Home » Joe Biden: these are not gaffes

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Joe Biden: these are not gaffes — 71 Comments

  1. I suspect that this, like every other ridiculous manifestation of Biden’s obvious cognitive impairment, is completely irrelevant to most voters on the left, since it must be clear to all but the very dimmest amongst them that his administration will be run by Kamala, by his cabinet, by the DNC and their lackeys in Congress and, of course, by the progressive permanent bureaucracy which inhabits the swamp in DC.

  2. Shows how much respect the Democrats have for the country, to keep him on as a figurehead for president, truly a useful idiot for the party. Will violent outbursts and wandering off the podium be next?

  3. Nope, not gaffes.
    Biden is exhibiting Sundowners Syndrome, and WORSE!
    If he is elected, Harris will be POTUS in short order.

  4. So he doesn’t seem to know or acknowledge the difference between a thousand and a million, but to most of my Democratic friends, (and unfortunately to some of my own children) it won’t matter. They’ll vote for him anyway.

  5. When the Rs nominated Bob Dole & John McCain…

    I barely could bring myself to vote for them. It seemed to me as if the Rs were “throwing the fight” by giving their nomination to such sub-par old men candidates “because it was their turn” perhaps(?) And don’t get me started on Romney…

    Now the Ds have thrown into the ring 2 of the worst human beings crawling the planet against one of the strongest R opponents since Reagan. First Hillary & now Joe.

    Is Joe a “Potemkin candidate?” Simply a placeholder until President Trump & the country have been weakened by 8 years of strife & bloodshed & open warfare when the “real D” will be put forward to “lead the country out of the mess created by Trump & the Rs”? And who would THAT be?

    Would the Ds really “throw” this election knowing gleefully that the riots would escalate & the body count would climb & eventually some new “baseball game shooter” would emerge…? Would they use Joe as a means to an end, where the end is anarchy chaos & more violence that POTUS would have to suppress or lose the country?

  6. Hello, Lowell! (I’ve not seen you here before. That’s a nice name. Makes me think of the folks over in Mass-achoo-setts. 🙂 ) It is an interesting error to make, not in principle that dissimilar to what happens when people not habituated to working with numbers confuse million and billion, and yet… someone of his supposed experience getting ‘thousand’ and ‘million’ mixed up, even on the fly, is pretty shocking. Ah, well. As pointed out here and elsewhere, his voters won’t care. This will not move the needle at all.

    Someone on Instapundit, I think it was, in reaction to this flub by Biden, congratulated her readers on having successfully survived the mass die-off. I laughed. 🙂

  7. By what calculus can Biden be seen to be fit as a candidate for President?

    Biden is simply incapable of even a minimal competence.

    How is this different from nominating a candidate with Downsyndrome?

    His candidacy is clearly in violation of the 25th Amendment, as severe cognitive decline is a blatant incapacitation.

  8. John Guilfoyle,

    Quite possibly, perhaps even probable, given that the only reasonable proposition for beating Trump is a stolen election.

    There’s no paucity of candidates on the left for that grim job.

  9. I am unfortunately aquatinted with dementia since several family members have had it. The evidence can be subtle, but a common sign is loss of muscle tone in the face. The sufferer’s facial expressions are “off”, not quite appropriate to the situation, and the face “softens up”. Compare Biden’s face from a few years ago and today. It used to be much “harder”. I think it’s clearly become more obvious even in the last six months.

  10. He reminds me of Robert Mueller at the congressional hearing on the Russia collusion investigation. It was obvious that Mueller had mental problems and could not have been in charge of the investigation so you had to wonder who was really in charge.

  11. One wonders what the Democrats have up their sleeves; it can’t be they really are hopeful of a Biden presidency. Are they laying their hopes on a Harris administration?

  12. neo: Perhaps Biden meant to say “200 kajillion.”

    The kajillion numbering system is pretty flexible. It basically means a really big number you should be impressed or frightened by.

  13. This is elder abuse plain and simple. How Jill Biden has allowed it is beyond me. I know it is a dream of his but how can she allow this to go on? These next 7 days is going to be real interesting in that there is going to be Ginsberg’s funeral, nomination of a replacement, the reported drop of the Senate report (Ron Johnson) regarding the Biden’s Ukraine dealing and the debate. Could that nomination or the report be the reason Biden pulls out of the debate stating that he will not deal with scandal mongers and people trammeling the constitution? We shall see.

    If his appearances in the next few days are showing even more deterioration he may not have any choice but to not debate. In dementia, you get longer periods of senility vs. lucidity. Let’s see if they try to substitute Harris then.

    In the Conservative Treehouse there is a theory why Biden got selected after Michael Bloomberg crashed and burned. I find it plausible. For those who hasn’t been there it is worth monitoring.

    https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/09/16/the-background-of-the-harris-biden-ticket/#more-199774

  14. He showed a similar problem with the number of firearms deaths earlier this year. Sad, his clock speed is running down, soon there will be no there there.

