Dems should be motived by things like access to abortion and staving off an attempt to institute a christofascist autocracy.

That’s a nothing sandwich with a side order of nothing. As far as motivating voters. It doesn’t apply to any one person. Any Democratic candidate could be saying these things, whether Biden, Harris, any of the other Democratic candidates from 2020, or a Speak-n-spell with a blue sticker on it. The GOP has, for decades, ran on people before policies. When they didn’t, they lost.

And whether we like it or not we don’t live in a logical system where policies are all that matter. If we did we could have a direct democracy and have every citizen vote directly on each policy. Instead we have a Republic, so the person making the empty campaign promises matters. Their personality matters. Their energy and likeability matters. It’s why Obama won, and Clinton before him. But now, the Democrats either can’t see that or don’t want to, or they’re led by bad actors who want to lose.