So…. The president neglects his constitutional duties for a week, choosing instead to be trained by the likes of Steven Spielberg for his debate with Donald Trump, and this is what we get? A doddering, tottering old man, stumbling over words and having brain freeze when asked for solutions to problems largely of his creation? Who stared openmouthed and slack-jawed when not actively lying to the American people (remember “Trump created the problems at the border?” or “I inherited high inflation from the Trump administration?). Who resorted more and more to shopworn phrases as the debate progressed (“Here’s the deal;” “the thing is;” “true story,” and so forth). Who appeared frail and pale on the stage, overwhelmed and not a little possessed by unfocussed anger?
Yeah, that’s what everyone finally saw. This wasn’t a debate, it was elder abuse.
Judging from polling results afterward, Joe’s performance was a surprise to some of us – mostly the credulous and the terminally partisan who for years lapped up the lies about his abilities from the Democrat party and their stenographic pool that most of our corporate media has become. For them, Thursday’s crash-and-burn was revelatory. For those of us who preferred the evidence of our own eyes and ears over the codswollop the party and its sycophants in the press were dishing out, it was no surprise at all.
What was most amusing was the flaming aftermath. Both Democrat party bigwigs and their allies in the media were caught flatfooted by the fiasco. These are people who had been lying to the American people for years – about Trump and “Russian collusion,” Trump and “Ukrainian collusion,” Trump and “dictatorship;” about Hunter’s laptop; about Joe’s sale of offices; about his fitness for his position and about anything else one might name. Now, one of their biggest lies had been exposed, and they trampled over one another in the rush for the exits.
The usual suspects among the punditry and political leadership turned in uniformly Inspector Renault-level performances. They were “…shocked to discover…” that the president, who many of them had claimed was “sharp as a tack” just weeks, or even days, before had collapsed into drooling dotage overnight. And something had to be done now, I tell you, now. Lest the Bad Orange Man give them all the spanking they jolly well deserve come November – in the name of the nation, and of us all.
These ideological diehards in both party and press will now move heaven and earth to pry Joe Biden out of his quest for a second term. They realize that after Toto pulled back the curtain, there’s no unseeing the man behind it. And the question will rapidly become, “If he’s like this in the friendliest setting possible, what’s he like when he’s defending our interests against Vlad the Bloody-Handed, to say nothing of Xi or the Terrible Theocrats of Tehran?” Quickly followed by another, equally important, question: “If you lied to us for years about this guy, how can we ever trust you again?”
Quick and helpful answer: you can’t. No-one can, and we should all remember that. These are the people who created myths about Donald Trump and used them to try to keep him from office. When they failed, they used those myths and others they invented to cripple his presidency. When he ran for a second term there were new lies, and they were successful. Now, Joe Biden is president; our borders are open and unsecure, inflation rages and war threatens in many quarters, no matter what Joe’s lackies and toadies say.
Here’s a useful exercise: round up photographs of everyone who told you Hunter Biden’s laptop was “Russian disinformation,” from the “51 former intelligence officials” to every politico and member of the commentariat who bleated that pathetic lie. Put them all on a convenient wall. Now you have a partial portrait of the “Deep State,” or perhaps more appropriately, the Administrative state.
These high-level persons, some elected, most not, are motivated by one thing: the accumulation and love of power. They itch to tell everyone else how to live, and to collect fat paychecks in the bargain. Not one of us can do anything to dent their intrusive reach, save through tedious and very expensive lawsuits. But Trump can. They, and the interfering agencies they work for, who sneer at the very thought of individual freedom, can be banished by a smaller budget, or in some cases by the stroke of the Chief Executive’s pen. Trump knows it; they know it. That’s why they hate him.
And why we must elect him in November. The alternative is a Democrat jackboot in your face. Forever.