The Democratic Party, the mainstream press corps, and the Biden family owe Americans an apology for lying about Biden’s mental state and allowing him to stand for renomination. Pictured: US President Joe Biden. Photo Credit: Joe Biden/X.
The sanctimonious and phoney outrage of liberals, progressives, never-Trumpers, and their friends in the mainstream media came home to roost Thursday night in Atlanta. President Joe Biden’s performance takes a backseat to the more important story. What matters coming out of the debate speaks to the precious commodity of truth, something those on the Left and in the Dominant Fourth Estate believe resides on their side.
For close to a decade, they have called out former president Donald Trump as an immoral and fetid presence in American democracy. With moral certainty, they have insisted and assured Americans that he is a liar, a cheat, and cannot be trusted. For most of his first term, Trump was dogged by charges of Russian interference helping him win in 2016. Twice impeached, after leaving office he became the number one target of Democratic prosecutors and the Biden Department of Justice. Facing three more cases, Trump has already been convicted in New York of 34 felonies arising from a payment to porn star Stormy Daniels.
On last Thursday night this rotting narrative came into question and the parallel narrative of Biden being the second coming of FDR fell apart. The dominant media has overseen this debacle, nursed it, abetted its growth, and promoted its formation. Having ensured that Trump’s reputation be destroyed, the Washington press corps felt justified in deciding to protect Biden and refusing to report the truth about his failing mental and physical condition.
Just three weeks ago, Wall Street journalist Annie Linsky dared report on Biden’s reported struggles behind the scenes in an article entitled, “Behind Closed Doors, Biden Shows Signs of Slipping.” As Ben Shapiro noted in his daily podcast on Friday, pretty much everyone in the dominant media went nuts. In a montage of quotes from leading celebrity journalists like Joe Scarborough and Anderson Cooper to political consultants such as Paul Begala (Clinton White House) and David Axelrod (Obama White House), all defended Biden’s state of mind as superb, perhaps better than ever.
Here are the comments in recent weeks:
- Scarborough on his MSNBC Show on June 15, 2024: “Start your tape right now, because I’m about to tell you the truth. And F you if you can’t handle the truth. This version of Biden is the best Biden ever. In fact, I think he’s better than ever.”
- Rep. Dan Goldman (D) NY on Erin Burnett’s CNN Show: “President Biden has a photographic memory. His understanding and mastery of a complicated geopolitical situation. Remarkable.”
- Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas: “He is sharp, intensely probing and detail oriented and focused.”
- Anderson Cooper: “I was sitting two feet from him across the table, and he was intense.”
- Scarborough again, “Has trouble walking sometimes? Yeah, so did FDR. He won a GD war.”
- Paul Begala: “But he’s totally focused. He’s very sharp.”
- David Axelrod: “They say he’s sharp in meetings and so on.”
- Paul Krugman: “Very lucid, very well informed.”
- Unnamed journalist: “Biden is stately. He comes with gravitas.”
As Shapiro noted, this kind of fawning and partisan reporting has occurred for over three years. On Thursday night the lies the media have told for years about Biden and his mental sharpness came home to destroy them. Americans have been told for years that their eyes are lying, their ears can’t hear properly and Biden, who we have all seen declining on the world stage has never been better. If those lies were meant to prevent Trump from reclaiming the presidency what would the media say about Trump to ensure his defeat? And what does it say about several other issues – COVID, climate change, transgenderism, abortion, or economic statistics and what the dominant media will report to advance an agenda?
A person does not need to carry a brief for Trump to know that for almost an entire presidential term a fraud has been perpetrated on the American people. The president is amid serious cognitive decline. That will not change the votes of most Democrats who would vote for a corpse instead of Trump, but this does not do American democracy any favours and the Democratic Party supposedly stands between Trump authoritarianism and liberty. It would be silly to think that Democrats, having watched Biden’s performance on Thursday night will now vote for Trump. But the Democratic Party, the mainstream press corps, and the Biden family owe Americans an apology for lying about Biden’s mental state and allowing him to stand for renomination. This craven effort to delay dealing with the divisions within the party has only fed the cynicism that many feel about politics.
Hoping for people so addicted to power and used to getting what they want to set aside their interests may be unrealistic. Nonetheless, asking Democratic Party elites to come clean about their hypocrisy and forcing, if necessary, Biden to release his delegates for the Democratic nomination, stepping aside, and allowing a younger Democrat to run seems like the least Americans should expect. The vice president may win the nomination. That may scare Democrats, but at least Vice President Kamala Harris has her faculties. Not being a doctor, I cannot determine Biden’s fitness for office, but to suggest he can do this job for four more years does not take a medical degree. Voters can and will make that judgment.
Despite an unprecedented mountain of opposition, Trump and his supporters helped him regain the Republican nomination, making him the first former President to seek a non-consecutive presidential term at the head of a major party since 1892. On Thursday night his chances of becoming president skyrocketed. What did America’s enemies see on stage that night? What did Putin, Xi, Kim, and Khomeini think? The United States national security took a hit for the cause of a selfish and self-serving effort to prop up a leader well past his prime and a party that fears an intra-party split if they don’t nominate his vice-president.
As Charles C. Cooke said on The Editors podcast for National Review the day after the debate, “They (the people who have been denying any Biden decline) lie to us and they know they’re lying about it, and we know they are lying about it…But they lie and they lie and they lie about it because they are more interested in trying to get him over the finish line than they are in promulgating the truth. And last night they got caught because you just can’t spin that.”
Watching First Lady Jill Biden treat the President like a kindergarten student at the post-debate rally reminded me that as skeptical as I am about Biden’s policies and unsteady behaviour, he has become reliant on his team, advisors, and family at this point. Let’s hope that Thursday night helped them accept his illness. America deserves better and so does Biden.
Dave Redekop is a retired elementary resource teacher who worked part-time at the St. Catharines Courthouse as a Registrar until being appointed Executive Director at Redeemer Bible Church in October 2023. He has worked on political campaigns since high school and attended university in South Carolina for five years, earning a Master’s in American History with a specialization in Civil Rights. Dave loves reading biographies.
