A clearly panicked New York Times has set out what opinion columnist Tom Friedman believes are the best ways for Joe Biden to avoid debating President Trump.

Presidential debates have been customary since the very first debate that took place in 1960 between then Senator John F. Kennedy, and Vice President Richard Nixon.

But columnist Thomas Friedman seems to want that tradition to end this year, attempting to provide an increasingly doddery Joe Biden with a way out of the nationally televised spectacles.

Friedman opens his article by declaring: “I worry about Joe Biden debating Donald Trump. He should do it only under two conditions. Otherwise, he’s giving Trump unfair advantages.”

Friedman went on to lay out his conditions, both unrelated to preconditions for any presidential debates in history.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRM7zQk8xJg

Firstly, on Trump’s tax returns:

“Biden should declare that he will take part in a debate only if Trump releases his tax returns for 2016 through 2018. Biden has already done so, and they are on his website. Trump must, too. No more gifting Trump something he can attack while hiding his own questionable finances.”

Upon releasing his tax returns, Biden was criticized for taking advantage of a tax code loophole that he and the Obama administration actively tried to close, substantially lowering his tax bill.

Richard Rubin of the WSJ wrote: “Mr. Biden has decried the proliferation of such loopholes since Ronald Reagan’s presidency and said the tax revenue could be used, in part, to help pay for initiatives to provide free community-college tuition or to fight climate change.”

Additionally, Biden has continued to dodge questions about records of his own kept at the University of Delaware. Now the University is being sued for refusing to release the records.

Friedman’s second condition for Biden appears to be a way to stack the deck in the former Vice President’s favor. What he calls “real-time fact checkers”.

Except we know who these so-called “impartial” fact checkers almost invariably are.

Fact-checking organizations around the world are usually funded by far-left or globalist institutions, and tend to employ former journalists from liberal media networks.

Effectively, Friedman wants Trump to have to debate several people, instead of Biden, as a way to balance the bout.

“Biden should insist that a real-time fact-checking team approved by both candidates be hired by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates — and that 10 minutes before the scheduled conclusion of the debate this team report on any misleading statements, phony numbers or outright lies either candidate had uttered. That way no one in that massive television audience can go away easily misled.” said Friedman.

What’s clear is Friedman wants to scrap the entire American political tradition by setting up a commission of fact checkers and recognizing “tax returns” as the only thing candidates need to be transparent about.

Why not their foreign dealings? What could Biden be hiding? Why not their records or transcripts while in office, all disclosed for the public to see? Why not their medical records – especially given Biden’s recent admission of being regularly tested for cognitive decline?

And anyway – what ever happened to the best way of testing two candidates? Head-to-head, no moderator, and let the public decides who won?

Unless, that is, you don’t trust the public.