  15. Like Ed above I noticed his gait. I watched him come out in FL “presser”. He walked like he was afraid of falling down, almost a shuffle. My Dad walked like that and he had Diabetes and neuropathy in his legs.

  16. Phillip, I think it’s because there is a general loss of muscle control with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s dementia. Tremors of various kinds, difficulty walking, eating, … go hand in hand with the mental difficulties. Heck, the neurology department that deals with these problems is called “Movement Disorders” at all the major hospitals here.

  17. In the Conservative Treehouse there is a theory why Biden got selected after Michael Bloomberg crashed and burned. I find it plausible. For those who hasn’t been there it is worth monitoring.

    Sundance is a big believer in guys-in-a-room-make-things-happen. Not buying.

  18. Biden and his people have done some strange things (e.g. the Carnegie-Mellon pantomime). Need to be wary of confirmation bias, though.

  19. I completely understand why Democrats would vote for a clearly deteriorating man over someone they think is pure evil. I’m sure they assume a competent staff of experts will make all the important decisions until the time comes for the figurehead of Biden to step aside. What I find amusing (disturbing) is that while everyone knows what’s going on, no Democrat in any position of power will admit it. They continue to treat Biden as if he is a perfectly normal candidate. I do think it’s more likely than not that he will have a moment that is so disturbing that it will not be able to be ignored, even by the corrupt mainstream media. It must be excruciating for Democrats to watch Biden wondering if he can make it through another appearance without completely forgetting where he is.

  20. Neo, I made the same point over at Althouse yesterday about Biden not catching that 200 million was clearly the wrong number. He does this over and over and the only explanation is that the part of his brain, that understood the magnitude of numbers and how they relate to the real world, is no longer functional.

    My father suffered from Alzheimers in the 5 years before his death, and I could mark the decline by his ability to handle and understand numbers. At the end, my father could still read something you put in front of him, but he couldn’t add 30 and 10 together, and though I never tried the experiment, I know that if I had put up a number like “200,000” he would have only said it was “two hundred thousand” as a complete accident. He would likely have done something similar to what Biden did- just get confused by all the zeroes- too many to count or understand- and went with very large number several magnitudes too high.

    His staff surely knows he isn’t capable of being the president, so what is their plan? Let the country be run by a guy who doesn’t know the difference between a thousand and a million?

  21. Truly sad (for him, his family and for the country if he wins), but I guess we could say that at least he didn’t spell potato with an “e” on the end like Dan Quayle did. That “mistake” was a heading in the news for days!

    Seriously though, I wonder if the Democrats are willing to put him through this because they believe no one will win against Trump? And, that they might as well throw away the “old guy” and save their better candidates for the next time.

    After all, anyone who runs against Trump and loses will be seen as an “already run” candidate (even with the news media on their side) for the next time.

  22. Kilotons, megatons, come on man! This ain’t horseshoes.

    Not funny that the democrats haven’t called in the back up, Bernie? Is that all they have? But then again they have shut down the economy in many states, encouraged riots and racial hatred, impeached over a phone call. A party of sociopaths.

  23. How can Biden’s family and the people around him allow him to go out there and appear so bumbling, make so many verbal gaffes? That is cruel and unusual punishment, or elder abuse — one or maybe both. I’m surprised Jill doesn’t blow the whistle and say “enough of this charade.” It must be terribly painful for her to watch him deteriorate and keep pushing him out there.

    I keep hoping fate will intervene somehow and it will be clear that Biden is not the real candidate. Not that I wish ill for Biden, but in truth, what could be worse for him than to continue looking bumbling and senile, especially as it progresses?

    I have to agree with OM — a party of sociopaths. And hard-hearted political hacks.

  24. Folks, it is what it is and the horse is already out of the gate and running in the big race. For whatever reason they picked a real dog this time and backed him up with a female dog and that’s it, it is what it is. I think the way the Democrats spend money, just like last time round they are going to target the groups they already have and so far I have not seen them trying to reach out to the middle so they can do like they did here in Texas when Beto spent twice the amount of Cruz and still lost the race. I expect to see some sort of a terrible disaster when the protestors kill lots more people as the Supreme Court nomination works itself out and the presidential races gets closer. This whole thing is off the tracks and when the Democrats spend money to destroy communities I think they are sending the wrong message to those who still have a little bit of common sense.

  25. “His staff surely knows he isn’t capable of being the president, so what is their plan? Let the country be run by a guy who doesn’t know the difference between a thousand and a million?” Yancey Ward

    Of course they know. Nor will he ever, even for a minute be running the country. His advisors along with Jill Biden would initially be calling the shots. But that charade can’t last long. Once Harris was President, I suspect many at the top levels imagine that a committee would be making policy.

    I think they underestimate Harris’ lust for power and ruthlessness. If she ever gains the Presidency, no one is going to tell that woman what to do. She wants to be top dog with everyone licking her butt.

    Nor does she care even in the least for any stinkin’ Constitution.

  26. Neo @ 9:37 – you did do that at various times. I just remember the CTH article as putting the pieces together in a plausible narrative. Your analysis are point on. I really didn’t start following you until July of this year.

