I view it a bit differently. I like the job Biden has done, and think he made a good President. But Biden has always had some key liabilities which limited his ability to win a national election. He has a long history of saying stupid stuff, and he has had a history of “heavily borrowing” from other sources in his speeches. There’s a reason why his campaigns in the 80s usually ended by Super Tuesday.

But all of those liabilities didn’t matter once he ran against Donald Trump. Trump said 10x more stupid stuff, told 10x more lies, and trigged Biden to fight 10x more fiercely. It is very possible that Donald Trump is the only candidate Joe Biden could ever have beaten in a national election.

That doesn’t mean that people were voting against Trump, but it does mean that Biden’s strengths were most apparent when running against Trump. And it also explains why his campaign floundered this time: there was a demonstrated lack of energy due to his age that he couldn’t overcome.