Lizza writes:

While the option of making a public pledge remains available, Biden has for now settled on an alternative strategy: quietly indicating that he will almost certainly not run for a second term while declining to make a promise that he and his advisers fear could turn him into a lame duck and sap him of his political capital … But the case for going public has some advocates. A political strategist [said]: “ … Biden wouldn’t be running if it were President Jeb Bush or President Marco Rubio. He’s running because it’s an exigent circumstance — Donald Trump. The next president will have to have oppositional virtues to the last president. We have a presidency that is defined by abject selfishness, self-regard and self-interest. So a one-term pledge would be viewed as an act of selflessness, putting the country ahead of any ambition.”

Kate Bedingfield, Biden’s deputy campaign manager, issued a classic semi-denial about the Politico story. “This is not a conversation our campaign is having and not something VP Biden is thinking about,” she wrote on Twitter.

Still, I found one of the most striking parts of Lizza’s article to be the description of Biden’s changing public remarks on the idea of a second term. He has switched from insisting he would not run for only one term to being considerably more ambiguous.

Which feels right to me. A one-term pledge seems weak. On the other hand, having an 86-year-old Biden as president — the age he would turn in 2028 — is far from desirable. Yet it still isn’t nearly the emergency that the Trump presidency has become.

For more …

Astead Herndon of The Times: “The people supporting Biden already see him as an emergency Trump fix and steadying hand during crisis, so I’m not sure this is as indicting as some might think.”

Jordan Weissmann, Slate: “If Biden thinks there’s a chance he simply won’t be able to handle the job in five or six years, he should realize there’s a chance he won’t be able to do it in two or three either. Being president is hard; it tends to age politicians rapidly, and Biden shouldn’t gamble on his ability to fill the role.”