    Art Deco @ 9:46 – normally I agree with you taking the axiom “never subscribe to a conspiracy when human stupidity can explain it”. However the method that the other candidates withdrew and Elizabeth Warren staying in points to the DNC putting the pressure on the other candidates. I really think that the DNC knew that if Bernie got nominated that the Democratic down ballets would be crushed. They couldn’t stand another wipe out like 2014.

  27. I am Sparticus: I found the Treehouse scenario entirely plausible.

    There were plenty of articles testifying that Obama was meeting with all the candidates and inside the loop as the primaries progressed. Surely we know Obama’s sense of mission and his disappointment, if not rage, that Trump was elected and stymied most of his agenda.

    Then there was that suspicious turnabout in the space of a few weeks after Harris and Bloomberg fizzled out and suddenly the other candidates faded away, as you mention, then Bernie bowed out, and Slow Joe was back on top.

    What’s not to like? Does anyone really suppose that Art Deco’s “guys-in-a-room-make-things-happen” don’t make things happen, at least some of the time?

    We’re talking Democrats here. These people are about power. Especially this year when Donald Trump poses a near-existential threat to their schemes to transform America. Is the Obama machine just going to say, “May the best woman or man win,” then watch to see how it turns out?

  28. Gregory Harper: “What I find amusing (disturbing) is that while everyone knows what’s going on, no Democrat in any position of power will admit it. They continue to treat Biden as if he is a perfectly normal candidate.”

    It’s maddening isn’t it. They have been gaslighting about so many things. Russia collusion, Kavanaugh’s hearing, obstructing the Mueller investigation, the Ukraine phone call, the “peaceful” protests, the need for social distancing except at protests/riots, defunding the police, and now, Joe Biden as a capable candidate for POTUS.
    They seem to believe it’s working. They have plenty of “True Believers” and useful idiots that seem to believe. So why not keep on doing what they’ve been doing. Like Wiley Coyote, they seem to be sure the next scheme or gadget will be the one that gets Trump, the Roadrunner.

  29. Ed B: “And the man shows so little energy. He walks out with that bib on his face, 30 feet from anyone and his gait is that of a dodderer.”

    Yes. And the lack of facial tone as also described above.
    And dang! He walks a short distance and he’s huffin’ and puffin’.
    That slurred speech, it’s not “gaffes”.

    I haven’t been watching Joe vids much, this is really quite scary.

  30. Bernie got “berned” both in 2016 and in 2020, by Those Who Know What Is Best For Us. Potentially decent candidates declined to run in 2016, so that her royal highness could get the nomination they felt that she so richly deserved. This time around, candidates dropped like flies on cue in order to concentrate support and positive primary outcomes for good ol’ Joe. It gave Democrats a loathsome candidate four years ago, and now a cognitively unfit candidate. You’d think Bernie might at least have enough pride not to play the good-sport sycophant this time around.

    As far as Democratic politicians and voters go, even the wolves are sheep.

  31. OlderandWheezier:

    I have a different take on it. I don’t think Bernie wanted to be president. He’s old and he doesn’t care as long as he’s one of the powers behind the throne and as long as the country moves far to the left. I think he’s very happy these days.

    And by the way, I think Biden is both cognitively unfit and loathsome. He’s corrupt, a hypocrite, destructive, and a brazen liar, and has been for a long time.

  32. Ray on September 21, 2020 at 8:14 pm said:
    He reminds me of Robert Mueller at the congressional hearing on the Russia collusion investigation. It was obvious that Mueller had mental problems and could not have been in charge of the investigation so you had to wonder who was really in charge.
    * * *
    That con worked so well, they decided to run it again.

  33. “he kajillion numbering system is pretty flexible. It basically means a really big number you should be impressed or frightened by.” – huxley

    Like, you know, when you’re talking about something really ginormous.

  34. “They continue to treat Biden as if he is a perfectly normal candidate.” – Biden

    There is a book or a movie with a premise something like this, going far beyond the Emperor’s New Clothes, but I can’t put my finger on it, although royalty might have been involved, since there is a general tendency not to remark out loud that Caligula is crazy.

    “I, Claudius” might be it, but I think there may be another one.

  35. “After all, anyone who runs against Trump and loses will be seen as an “already run” candidate (even with the news media on their side) for the next time.” – charles

    That has only become a problem recently, if at all.
    Of the 8 serious candidates who ran more than once, 4 eventually won.
    https://www.thoughtco.com/losing-presidential-candidates-nominated-again-3368135

    When it comes to second chances in American politics, political parties and voters alike are fairly generous. Losing presidential candidates have re-emerged as a nominee and gone on to the White House, giving failed candidates hope that their second election attempts might be as successful as Richard Nixon, William Henry Harrison, Andrew Jackson, and Thomas Jefferson.

    “Serious candidates” do not include the perennial also-rans.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perennial_candidates_in_the_United_States

    I wish I still had a Pat Paulsen sign.

