A half-dozen at-bats later, a Mookie Wilson ground ball went through Buckner’s wobbly legs, sending the World Series to Game 7 and a certain 6-year-old Red Sox fan to bed in desperate tears. Those tears were my first acquaintance with the harsh truth of a baseball aphorism: The ball will always find you. Obviously, this is a column about President Biden’s age. But not only about Biden, because America has been running a lot of Buckner experiments of late. And she almost did — but in the end, her legacy was reshaped and even unmade by a decision to stay too long on the political field.

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Persons: John McNamara, Bill Buckner —, Dave Stapleton, Biden’s, Buckner, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s, Donald Trump, Dave Stapleton —, Mike Pence — Organizations: Boston Red Sox, New York Mets, Red Sox, Biden, Trump Locations: America