Victor Davis Hanson on the fake Joe Biden
I’ve long described Joe Biden as incompetent, corrupt, mendacious, and without any principle save the principle of advancing his own political fortunes – although, regarding the latter, until 2020 he’d never been very good at running for president even among Democrats.
There is nothing new in Joe Biden circa 2021, except for the addition of some cognitive impairment, and a change in the ideology he sees as furthering those political fortunes.
That’s why it has long puzzled me that Biden was ever seen as likeable or smart or competent – and certainly never a political healer who could bring people together. It was laughable that anyone would believe such a thing.
But that’s the way he was sold during the campaign and beyond, and whatever you think about the validity of the vote count and whether Joe really won or didn’t, a lot of people did vote for him. Did they vote because they bought the myth about him, or just because they hated Trump, or some combination of the two? I don’t know. But although I’ve never heard any of my Democrat friends and acquaintances say they admire him, many have indicated a slight liking for him and have expressed relief that he’s president now rather than you-know-who.
Here’s Victor Davis Hanson on the subject:
At an age when most long ago embraced a consistent political belief, late septuagenarian Joe Biden suddenly reinvented himself as our first woke president. That is ironic in so many ways because Joe’s past is a wasteland of racialist condescension and prejudicial gaffes. For much of the 1980s and 1990s, he positioned himself as the workingman’s Democrat from Delaware (or, as Biden once beamed, “We [Delawareans] were on the South’s side in the Civil War.”). In truth, he exuded chauvinism well beyond that of his constituents…
Add up what Joe has said about race and it is hard to find any major political figure of either party who has been so overtly race-obsessed…
As vice president, Biden condescendingly warned an audience of successful black professionals that a rather meek Mitt Romney had the superhuman ability to “put y’all back in chains.”
Indeed, he warned them in a fake black patois, reminiscent of Hillary Clinton’s grating “I don’t feel no ways tired.” In Bidenland, donut shops are full of Indians and the sum total of Barack Obama is the fact he was supposedly “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.”…
Joe has been exempt from any scrutiny because he is metamorphosed into a hard leftist and thus was still useful, despite Barack Obama’s earlier prescient warning to peers, “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to f— things up.”…
Calling opponents Neanderthals, chumps, dregs, and racists, and denigrating those who support modest requirements of presenting an ID to vote with slurs like Jim Crow are not lowering the temperature but vintage Biden.
NeverTrump conventional wisdom that Joe Biden would govern as a moderate four-year caretaker, restoring “decency” to the office and “normal discourse” had no support in anything Joe had said or done in the past.
More at the link.
Nothing the Biden administration has been doing lately should be any surprise to anyone who was paying attention before. The left is happy with the latest version of Joe, the middle may not be paying attention even now, and the right predicted it. I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again: Biden may indeed have some cognitive problems, but I believe he’s not so far gone that he doesn’t understand what he’s doing and he is fully onboard.
Biden may not even be intending to run in 2024 – I’m not sure about that. But he’s intent on making a name for himself, and he’s intent on furthering the power and dominance of the Democratic Party he’s served for just about his entire adult life.
VDH agrees, and he says it better:
Joe is liberated, not shackled, by his age and fragility. Just one term, the chance that he might lose the entire Congress in 2022, the left-wing, unhinged venom of the New Democratic Party—these were never reasons to reach out or find compromise.
Rather they were urgent goads to accelerate and ram through as many structural changes that would not just move the country leftward now, but become hard to undo in the future—even without a mandate, without a majority in the Senate, without a safe margin in the House, and without an agreeable Supreme Court. The more beat-the-clock extremism now, the more left-wing canonization later.
Biden thinks he knows who will get to write the history books.
The obsession with race of the Harris/Biden administration is very real and very worrisome indeed; one might well argue that the theme of Beijing Biden’s destructive first three months as the Puppet of 1600 is the “racialization of everything.” Two recently-posted essays are essential reading in this regard, the first by Stanley Kurtz at NRO on Biden’s effort towards disseminating BLM/CRT/1619 propaganda throughout our system of public education, the second by Ben Weingarten at The Federalist concerning Ibram Kendi, the Grand Wizard of so-called “anti-racism”, and the corrosive and toxic effects of this pseudo-academic race-hustling grifter on our decadent culture.