  36. “Someone on Instapundit, I think it was, in reaction to this flub by Biden, congratulated her readers on having successfully survived the mass die-off. I laughed. ?” – Philip Sells

    https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/401841/

    WHO? BidenWatch for September 21, 2020. “Greetings regular readers! I’m so glad you survived yesterday’s tragic mass die-off! Plus Biden campaign troubles, fundraising updates, the “Harris Administration,’ and the Burisma report looms.”

    Posted by Stephen Green at 12:49 pm

    Link goes here (Lawrence Person appears to be a “he” but we can’t assume anymore):
    https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=45715

    BidenWatch for September 21, 2020
    Greetings regular readers! I’m so glad you survived yesterday’s tragic mass die-off! Plus Biden campaign troubles, fundraising updates, the “Harris Administration,” and the Burisma report looms. It’s this week’s BidenWatch!

    He’s got a LOT of links and quotes; if any Democrat chances onto this blog post, they will definitely have exploding-head problems.

    Person’s blog links to the shattering news that’s really ginormous:
    https://babylonbee.com/news/biden-says-trump-is-responsible-for-all-deaths-throughout-human-history-since-the-dawn-of-time

  37. Instapundit found some more good posts (how do they do that so well?) –

    WHY DOES COCAINE MITCH GET THE COOLEST NICKNAMES? Mitch McConnell, ‘Apex Predator!’
    –> https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/mitch-mcconnell-apex-predator/

    THE DEMOCRATS’ PITCH, SUMMARIZED: “So get out and vote for 77-year-old Joe Biden. Old white man Joe. It’s your only choice. For diversity!”
    –> https://althouse.blogspot.com/2020/09/if-you-are-between-ages-of-18-and-29-i.html

    KRUISER: You Don’t Have Enough Ammo for the Post-Ginsburg 2020 Apocalypse.
    —> https://pjmedia.com/columns/stephen-kruiser/2020/09/21/you-dont-have-enough-ammo-for-the-post-ginsburg-2020-apocalypse-n946532
    “Hang on and for the love of God let’s not ask what else can go wrong this year.”

    NOW WHY WOULD BLM GO AND DO THAT? Delete their About page that talked about disrupting the nuclear family and much more toward the end of Western civilization, Christianity and capitalism.
    –> https://www.faithwire.com/2020/09/21/black-lives-matter-org-deletes-about-page-calling-for-disruption-of-nuclear-family/?utm_source=FWNL
    (already mentioned by someone linking the Twitchy report)

    JOE BIDEN’S SUPREME COURT SHORTLIST: White people need not apply.
    –> https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/joe-bidens-supreme-court-shortlist-white-people-need-not-apply

    At a press conference in June, Biden said, “We are putting together a list of African American women who are qualified and have the experience to be on the court.”
    Biden has maintained this commitment. In a Sunday press conference addressing Ginsburg’s passing, he reiterated his promise that if he is allowed to fill the seat, he will select an African American woman.

    To be clear, there are surely many African American women, both liberal and conservative, who are qualified to sit on the Supreme Court and would make for excellent nominees. But Biden’s categorical rejection of all men and all non-black women for the slot is openly discriminatory and a rejection of meritocracy.”
    [Three cheers for Harriet Miers!]

    As a white Jewish woman, Ginsburg herself wouldn’t check enough identity boxes to make Biden’s Supreme Court shortlist.

    This rigid use of race as a qualification doesn’t help diversity; in fact, it would hurt whatever African American woman Biden ended up selecting. She would no doubt be qualified in her own right but would be forever viewed as a token diversity pick. She would go down in history not as a trailblazer but as the token black woman Biden picked after disqualifying most of the candidate pool through identity politics. This would be an undeserved insult to the potential nominee, who may well have been selected anyway on her own merits in an open process.

    AND YOU KNOW HE’S RIGHT ABOUT THIS:
    –> https://twitter.com/MarkSimoneNY/status/1307512493405806592
    “So many woman posting such touching tributes to Ruth Bader Ginsburg for leading the way for a woman to serve on the SCOTUS. Next week the same women will be trashing, degrading, spitting all over the woman President Trump nominates, for trying to serve on the SCOTUS.”

    Best picture meme from the links:
    https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/why_is_my_democrat_city_on_fire_today_09-21-2020.jpg

  38. And Mr. Person (taking a wild gender-guess) had several interesting posts, including this one; although it’s not new thinking around here, he adds a few good rhetorical flourishes.
    https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=45750
    “Democrats Really Haven’t Thought Through This “Total War” Thing”

    Democrats seem to be operating on the old Soviet doctrine of “What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable.” We should take any “if we win, we’ll do X” proposal as a blueprint of our own (assuming it’s not outright unconstitutional; after all, Republicans, unlike Democrats, still respect the Constitution).

    What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.

    *Like pretty much all their rhetoric these days, “total war” is drama queen overstatement. In a real left-right no-hold-barred, actual honest-to-God shooting war, the right wins because we have all the guns.

    Antifa has shown that they have a considerable armory, though.

