Tag Archives: Joe Biden

national news, political news

What does Biden’s courage mean?

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Time gives us a chance for reflection, and so just a few hours after hearing gut-wrenching news of President Biden’s decision to bow out of the 2024 presidential race, I want to reflect briefly on what I believe it means.

And not just for the candidate, but for the country he loves.

Every strand of Joe Biden’s being seemed to pull him toward staying in the race. I mean, he ran for the presidency twice before actually winning the 2020 contest. He sought the 1988 Democratic nomination, but got derailed over a plagiarism scandal. He ran again in 2008, but fell to the Barack Obama buzzsaw.

He had a horrible debate performance in mid-June. He vowed to stay in. Democrats bailed on him. The money spigot dried up.

Then this past weekend came the announcement: He would end his candidacy and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic nomination.

Biden likely knew he couldn’t defeat Donald Trump. He stepped aside to let a young, more intellectually agile public servant, VP Harris, make her effort to keep Trump out of the White House.

He said he did it out of love for his country, which he wants to shield from the evil impulses that Trump would deploy if he gets the chance at another presidential term.

Joe Biden served his country honorably for more than 50 years … as a senator, vice president and president. He left his most indelible imprint on our nation by walking away from a fight he knew he couldn’t win.

That’s how you define patriotism.

national news, political news

Stop the ‘quit now’ diatribes

MAGA cultists who are foaming at the mouth over President Biden’s decision to cease his re-election campaign need to take a breather and cast an eye toward realism … if that is possible.

They are proclaiming that since Biden said he is “unfit to run for re-election, he is unfit to hold the office,” and therefore he must resign immediately. Give me a fu**ing break! We all know what happened Sunday. I applaud Joe Biden for reaching a conclusion he believes is best for the country. He won’t seek a second term and has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the next Democratic Party presidential nominee. He said he will continue to serve as president and will work when he can to elect Harris if she’s nominated in Chicago later this summer. The MAGA cult members, led by their supreme leader Donald Trump, have lapped the field already in declaring that Biden must go. Trump issued a typically tasteless, crass, boorish response to Biden’s announcement; his followers have climbed aboard the Trump clown car. If a medical doctor examines the president and concludes he must resign, then I’ll listen. Short of that … the MAGA goons should just shut the hell up!
national news

Now what for Election 2024?

I am pretty sure I will remember where I was when I heard the stunning news of the day, that President Biden had ended his re-election campaign and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor.

It’s a mind-blower to be sure. We now are trudging down a never-before-traveled trail. A sitting president who had his party nomination locked up has tossed it into the crapper because (a) he apparently no longer believes he can win and (b) too many questions remain over whether he has the snap to serve another four years in power.

This was Joe Biden’s call to make. I have said I would support whatever decision he made. Part of me wanted him to stay in the race, but it became untenable as scores of Democratic politicians and big hitters bailed on him.

What about Vice President Harris? She is a known quantity. Now she gets to pick a VP running mate, presuming she wins the Democratic Party nomination later this summer. It would seem to be a no-brainer, given that the delegates chosen to support President Biden were on board with VP Harris as well.

My head is still spinning at this moment. There will be plenty to say about the campaign that is going take shape …. all over again!

***

Oh, just so you know, I was watching a theater production of “Mama Mia!” in Fort Worth when I heard the news … in case you’re interested.

national news

So much to ponder this election cycle

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This big world is full of issues, talking points and factors that zoom right past my pointy little head.

Here’s another one I want to examine briefly. How does a president as successful as Joseph R. Biden Jr. struggle with polling data that suggest he is going to get his clocked cleaned on Election Day?

I do not get it!

Biden inherited an economy in free fall from the COVID pandemic. Joblessness was through the roof. Hundreds of Americans were dying daily from the killer virus. Our national budget deficit was skyrocketing. His presidential predecessor had sought to undermine the “peaceful transition of power.”

President Biden took office and managed to work with Congress to enact an infrastructure rebuilding bill, approve the Inflation Reduction Act, approve climate change legislation. He issued executive orders that took aim at reducing prescription drug costs.

Joe Biden is in the midst of a successful presidency. Now he’s in deep trouble of being forced out of the re-election campaign because Democratic Party honchos are worried he cannot beat Donald Trump, the GOP nominee.