Putting aside the shameful conduct of the Fake News during the election, the only reason China Joe is in office is because the Progs stole it for him. And now he has to pay them back. Or let them run the show.
When I questioned Sen. Sasse, he said Ron Klain was running domestic policy and that Klain is a dangerous radical.
It’s “Biden” vs. the Politburo:
https://twitter.com/SteveGuest/status/1384178820018675717
Guess “who” wins….
“…because the Progs stole it for him….”
Um, no.
This was a finely-tuned, immaculately-planned, professionally-orchestrated Democratic Party operation at the Federal, State and Local levels all the way down.
Sure, the corrupt media and powerfully twisted info-tech orgs assisted, along with funding from hideously wealthy global ideologues fronted by Orwellian-named perversities; but it was DPUSA all the way.
And the guilty party will continue to lie, distort, pervert and destroy.
(It’s just what they do.)
Hanson gets Biden right. A disgusting politician.
Biden hardly knows whether he’s coming or going.
Biden’s election (the vote fraud aside) is indicative of the decay of the political culture. Among those in the Democratic Party who were able to set up campaign committees and raise more than a token treasury, you had three quite capable men of business (Bloomberg, Yang, Delaney), one man experienced as an executive in both the public and private sector (Hickenlooper), four men who are experienced public sector executives (one of whom – Schweitzer – can appeal to red state electorates and only one of whom – Inslee – is a manifest tool), and one legislator who is actually something of an independent thinker (Gabbard). Who was actually somewhat competitive? A septuagenarian old Trot, a faculty fraud, a wet-behind-the-ears ambulatory resume, a lapsed prosecutor who treats her staff like dirt, and the odious Biden. Who do they land on? The worst of the bunch, Biden. He’s who the Democratic electorate wanted.
One can say the Republicans in 2016 had better choices than the man they selected, but he did have (and came to demonstrate) certain properties that made him worthy of consideration. (Accomplishments in business, executive experience, and a willingness to hang tough). Pretty much all the Republican candidates in 2016 brought something to the table (Lindsay Graham and Marco Rubio the arguable exceptions).
The Democrats in 2016 each brought something to the table; given five choices, the Democratic electorate chose the worst one.
Repair to 2008; only one of the Democratic candidates had much business running (Bill Richardson), and his candidacy disappeared. The contest was between three lawyers with no executive experience, and the man they nominate is the one among them who never made much of a living in law.
Repair to 2004: Democrats reject an experience executive who had practiced medicine (Dean), reject a retired Army general (Clark), and give the nod to a rank and file lawyer from Boston notable for his pomposity, biographical fictions, and a habit of marrying women with eight figure sums of money behind them; the runner up was a skeezy ambulance chaser.
Repair to 2000; the two Democratic candidates were quite similar; their electorate preferred the more dishonest of the two.
Repair to 1992; you have five notable Democratic candidates. Rank-ordered in terms of quality, you have Bob Kerrey, Jerry Brown, Paul Tsongas, with Bill Clinton and Tom Harkin bringing up the rear.
Contrast this experience with the behavior of Democratic electorates during the period running from 1968 to 1988, where every year but one they put one of their better feet forward. (The exception was 1972; George McGovern was unsuitable for the Presidency, but he was a good man).
Biden is a Potemkin candidate who was chosen because all the others were even worse. There are millions of Democrats out there (Some are my children) who hate Trump and needed a relatively normal Democrat candidate. The Progs needed the same. Biden was the only one who was passive enough to put up with the crazy left and who looked like a traditional Democrat. He has dementia, one feature of which is sudden bursts of anger at inoffensive stimuli. We will see how this plays out. I doubt the Democrats have mastered vote fraud in 535 elections.
because all the others were even worse.
They weren’t. He was the worst. The worst is what they wanted.
There are millions of Democrats out there (Some are my children) who hate Trump
He’s an adulterer? Wasn’t a problem when it was Bill Clinton running (and it wasn’t a problem for John McCain’s media admirers when he was running). He had a vulgar conversation with Billy Bush? Since when have partisan Democrats been suitable candidates for a Dutch Reformed diaconate, ca. 1920? (Maybe they fancy JFK’s yap with Dave Powers over Mimi Beardsley’s fellatio skills was much more elegant). The ‘Trump is abominable’ meme is the issue of some cultural force that has yet to be elucidated.