  39. The bar is really, really low.
    https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2020/09/21/watch-joe-biden-just-completely-botched-the-pledge-of-allegiance-n950379

    During a campaign speech on Monday, Joe Biden attempted to quote the Pledge of Allegiance, and instead delivered a jumbled version of it, saying, “I pledge allegiance to the United States of America, one nation, indivisible, under God, for real.”

    This comes months after Biden infamously botched the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident. All men and women created by the—you know, you know, the thing.”

    He is probably still doing a better job of recitation than the vast majority of people under the age of 30 (or more, depending on when their school systems were first corrupted).

    https://pjmedia.com/election/bryan-preston/2020/09/21/video-the-one-where-joe-biden-loses-his-line-in-the-middle-of-an-answer-n951148

    Weird, right? Biden is running along and then he looks off to the side, almost as if he’s asking someone off-camera if he got his answer right and gets a cookie. Then when he looks back he apparently forgets where he was on the screen he’s looking at.

    Which means yes, Biden is using a teleprompter just to get through softball interviews.

    PJ Media’s Matt Margolis noticed this trick a few days back. Now it’s popped up again, raising all kinds of questions, including:

    Why is Joe Biden using a teleprompter in interviews with alleged media?
    Are media aware of and cooperating with this charade?
    Why are media cooperating with this fraud on the American people?
    Why is Joe Biden using a teleprompter in interviews with alleged media?
    I know I asked that fourth one twice. It’s important.

    Because it looks an awful lot like Biden is already a sock puppet controlled by someone off-screen.

    For real.

  40. Should Biden win the Presidency he will be the USA`s version of Leonid Brezhnev. Perhaps the Soviets were correct after all…the USA will follow in our footsteps.

  41. Biden’s campaign, his entire deportment and presentation, is consistently such a non sequitur I can’t stop wondering what I’m missing or simply failing to understand. I can’t help but think it’s somehow related to a magician’s misdirection, but being performed a great deal less adroitly.

    There are a number of people in, or near, national Democratic party management who are anything but stupid; there has to be more to this; their part of the campaign and election process cannot be this bad except on purpose.

  42. “… Biden is both cognitively unfit and loathsome.” (Neo, above @12:48 am).

    Yes! This is profoundly true and this is why I don’t subscribe to the “Feel sorry for the poor old man being manipulated by his evil handlers” theory. And, on the question of why his wife permits this, to me it really looks like she is drooling over the prospect of becoming Edith Wilson v. 2.0 in a Biden administration.

    And, if Biden does win the election (legitimately or otherwise), I foresee epic-level court intrigues pitting Jill Biden and her allies against other party factions wanting to control President Meat Puppet and those who will want to replace him with President Harris.

  43. Combining the topics of the day:
    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/09/21/joe-biden-voters-dont-deserve-appoint-supreme-court/

    He admitted the first selection was based on race and gender: a black woman. But beyond that, he would not provide additional details.

    “Should voters know?” the reporter asked. “Should voters know who you’re going to appoint?”

    “No, they don’t, but they will if I’m elected. They’ll have plenty of time,” Biden answered.

    He claimed he would not share the names because it, among other things, would give critics too much time to scrutinize them.

    Now, these really ARE gaffes, by definition.

    https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/09/21/biden-im-not-going-to-answer-on-whether-id-add-scotus-seats/

    Reporter Brittany Schmidt asked, “If Trump’s Supreme Court pick goes through, but you win the election, and let’s say the Democrats then take over the Senate, but maintain the House, would you consider adding more Supreme Court justices to the bench?”

    Biden responded, “It’s a legitimate question, but let me tell you why I’m not going to answer that question. Because it will shift the focus. That’s what he wants. He never wants to talk about the issue at hand. He always tries to change the subject. Let’s say I answer that question, then the whole debate’s going to be, what Biden said or didn’t say, Biden said he would or wouldn’t. That’s going to — the discussion should be about why he is moving in a direction that’s totally inconsistent with what the founders wanted. … Voters get to pick the president, who gets to make the pick, and the Senate gets to decide. We’re in the middle of the election right now, remember, you know people are voting now. By the time this Supreme Court hearing would be held, if they hold one…it’s estimated 30 to 40% of the American people will already have voted. It is a fundamental breach of constitutional principle. It must stay on that and it shouldn’t happen.”

    SO: we should only talk about what Trump wants to do, not what Biden wants to do.
    AND court nominations are only applicable to NEW picks for President and Senate, not the existing ones.

  44. Errata: some interesting posts discovered via Mr. Person’s blog:
    Letters to the editor of The Navaho Times reveal pressing issues that sound familiar.
    https://navajotimes.com/opinion/letters/letters-foreign-workers-causing-problems/

    By Navajo Times | Sep 10, 2020 | Letters |

    The unlawful hemp cultivation in Shiprock has brought an onslaught of foreigners working in hemp greenhouses. These people are of Asian descent who do not speak English, but converse among themselves in their language. Many of them appear in the public places more often than before. It appears the reason is that more and more of these people have come to live in Shiprock, making local citizens uneasy and leery.