How in the world does the president wrap his arms around the juxtaposition of those facts. Unemployment is down, the budget deficit is shrinking, our alliances are strong … but he’s trailing in the polls and experts are telling him his chances of winning are shrinking daily.

The MAGA cultists who comprise Trump’s base are energized. Biden’s base is demoralized. Trump has a deeply flawed moral character that he seems to wear like a badge of honor. Biden enjoys deep affection among those who are close to him.

Up is down and down is up. The man who lost the previous election now might be poised to beat the man who defeated him four years ago. What the hell is wrong with this country?

Joe Biden, national news, political news

Does Joe stay … or go?

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My mind has been flip-flopping like a fish out of water on the issue of President Biden’s viability as a presidential candidate in 2024.

I believe I have reached a conclusion on this matter, so I will share it with you right now.

The president needs to step aside. He needs to hand the top spot on the Democratic ticket to Vice President Kamala Harris, who needs then to find a suitable running mate to carry the fight forward against Donald Trump and J.D. Vance.

I will offer only one caveat. If the president stays in, I’ll be with him until hell freezes over. Which ain’t gonna happen.

The foremost issue must be to keep Donald Trump from darkening the Oval Office’s door ever again.

I have been watching many of VP Harris’s speeches over the past few days and to my aging but still perceptive ears, she has found her voice. One hears no quiver in her voice. She is certain on where she stands and she delivers her views with vigor and conviction. The vice president relies heavily on her years as a prosecutor, telling cheering audiences, “Let’s look at the facts.”

When I watch the vice president recite chapter and verse how Trump and Vance are wrong, on, say, women’s reproductive rights, I see a stand-up champion. When she talks about how the GOP talks out of both sides of its mouth on seeking “unity,” I see a fierce fighter.

Sadly, the Joe Biden I grew to admire from his first days in the US Senate — the ferocious and occasionally garrulous advocate he became — no longer exists. Make no mistake, though, on this key point: Joe Biden has been one of the better presidents of the past century and he accomplished plenty during his time in office. He will leave office, whether this coming January or in January 2029, with his head held high.

However … the Democratic Party leadership is bailing on him. The source of the money the party will need to defeat Trump has dried up. President Biden should step aside.

Joe Biden chose well when he picked Kamala Harris to run with him in 2020. It’s her turn now.

Donald Trump

What has happened to us?

You want any graphic example of just how topsy-turvy the US political system has become? Look at what is happening in Milwaukee this very evening.

Republican convention delegates have nominated a former POTUS who was impeached twice during his term in office, who is accused of instigating an attack on our government and of trying to overturn a free and fair election, who has been convicted of 34 felony counts, is indicted on four additional felonies, been deemed liable for the rape of a woman and has admitted to being a sexual assailant.

What’s more, GOP delegates are standing tall, firm and foursquare behind Donald Trump. They are united behind this man’s candidacy.

Meanwhile, Democratic political leaders are turning on the incumbent president, Joe Biden, because of a poor debate performance, many of them calling on him to forgo his re-election campaign. They are splintered and Biden is in actual danger of losing the election to the guy he defeated four years ago.

Many of us who have been around long enough remember earlier times when we wondered whether our system could survive tempest and tumult.

But …. nothing like this!

I am at a total loss to understand what has happened to my beloved United States of America.

national news

Then and now: big difference

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There might be some temptation to compare the pressure that President Biden is feeling from Democratic lawmakers to that which fell on President Nixon in the summer of 1974.

There’s a heap of difference between the circumstances.

Biden’s heat is coming from Democratic leaders who are urging him to drop out of the 2024 presidential race, fearing he is sure to lose to GOP nominee Donald J. Trump. Biden doesn’t see it that way. He believes he has a path to victory and to be blunt, I share his belief that the fight ain’t over. Yes, the questions are lingering about Biden’s mental acuity in the wake of that debate fiasco, but he’s showing signs of recovery from that stumble-bum performance.

In August 1974, Richard Nixon faced a different set of circumstances. The House Judiciary Committee was preparing articles of impeachment against the president over his covering up of the Watergate scandal. Several senators stepped up, ventured to the White House and told Nixon the following: The House is going to impeach you, Mr. President, and the Senate is going to convict you in a trial that will commence. You need to resign.