Art Deco:
Most of the others were worse in the following ways:
(1) They might have been less malleable and have more of a will of their own.
(2) They were less able to successfully present themselves to the public as not being on the left.
(3) They hadn’t been Obama’s vice-president. That part of Biden’s resume was probably attractive to many voters.
(4) Because of his long long record in national public office (as well as #3 above), Biden could be promoted as more experienced than they.
Barry Meislin,
Like hell they didn’t steal the election. When there’s a massive amount of smoke over the horizon, you don’t need direct sight of it to know that something is fiercely burning. The evidence is overwhelming.
Geoffrey, I guess I wasn’t as clear as I should have been.
I believe—I am absolutely convinced—that the election was stolen.
I dissented from the contention that the crime was perpetrated ONLY by the “Prog” members (or wing) of the Democratic Party.
(2) They were less able to successfully present themselves to the public as not being on the left.
I doubt that matters in this context. The Democratic electorate is chock-a-block with people who would vote for a dead dog in the road over Trump. Silly, but that’s them.
If it did matter, Klobberherworkers and Booty-gag would have done just as well, and they’re still lucid.
(1) They might have been less malleable and have more of a will of their own.
Matters to people like Klain, not to primary voters.
(4) Because of his long long record in national public office (as well as #3 above), Biden could be promoted as more experienced than they.
Experience didn’t matter to Democratic voters in 2008; Obama’s experience consisted of running the Chicago Annenberg Challenge into the ground. And Biden’s never held an executive position. He’s never run a business. His career in law was limited to a few years as a suburban associate. The legislation he’s shepherded through Congress has been meh. (I doubt any of this matters to Democratic voters, of course).
Sundowner has always dreamed of this glory, he has ran and failed many times in past as everyone knows. Proped up by the Leftists he has grabbed their banner and is charging forward but only for the name he will, he thinks get from it.
I am absolutely sure the election was rigged.
Art Deco,
Yes, technically the Democrat electorate chose Biden in the primaries, but there is very strong, circumstantial evidence that it was all choreographed by the party heads. When left to their own devices primary voters were not choosing Biden nor Kamala. When Bernie started gathering too much momentum the others (who were doing better than Biden) dropped out, and in rather short order. I haven’t seen the smoking gun in the form of a recorded conversation, or written memo; but it seems very likely the heads of the Democrat party pulled the other candidates together (Kamala had already exited) and offered future rewards for bowing out and supporting Biden.
You almost certainly remember who had won which primary states, and in what order, and the timing of who dropped out, when, but the way I remember it there was a very abrupt shift to Biden and Buttigieg and Klobuchar announced their exit and support of Joe very suddenly, with Warren and Bernie following not far behind.
James Buchanan can finally rest in peace now that Biden has won (!) the title of “worst president in American history.”
A comment too good not to drop into the conversation somewhere.
It occurred in the discussion on Glenn Greenwald’s rant about the Sicknick autopsy report finally being revealed.
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/the-media-lied-repeatedly-about-officer/comments#comment-1774969
Haiku Morsels:
A vast ocean of
Propaganda, a teaspoon
Of unvarnished Truth.
Neo,
“’Ive long described Joe Biden as incompetent, corrupt, mendacious, and without any principle save the principle of advancing his own political fortunes –”
Stop equivocating and tell us what you really think about Biden.
“…advancing his own political fortunes….”
Um, er, just a few small emendations:
1. Not just “political” (Why squander “opportunities”…financial or tactile?).
2. Not just “his”. (Family is so, so important!…see below)
And one can’t deny that he deserves a lot of credit for:
a. Being utterly consistent over the almost five decades of public life. (I.e., venally consistent.)
b. Being a family(!) man.
c. The remarkable ability to present himself as “Decent Joe Biden” for all these many decades (though he really ought to give most of the credit for this indisputable achievement to the corrupt media….).
d. His mastery of Eubonics (Giving Hillary a run for her money(!); though I don’t suppose he does “Ozark” as well as she does….)
Indeed, a man of many talents.
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Cry me a river NRO. if you hadn’t been so anti-Trump we would not be in this position. Idiots!!