However heartfelt and relatable, Joe Biden’s declaration that he would have whupped Donald Trump’s teenage ass in high school is like listening to someone elevator-pitch the worst Back to the Future spin-off ever. It’s also very much like listening to someone make a clear case that he should not be the Democratic presidential candidate in 2020. And now that Biden has said that he regrets making the remarks, even as he tried to explain that they were taken out of context — he was talking about a time-traveling Joe and Don, not a present-day senior division wrestling match — he’s just provided more evidence that whatever his many virtues, Biden is not the person Democrats should look to as their 2020 presidential candidate.

The number one rule for taking on Trump is to never, ever lower yourself to his level — Trump is simply the king of the muddy pigpen, and there’s nothing to be gained by engaging at his schoolyard level. This includes never partaking of the ways that he has gradually insinuated the threat of violence into mainstream political discourse, from encouraging supporters to threaten reporters covering his rallies, to his refusal to call out neo-Nazis in the Charlottesville clashes last year. For Joe Biden to have gone there — first in 2016, and again more recently — was an idea lacking this basic common sense. I suspect his Fight Club remarks, rather than being a gaffe, were quite consciously made to establish him as a tough guy who can take on Trump. To me and I suspect many others though, the talk of fighting it out in the name of defending women’s honor more strongly suggests that it’s long past time we had a woman as president. Our times demand a different type of toughness than fists and bluster.

For a more comprehensive argument against Biden 2020, check out this piece by Jamelle Bouie.