    The Navajo citizens are dismayed, but also fearful not knowing what to do when confronted by these people.

    That topic engages most of the letters, but there are also a few other issues.
    Window on another world…

    https://www.wired.com/story/googles-autocomplete-ban-politics-glitches/

    The search giant tweaks its algorithm after WIRED finds it would suggest “Donate Biden,” but not “Donate Trump.”
    (that got fixed – BUT)
    Google’s response to a second pattern WIRED noticed in autocomplete illustrates the tricky judgments that can’t be handed off to computers. Typing just “donate” into the search box yielded 10 mostly neutral suggestions, including “car,” “clothes near me,” and “a testicle.” [top entry, in fact] The second entry was “to black lives matter,” a cause many Republicans identify as partisan opposition.

    Google says that does not fall within the new policy for autocomplete. “While it’s a topic that has become politicized, this policy is specifically around predictions that could be interpreted as claims in support of or against political parties or candidates,” the company spokesperson said.

    Caught with their hands in the cookie jar…
    Again.

    https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/09/16/hard-hitting-joe-biden-teleprompter-ad/comment-page-2/#comment-8785090
    The ad is quite devastating – or would be if anyone not already in Trump’s base got to see it – but I am jumping straight to a comment:

    Jeffrey Coley says:
    September 17, 2020 at 9:30 am
    How ironic is it, after trying to invoke the 25th Amendment against Trump over policy differences, the Democrats are trying to elect a man who is demonstrably suffering from the sort of cognitive deficits the 25th Amendment was intended to address.

  45. More from Mr. Person’s links at his post cited above
    https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=45660
    — and this one is important, not erratic.

    https://borepatch.blogspot.com/2020/09/the-breakup-of-democratic-party.html
    Monday, September 14, 2020

    The breakup of the Democratic Party coalition
    The Democratic Party is made up of various groups that do not have much in common. Blacks are not hispanics, and vice versa. Private sector unions are not public sector unions. A lot of effort has gone into trying to convince suburban women that it’s mean to vote Republican. Meanwhile, there is a set of elite power brokers pulling everyone’s strings.

    One problem with this is that the hypocrisy has gotten too blatant, opening the door to Bernie Sanders and AOC and the radical left of the Party. The other problem with this cozy arrangement is that the power brokers have essentially gone insane in their attempts to get rid of OrangeManBad. Now consider what actions the Elite has taken and what they have done to the members of their coalition:

    The Elite has stiffed Bernie (twice), alienating his supporters.
    The Elite has sent their (white) radical street muscle into Black neighborhoods, burning and looting black businesses.
    The Elite hasn’t really done anything at all for the hispanic community. Their support for communists has hurt them in Florida where Donald Trump is outpolling Joe Biden among hispanics (!).

    The Elite has pushed outsourcing (most recently the Trans Pacific Partnership treaty which Trump killed). Private sector unions have noticed.
    The Elite has pushed the virus lockdown which has thrown millions of restaurant employees out of work. Many of these folks belong to SEIU. Now that emergency unemployment benefits have run out – and restaurants are going out of business because of the continuing lockdown – you have to wonder if these people will start to wonder why they support the Democrats.

    Public Sector employees have done well, but the areas that locked down hardest are the areas where the government budgets are most in trouble. New York City is going to lay off 40,000 employees. The Elite has hoped that Biden will win and bail out the states and cities. Good luck with that.

    Lastly, suburban women are hit with a Democratic Party double whammy: schools remain closed in many (especially Blue) areas. Women see their family lifestyles massively disrupted, and potentially are forced to consider giving up their own job to home school their kids. At the same time they see radical rioters entering suburban towns. Rioters are filmed telling people to get out of their homes which will be taken as “reparations”.

    Good job, Democratic Elites! It looks like you’ve angered every single constituency that makes up your party, six weeks before the election.

    These ideas are shamelessly stolen from an outstanding post at William Briggs (Statistician to the Stars!). I’m not entirely sure I agree with the conclusions but maybe that’s just me. Go read the whole thing. It proves that sometimes Monday mornings get off to a good start.

    The summary was pretty good, and actually leaves out some of the offenses; the original author is a LOT wordier, however, he gives some historical allusions to the French and Russian Revolutions that are worth exploring.
    I don’t agree with all of his remarks, but he covers most of the crises that the Democrats are bringing on themselves in their relentless quest for power.

    https://wmbriggs.com/post/32501/
    The Democrats Crumbling Wall Of Support — Guest Post by Ianto Watt Sept 11 2020

  46. Remember that off-the-wall claim by Biden that a black man, not Edison, invented the light bulb?
    This may be related.
    I actually remember reading something about this weirdly gamed search back when the news was new, but not it has an anchor point.
    https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=45680

    Image Search at The Ministry of Truth
    This is a weird one that I first became alerted to by this Scott Adams’ Tweet:

    Search for “American Inventor” on Google Image Search.