Moreover, the message came from the likes of Nixon’s fellow Republicans, such as Sens. Barry Goldwater and Hugh Scott … both of whom told Nixon they would vote convict him of the crime of coverup.

Nixon had no choice but to resign. He did the next day.

The drama playing out today is far from finished, despite what many in the media are reporting.

national news

Time for ‘unity’ … do ya think?

Word out of Donald J. Trump’s campaign headquarters is that the presumed Republican Party presidential nominee is re-writing his acceptance speech.

Reports say he is going to seek to strike a theme of national “unity” in the wake of what we all saw unfold in Butler, Pa., over the weekend.

A gunman opened fire on Trump, grazing his right ear with a bullet. Another man died while protecting his family from the gunfire, two more bystanders were seriously injured … and the Secret Service killed the shooter where he stood with his rifle.

Trump issued a statement immediately after being transported for treatment of his injury. He spoke of the need to stand as one nation and to work to quell the violence that too often is a result of heated political rhetoric.

On Thursday night he will stand before the nation, accept his party’s nomination and reportedly will deliver his unification remarks.

For the ever-lovin’ life of me, I hope the man is sincere, that he means what he says that he will do his part to cool the atmospherics that surround this political season.

President Biden, his opponent in the election, has said the same thing, calling on the nation to step back and to reflect on a fundamental tenet of American politics. It is that we can differ strongly on issues but that we’re all still Americans, we all love the country and that we are not each other’s “enemy.”

Yes, I oppose Donald Trump’s election. I remain grateful and glad that he didn’t suffer a more serious injury from the moron who opened fire.

Now we will get to measure just how much — if at all — this incident might have changed him.

Joe Biden, national news

‘Vote shaming’ has commenced

There appears to be a tide of “vote shaming” that is swelling across the land as Democrats are now rallying behind their presumptive presidential nominee.

We now are hearing it more loudly and clearly than at any time during the past three presidential cycles. A vote for Donald J. Trump for president is going to relegate the presidency and the nation into a spiral from which neither can recover.

And it is to the ever-lasting shame of those who today remain dedicated to casting their presidential vote for a convicted felon, an admitted philanderer, a man found liable for rape and an individual who admits to groping women.

Democrats are ramping up their message machine to cast shame and embarrassment on the MAGA cultists and the Republican Party leadership who continue to back a man who has been shown to be a fraud, someone who isn’t even close to being the smartest businessman in the room. Indeed, as President Biden has been saying, Trump has filed for bankruptcy “six times, even for a casino” in which had invested. “I didn’t know that was possible,” Biden has said.

President Biden and the Democrats are making Donald Trump the issue in their battle to keep him away from the Oval Office.

They damn sure should make Trump the No. 1 issue in this campaign.

But here we are, wringing our hands over whether Joe Biden is too old and too mentally infirm to run for president. I am teetering on this issue myself and I am not comfortable admitting that. However, you may count me as one American patriot who will gladly cast my ballot for Joe Biden if the choice happens to be Donald Trump.

Those who are standing behind a moral reprobate who is now a convicted felon, someone who embraces tyrants over small-d democrats, well … you deserve the shame you are getting.

national news

What should his legacy become?

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Suppose for a moment that President Biden’s parsing of the tea leaves tells him he should no longer seek re-election … what shall be the opening paragraph say about his term as leader of the world’s pre-eminent nation?

I hope it doesn’t mention that he ended his re-election effort over questions about whether he was competent to run the nation for a second term. I want it to focus on what he did accomplish.

He took the reins of power as the nation fought like hell to recover from the COVID pandemic. That battle included rescuing an economy that had tanked. Biden wanted to restore our national “soul,” which had been wounded grievously by the chaos that enveloped the presidency of his immediate predecessor.

By almost any measure one can apply, Joe Biden’s presidency has been a success. He signed legislation that aims to improve our infrastructure, seeks to reduce inflation, and seeks to arm Ukraine in its fight for survival against invading forces from Russia.

Biden has taken executive action to eliminate crushing student debt obligations and has acted with dignity and decorum on the world stage.

All of that might get short shrift in the event President Biden decides to pull the plug on his re-election campaign. Instead, the media will focus on whether he has lost too many steps in his losing fight against Father Time.

Joe Biden’s presidency has been a success and no matter when we start writing the history of this man’s time at the pinnacle of power, I want us to remember that fact first.