"My baseline view of politics... is that political parties engage in something roughly resembling game-theory optimal behavior..."

"... and undertake reasonably rational strategies in an effort to win elections and fulfill their other objectives.... As compared to Republicans’ decision about what to do about Trump, I thought Democrats had more agency about Biden following his disastrous debate. Unlike Republicans in 2016, Democrats hadn’t even bothered to hold a competitive primary — if they had, Biden’s flaws might have been even evident earlier — so the will-of-the-voters argument was weak. And unlike Trump in October 2016 following the release of the 'Access Hollywood' tape — after which some Republicans called on him to drop out — Biden wasn’t even the Democratic nominee yet since the party convention hadn’t been held. And Biden has always been a loyal Democrat who got a huge boost from the party establishment in wrapping up the nomination in 2020 — not someone who gave his party the middle finger...."

Writes Nate Silver, noting his failure to predict that Trump would win in 2016 and his early prediction that Biden would withdraw, in "Biden and Democrats make the rational choice/They're probably still underdogs against Trump, but Biden dropping out improves their odds."