    Spoiler: On the first page teaser strip, you get Thomas Edison, eight black people, and a picture of Scottish-born Alexander Graham Bell with coloration that makes him look black:

    Of the black inventors shown, probably only George Washington Carver ranks among the top ten American inventors.

    Someone has obviously gone to a great deal of time and effort to falsify history for political reason. Particularly suspicious is the elevation of Lewis Howard Latimer, an Edison underling who helped develop a better light bulb filament, to the second position on the list, shortly after Democratic president nominee Joe Biden announced that it was Latimer rather than Edison who invented the light bulb.

    Even stranger: It’s not just Google. As similar image search at Duck Duck Go now brings up similar results. Ditto Yahoo.

    I can think of three possible explanations for the multiple racist results to be shown across all image search services:

    Someone at Google has made the conscious decision to feature black inventors at the expense of all other races and the other search service are somehow using Google image search as their own image search engine.
    Coordinated efforts across image search companies to distort the search results.
    Someone is employing a web spider to automatically game image results to favor black Americans (this could explain how the dark-skinned image of Alexander Graham Bell makes the cut).
    All of these are causes for concern.

    We’re getting to watch the Ministry of Truth falsify history in real-time for political reasons.

    Granted, all these people are (most likely; I didn’t check) American inventors; but as pointed out in one of the ellipses, the list of prominent white inventors omitted is bogglesome.

  47. One more for the computer geeks.
    Because this is what we get regardless of the (D) or (R) behind the names.

    https://borepatch.blogspot.com/2020/09/you-may-be-guilty-of-hacking.html

    Wednesday, September 16, 2020
    You may be guilty of hacking
    I’ve been working in computer and network security for literally decades. During this career I’ve been at companies that did security research. We did a lot to help improve the sorry state of Internet Security and you are better off for it. Now that may about to become illegal, depending on how the Supreme Court rules on an upcoming case:

    A US Supreme Court case that could expand the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) to include prosecuting “improper” uses of technology not specifically allowed by software makers will chill security research and could be used to punish other fair uses of technology, a group of nearly 70 vulnerability researchers and security firms said in a letter published on September 14.

    The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act is a 1980s era statute passed right around when I got into computer security. It was passed to criminalize computer hacking – you know, breaking into someone’s computer. Simples, amirite?

    It gets seriously into the eyes-glaze-over details, but if you’re in the field, give it a look.

  48. As for why Biden said 200 million and didn’t blink, I’m not sure it’s dementia. I think it’s a lifetime habit of bullshit. To paraphrase a quote I can’t seem to find right now, the liar has enough respect for the truth to tell its opposite, but the bullshitter is concerned only with the effect on the listener and has no regard for the truth or falsity of what he says. (Trump is also a bullshitter, IMHO, but business provides reality checks that Democrat politics does not.)

    He’s even going back to the Neil Kinnock life story he plagiarized that ended his first run at the Presidency.

    As for “why is Biden the nominee”, I think the smoke-filled rooms are real. The Left is HIGHLY organized. This organization is how people like David Hogg and Greta Thunberg are elevated from obscurity into ubiquity in such a short time whenever there’s an occasion. The street protests have large numbers of people who are employed to attend them, I saw the recruiters myself at Berkeley. And how do they get professionally printed signs so quickly? Who paid for Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez’s designer clothes when she was a bartender running for Congress? The media is an adjunct to this and they don’t report on it any more than fish would report on the existence of water, but if you read carefully and see who they go to for quotes and that you can see the links.

    Politics is like pro wrestling at this point. The characters you see are playing roles and their actions benefit the organizations behind them. Unlike pro wrestling it’s not one organization writing the script, there’s multiple interlocking organizations that pull in different directions.

    But to use another metaphor, Americans have found in the last 20 years that they really don’t like the dog food no matter how good the marketing is.

  49. To add to my last point, Ace linked today to a guy who’s given away $8 B in his lifetime, a big chunk of it to left-wing causes if you read the linked article (so I dispute the “Feel-good story of the day” tag given it).

    He’s not the guy pulling the strings, but it’s people like him who enable Left wing politics to be full-time jobs.

    Between that and the taxpayer money they capture through grants to NGOs and that, yes the Left has real and professional organization. The problem is that now they are focused on really stupid things and out of step with the American people. So they can cause a lot of trouble like we see in Seattle and Portland but I don’t know that it’s translating well into votes.

  50. Going around with a college friend on FB about such things. There have been several tells. About guns–he used the “weapons of war” to describe the popular AR series. That comes from the left’s propaganda bin. He was Field Artillery in Viet Nam. He knows better.
    He challenged me on a couple of items. I said it doesn’t make any difference. Show cites….subject is changed. Been like that forever. I showed cites. Subject was changed.
    Discussing the general…he goes to the particular, or vice versa.
    These are consciously-deployed tactics.

