STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – Remember how President Joe Biden was going to make America great again?
Biden didn’t use those words, of course.
But remember how Biden ran for president because he wanted to save America from President Donald Trump? It was a battle for the soul of the nation.
Eight months into the Biden presidency, there are Dumpster fires everywhere you look.
The border with Mexico is a disaster, with thousands upon thousands of people entering the United States illegally. Biden has not disappointed those who want to erase the border entirely.
How many of these arrivals are COVID positive? How many have had vaccinations? Who knows?
Meanwhile, the rest of us have to present proof of a jab in order to eat indoors, and American school kids have to wear masks in the classroom.
Never mind how the coronavirus pandemic continues under Biden, despite his promise that we would be free of the virus by the Fourth of July. The mandates and restrictions go on and on, and the unvaccinated are under threat of losing their jobs.
And imagine the outcry if the leader of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under Trump had overruled their own scientists and insisted on booster vaccination shots for some, as CDC chief Dr. Rochelle Walensky did on Friday. The cries of “politicizing the pandemic” would be deafening.
And remember how Biden was going to restore American prestige with our allies around the world? Remember how offended the Dems were when Trump talked tough with England, France and Germany?
That was before Biden’s bumbling, go-it-alone withdrawal from Afghanistan and the resulting re-empowering of the terrorist-abetting, human-rights-violating Taliban regime.
We still don’t know what the full ramifications of the sorry withdrawal will be when it comes to world security from terrorism.
But we do know that Biden left the British, our oldest and staunches allies, in the lurch and that the whole mess will be an enduring stain on Biden’s legacy.
And speaking of upending enduring alliances, Biden then pulled the rug out from under France by forming a submarine alliance with the United Kingdom and Australia, costing France a military contract. The French temporarily recalled their U.S. ambassador in protest.
Not to cry too many tears for the French, but I thought Biden was going treat our allies better than that. Non?
But who even knows Biden anymore?
The president isn’t always allowed to take questions from the press. And when Biden does deign to hold a press conference, he calls on reporters according to a list prepared by his aides.
Biden’s not allowed to have off-script moments. He’s not allowed to be seen except in controlled circumstances. The courtiers are running the kingdom.
It makes you long for the days when Trump would stand in the White House driveway and endlessly spar with reporters.
Dems and other Trump opponents didn’t always like Trump’s answers. They said he spewed fake news. But Trump took the questions. Without cheat sheets. Without his handlers pulling him away. He actually had fun doing it.
Biden has seen the result of all the bad news: The president’s poll numbers have plummeted, including with all-important independent voters. One survey had him less popular than Trump. And even the mainstream media, in their incremental, mother-may-I fashion, has begun to chastise the president.
And the Biden White House has responded predictably in some ways, the other day saying that they would roll out some damning stuff about Trump and the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. It’s an easy, red-meat distraction for the partisans.
It’s taken as settled fact that the “insurrection” was an existential threat to the Republic and to American democracy. But Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, circumvents Trump’s constitutional authority as commander-in-chief and gives secret military assurances to the Chinese? Hardly an eyebrow is raised.
This is the through-the-looking glass America that Biden is giving us. Dems are right to worry that they could face an electoral catastrophe in next year’s mid-term elections.
Ad Choices