Hey, that's probably about the way the actual conversation went. And if they wanted to do Beatles, did they have to pick that one? (Although come to think of it, I don't know what an option would have been.)
I guess he could have done a decent job with "And I Love Her" or another of the ballads. Not Hey Jude.
Bet his duet with David Bowie (on his posthumously-aired Christmas special) was part of the same thinking, perhaps by the same person.
"I feel so low, old chap, that I could get on stilts and walk under a dachshund." - Monty, It (1927)
Yes, "And I Love Her" might not have been too bad, at that, if he'd styled it his way.
That was really some wrong-minded thinking, trying to make Bing something he wasn't, when what he was was so good. But I think there was a lot of that going on in that era, what with the massive cultural shift, the "generation gap," etc.
To steer this back on topic, and just to show that April Stevens was no slouch in her youth, here's her recording of "I'm in Love Again" that went to #6 in 1951.