President Biden’s Friday sitdown with ABC News did nothing to staunch the bleeding. I’ve been boosting and defending him for the last four years, but I can’t deny what I see and hear with my own eyes and ears. It pains me to say this, but he’s the one living in denial – and we may all pay the price for that in November.

If you haven’t reluctantly tuned in to his damage-control gig with George Stephanopoulos, you need to know what he said about his debate performance. When George asked Joe whether he knew in real time how badly it was going, this was his response:

“I, uh – I prepared what I usually would do, sitting down as I did come back with foreign leaders or National Security Council for explicit detail. And I realized – about partway through that, you know, all – I get quoted, The New York Times had me down at 10 points before the debate, nine now, or whatever the hell it is. The fact of the matter is, what I looked at is that he also lied 28 times. I couldn’t – I mean, the way the debate ran, not – my fault, no one else’s fault, no one else’s fault.”

This is the guy who thinks he’s cognitively fit to hold back the tide of MAGA fascism?

Note that he never answered the question. He started off talking about his debate prep, then he lurched into a riff about polls, then he took a drive-by swing at Trump, then he landed back on the debate…and George followed up by asking: “How quickly did it – did it come to you that you were having that bad night?”

His response:

“Well, it came to me, I was having a bad night when I realized that even when I was answering a question, even though they turned his mic off, he was still shouting. And I – I let it distract me. I – I’m not blaming it on that, but I realized that I just wasn’t in control.”

That’s honest, as far as it goes. The candidate we’re depending on to save democracy admits he “wasn’t in control,” that he was distracted by the lunatic, and “I just had a bad night, I don’t know why.” That’s hardly reassuring. I like a candidate who’s in control, especially when confronted by a lunatic. And did he watch the debate after it aired, to learn what went wrong? His response: “I don’t think I did, no.”

Later George asked: “Would you be willing to undergo an independent medical evaluation that included neurological and cognitive tests and release the results to the American people?”

His response (his way of saying nope):

“Look. I have a cognitive test every single day. Every day I have that test. Everything I do. You know, not only am I campaigning, but I’m running the world.”

I guess we’re just supposed take it on trust that he will have all good days and no bad days. Are we supposed to just hold our breath every time he talks unscripted between now and November?

When George pointed out that a huge share of Americans think the Dems would fare better against Trump if Biden stepped down – a whopping 75 percent said this in a new national poll – Biden shrugged that he doesn’t believe the polls. When George asked whether he’d step down if key lawmakers in his party pleaded with him to do so, he said he’d answer only to God:

“If the Lord Almighty came down and said, ‘Joe, get out of the race,’ I’d get out of the race. The Lord Almighty’s not coming down.”

But one of Biden’s remarks was especially awful; it had a touch of megalomania. George asked, “if you stay in, and Trump is elected…how will you feel in January?”

This was his response:

“I’ll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the goodest job as I know I can do, that’s what this is about.”

Um, no. That’s not what this race is about. This is about a country in growing peril of going fascist. This is about finding a candidate with undiminished acuity who can squash that peril. This race is not about Joe Biden doing “the goodest job” he can do. I love the job he’s done, but it’s time to forfeit the car keys.