as an opponent." But with Trump a point ahead in the Real Clear Politics average, he writes: "Yes, it is early but these results are not nothing." 

Given that Trump is under indictment, under investigation for Jan. 6 and other issues, and just lost a sexual assault suit, shouldn’t Biden have a healthy lead?

What’s more, Teixeira says, Biden and the Democrats haven’t drawn any line "against the cultural extremists in their own party." The growing backlash on crime, illegal immigration and teaching sexual material in school, among other things, will be a drag on the Biden candidacy.

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The president isn’t exactly Bernie Sanders, but if he had started trying to ease the border crisis two years ago rather than waiting for Title 42 to expire – and his plan has eased migrant crossings in the short term – he’d be much better off. 

From the right, National Review Editor Rich Lowry says Biden is one step away from electoral disaster.

I have to argue with Lowry from the start, because he used a meaningless half-stumble by Biden as a metaphor. The president lost his balance coming down stairs in Japan for a split-second, righted himself with the next step – something we’ve all done without a second thought.

But it’s hard to argue with the next part: 

"If Biden were to do a face-plant, even down a few steps, it could be very ugly. Fairly or not, it’d be a symbol of U.S. decrepitude. It’s one thing to have a senior senator from California who obviously should have hung it up several years ago; it’s another to have a president of the United States lacking the agility to get around easily anymore."

With Mitch McConnell having recently suffered a concussion and broken rib from a fall, "Biden could take a wrong step at any time, and there’s no guarantee that it would happen on a convenient timetable for Democrats, when, say, they could still go in another direction. In fact, it could happen on a catastrophic timetable — if something happened to Biden in late October 2024, it could easily throw a close race to his Republican opponent, including Donald Trump.

"It’d be likelier to make him look foolhardy for having taken on, once again, at age 80 or 81, the physically, mentally, and emotionally taxing enterprise of a national campaign, rather than like the victim of circumstances out of his control." And it would make Biden, not Trump, the issue." 

So things are looking grim for the president if he’s one banana peel away from disaster, right?

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Well, stop hyperventilating if you want Biden to win. We’ve got a focus group coming to the rescue. 

With a mixed group from Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin, the Washington Post found no particular enthusiasm for the president, with most of the 15 participants describing negative emotions when they saw Biden: ‘confused,’ ‘concern,’ ‘worry,’ ‘sad,’ ‘sorry’ and even ‘panicked.’"

It gets worse, with several offering "dire assessments of Biden’s mental and physical capacities, calling him too old or speculating about the possibility of dementia."

But 9 of the 15 in the group said they would vote for Biden. 

The reason? "In both focus groups and polling, concerns about another Trump presidency are even greater, leaving Biden in a much better position if the two men meet in a rematch." 

Moderator Rich Thau told the paper that "deciding between Trump and Biden is like being forced to choose either a demolition derby car or an old clunker for a cross-country trip. With either choice, they are not particularly happy."

Yup, this is hardly inspiring. Most people don’t want either president to run again, and will likely be depressed if that happens, with a certain percentage staying home.

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But we can’t predict an election outcome by relying on 15 strangers. A different group might say different things a month from now or a year from now.

So the race could come down to each man’s Kryptonite — Biden’s advanced age versus Trump’s history of investigations and accusations.