    Recently, he let himself go and said, of Trump, “evil like you’ve never seen”.
    This, I suggest, is the crux. This is what he really believes and he uses what he must know is dishonesty to fight Trump. But if you have legitimate reasons, you don’t need dishonesty. So he knows he doesn’t have legitimate reasons.
    Someplace, somehow, he got the notion that Trump is some kind of evil.
    Been here before; ask what the point is and get vicious slanders presented as if they’re objective truth.

    With this mindset, propping up Biden is not a problem at all. Looking forward to the triumph of the hard left is fine, as long as Trump goes. And if Trump goes, they’ll go after him for the rest of his life…..

    Not getting it, but the syndrome is common: What’s wrong with Trump? Hysteria ensues.

    And there are enough people subject to it to make this a close race. You don’t need enthusiasm for Biden as a factor. You need to look at hysterically-based, white-hot intent to vote against Trump, even for BIDEN!

  51. The silence from the press at the end is blaring. They don’t even try to ask a question anymore. They are totally trained at this point.

  52. AesopFan,
    Re:

    “In a real left-right no-hold-barred, actual honest-to-God shooting war, the right wins because we have all the guns.”

    “Antifa has shown that they have a considerable armory, though.”

    Their supplies are limited. In the main, they have zero military training. Most of all, they are urban dwellers. And while they have been trained in urban rioting tactics, neither they nor their backers have any understanding of logistics. If it comes down to a hot war, they’re toast.

    The real question is how would the military react to an outbreak of war between civilians? If Trump, he’ll invoke the Insurrection Act, nationalize the national Guard and put down the Insurrection. Impeachment will follow and conviction will depend upon the Senate makeup.

    If Biden, they’ll attempt to use the Feds to impose tyranny and that will precipitate “a real left-right no-hold-barred, actual honest-to-God shooting war”…

    The irony here is that with Trump their covert treason continues, whereas with Biden its a counter-productive descent into “politics by other means”.

  53. Frederick:

    “To paraphrase a quote I can’t seem to find right now, the liar has enough respect for the truth to tell its opposite, but the bullshitter is concerned only with the effect on the listener and has no regard for the truth or falsity of what he says.”

    That’s the thesis of ‘On Bullshit’, by Harry Frankfurt.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Bullshit#Summary

  54. Interesting observations on dementia and facial muscle tone. I have an acquaintance whom I’d heard was in the early stages. A few weeks ago I glimpsed her briefly at church from at least 30 feet away. It was instantly obvious from her face that something was very wrong. It’s very sad as I don’t think she’s much over 60.

  55. I think Biden is both cognitively unfit and loathsome. He’s corrupt, a hypocrite, destructive, and a brazen liar, and has been for a long time.

    –neo

    Meanwhile, from the universe where Spock wears a beard:
    ___________________________________________________

    Can you imagine what mix of deep sorrow and tenacity it took for Biden to stay in public life, to carry on at all [after family tragedies]? Yes, he sometimes stumbles, but there is a core authenticity to the man.

    In political life, you can fake a lot. You can’t fake compassion. And Donald Trump, who suffers from malignant narcissism, could not plausibly do compassion if it was scripted.

    I think people are noticing. Once in a great while, basic human decency turns out to be winning politics.

    –Robert Kuttner, “Biden’s Secret Weapon—Compassion”
    https://prospect.org/blogs/tap/bidens-secret-weapon-compassion/

    ___________________________________________________

    Kuttner is a professor at Brandeis.

  56. Biden’s not alone in this, though. A while back, one prominent Dem politician (I want to say it was Terry McAuliffe, though I’m not certain) claimed some absurdly high rate of gun deaths that would have seen the country depopulated in a month (93 million a week, iirc). And he’s shown no signs of impending senility. I don’t remember the media remarking on that incident, either.

  57. I think, if Joe wins — God forbid — we should have a pool on how long before Kamala deposes him. I’d bet less than five weeks.

  58. Richard Saunders: Biden better get a food taster!

    Visions of Livia in “I, Claudius” dance through my head.

  59. Richard, I’d be up for that. I’m not generally a betting man, but for this I can make an exception. What’s the stake? And deadline for entries is when? 🙂

  60. The timing of Kamala’s coup will depend on the make-up of the Congress after the election.
    Democrats of the Newest Left are not going to put Pelosi in line of succession.
    See what they are pushing now about Feinstein (age 87) – same for all the rest of the old fossils is in the works.
    They will want to get a young Squaddie into the Speaker’s position before shifting everyone up one notch.

    https://www.redstate.com/shipwreckedcrew/2020/09/23/unnamed-democrats-are-questioning-sen-diane-feinsteins-ability-to-lead-judiciary-committee-fight-over-supreme-court-nominee/

    The other hitch is that Chuck Grassley (age 84) is currently President Pro Tem of the Senate, and he is next in line after Pelosi.

    The only thing I agree with the Democrats of the Newest Left about is that there needs to be a retirement age for Congress.
    And that’s not really agreement, because they are happy to keep people around if they are useful to the “cause” – as are the Republicans.

    https://www.oldest.org/politics/members-us-congress/
    Of the 10 oldest people in Congress, there are 5 of each party.

  61. Pingback:Strange Daze

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