This is being written on a Tuesday afternoon after eight House Republicans just kicked their putative leader to the curb. The vote was historic. More than that, it was symptomatic of the chaos of our politics.

In watching it unfold, phrases about “reaping what you sow” and “chickens coming home to roost” popped to mind.

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and what’s left of any actual governing coalition in the House GOP were brought low by the craziness they too long countenanced and enabled. “Just rewards” is another apt description.

Those expecting one more column on Trump-induced lunacy and dysfunction in the Republican Party will be disappointed. As I want to focus instead on the severe question facing their opposites in the upper echelons of the Democratic Party.

On the surface, these should be days of roses for Democratic partisans. Donald Trump will spend as much time over the next year in courtrooms as on the campaign trail. His challengers for the GOP nomination appear as dwarfs in his shadow.

A handful of special elections here and there around the country have gone Democrats’ way. The energy of women voters shows little sign of withering in the aftermath of the Dobbs ruling.

But none of that alters one core, inescapable reality – that being that roughly three-quarters of the country, including a decided majority of his fellow Democrats, think Joe Biden too old to seek and serve another term as president.

To repeat, 75% of American voters, or very close thereto, want President Biden to step aside after a single term.

That number is growing and hardening. As Biden turns 81 next month – and will celebrate his 82nd birthday two weeks after the 2024 election – America is making a collective judgment that is too old for the demands of the office.

Call it “ageist,” if you wish. Note that Trump is only three years younger and hardly a picture of fitness and healthy habits. Suggest that, as president, Biden receives the finest medical care to be found.

None of that changes the consensus view of Americans of all political stripes. Sure, many of them will override those concerns to vote for Biden as the only plausible choice in a rematch with Trump.

Though some will not. And it is not exactly the case that Biden and Democrats have a ton of breathing room in the pivotal states that flipped the White House in 2020 and will be decisive again next year.

Last time out, Biden carried Pennsylvania by just 81,000 votes; Wisconsin by less than 21,000; Georgia by the 11,779 votes Trump pleaded with the secretary of state to find or reverse; and, Arizona by an even slimmer 10,457 votes.

Those are microscopic margins subject to reversal in even the faintest of breezes.

Here is the inescapable dilemma facing the president and his party: In 2020, Biden was uniquely situated to defeat and dislodge Trump. He was, arguably, the only Democrat capable of doing so.

But times change and all of us age. Come 2024, Biden may be uniquely unable to prevail and forestall a Trump return to the Oval Office.

Were this a run-of-the-mill election, deference might be due to the incumbent president, along with a willingness to roll the dice. But any election involving the menace of Trump, much less with him now driven by retribution and ever more disdainful of rules and limits, is anything but routine.

For all those satisfyingly telling themselves that Trump is now assuredly unelectable, I refer you back to 2016. And ask whether that is a risk you wish to entertain.

It is not as if Biden’s poll numbers should be heartening for Democrats save for the age issue. His approval rating has been underwater essentially from the beginning. Over recent months, it has sunk to new depths.

The latest ABC News/538.com report shows Biden’s approval at 39.8% and disapproval at 55.1%. Care to take another deep inhale of that confidence stogie, Democrats?

True, Biden’s unpopularity does not account for that of Trump. The abortion issue and the fear of Trump-driven, creeping authoritarianism work in Biden’s favor.

Beyond that, it is not as if voters are particularly high on the direction of the country. Bidenomics is hardly an easy sell, as an increasing number of Americans feel economic anxiety and insecurity. Crime and immigration are loser issues for any vulnerable Democrat, starting with the top guy.

The combination of those issues, along with excesses on a number of cultural fronts, is dampening support for Democrats in Black and Brown communities. Both are constituencies on which the party has long relied. Even a slight softening spells political exposure and weakness.

Dianne Feinstein’s extended decline and recent passing on top of Mitch McConnell’s apparent cognitive lapses have only added to the saliency of the age question. When a senator suffers or dies, the national response is one of sadness and taking stock. A presidential death is traumatic and nothing that voters wish to willfully invite.

By conventional standards, time is drawing short for Biden to exit the coming race. But in this viral age of 24/7/365 politics, new candidates can launch quickly.

While not to be under-estimated in a party in full embrace of group identity, Kamala Harris has been found wanting by most voters. She is as much a product of thorough immersion in a political echo chamber (California), as is the most tone deaf, good old boy, southern Republican.

Harris is not the answer, but she might represent the right gender. Thirty-two years ago, Bill Clinton broke the mold of balancing presidential tickets by age or geography or ideology in inviting a veritable look-alike from an adjacent state to join him on a ticket signifying generational change.

Americans are desperate for a political cleansing. Even if the perception has sexist roots, who is better suited to such a moment than a ticket of two women? Why just break the glass ceiling when you can obliterate it?

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and former Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo, step forward. In whatever order.

The Republican Party may be in full meltdown mode. That barely constitutes news these days. Even that disarray offers Democrats no guarantee.

Joe Biden should not be regarded as feeble. Though his fastball is not nearly what it once might have been. And his countrymen prefer not to contemplate him handling these awesome responsibilities into his mid-80s.

Sad to say, in a contest between the perceived demented and the demonstrated deranged, voters might choose the one who can still command the office and make the trains run on time.

Eric Sondermann is a Colorado-based independent political commentator. He writes regularly for Colorado Politics and the Gazette newspapers. Reach him at?EWS@EricSondermann.com; follow him at @EricSondermann