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I struggle. I struggle all the time. I struggle with everything. But on the political front, what I struggle with most of all is the knowledge that approximately half this nation loves President Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. They don’t just tolerate him. They don’t just like him, or even admire him. They LOVE him. I have read the comments on dozens of pieces here on Substack, in print media, on social media. The comments, even more than the pieces themselves reveal the mood of a large segment of the American public that I struggle to understand.
The comments (and I’ve read dozens, if not hundreds) are by voters who can be roughly divided into three sections. One third carries in its chest such visceral hatred of Donald Trump, such profound animus and revulsion, that they would view Ted Bundy as a perfectly suitable option to replace DJT. For them, during 2017 - 2021, no earthly villain came close to Trump in malefaction, misconduct, all-out criminality. Not Kim Jong Un, not Vladimir Putin or Belorussian President-For-Life Alexander Lukashenko. Having Trump out of office causes them to extol and celebrate any occupant of the White House.
Another thirty percent - and these are the people I dislike the most - think that Biden is doing an amazing job. They think Afghanistan was an excellent move, perfectly timed and executed, with a finesse and cunning only the reliable and experienced Joe Biden could pull off. They absolutely adore his newest Covid executive order, which they see not as the crypto-fascist edict that mocks the constitution and undermines democracy but as the first step towards a glorious victory over SarsCoV2. This is the crowd that still, in September 2021, believes that Zero Covid is the right policy and that half a million people would not have died had Joseph Robinette Biden been steering the ship of state. This is the crowd that swoons at every woke sentence, at every conspiratorial whisper, every fake toothy smile and every bit of muscle rhetoric. “Finally!” they sigh as they take a sip of their chilled Chardonnay and fire up their Zoom to congratulate themselves and their friends in their high-IQ, high-tolerance, high-diversity crowd.
Finally, about 30 percent aren’t really sure about policy but they just like the guy. They like his suits, they like the fact that he looks slim and trim and keeps his fake hair nicely combed. They close their eyes when he nearly tumbles down the steps to Air Force One and they shut their ears when he stumbles trying to read the teleprompter. “Let’s face it, he’s really a nice guy, right?” they think. “Some moves kind of look like…mistakes…but he’s SUCH a nice guy, finally a REAL president”
I struggle. I struggle mightily. I struggle to comprehend how millions of people can look at a stinking fish carcass and see a slice of freshly cut smoked salmon. This is a man who has done more damage to America’s reputation, America’s economy and America’s unity than three of his predecessors managed in two decades. Any child - and any foreign leader - can see that what has happened in Afghanistan leaves the United States weak, indecisive and looking pathetic. While Kabul burns, with Americans left behind, Biden’s White House is worried about the Taliban’s lack of diversity. The man’s first act in office was to strike a deadly blow to the oil industry, kicking off inflation and voluntarily stripping our country of its energy self-sufficiency. Worse: he did this to a friendly neighbor nation, adding to the unemployment rolls not just in the United States but in Canada, which unlike Venezuela or Saudi Arabia, shares with us a common history of (now rapidly fading) democracy and liberty. Canada was never going to leave the US stranded in an hour of need, which, I need not remind anyone, is exactly what the likes of Saudi Arabia will do at the first opportunity.
This is a man who promised to decimate Covid but instead is decimating the economy. Millions of people eligible for work continue to lie on their couches, living off “Biden money” The scepter of monster inflation is breathing down our neck. And worst of all, this President now insists on dividing the nation into the clean and the unclean, blaming and threatening his own citizens instead of having the balls to admit that not he, nor Doctor Saint Anthony Fauci, nor Doctor Crybaby Rochelle Wallensky, indeed no human on earth can stop this advancing virus. If he had the balls to admit it, he would also have to admit that the vaccination program is a failure, that the Great Barrington experts were right a year ago, that his Covid approach has zero scientific grounding and that we have to really start from scratch and just traverse this pandemic like every other pandemic in the history of mankind has been traversed: via herd immunity, preparedness, willingness to try novel medications and an admission that death is an integral part of human existence, not something that just happens to deplorable rednecks who refuse to have federal political will rammed down their throats.
This is the most catastrophic presidency in memory. Jimmy Carter’s comes close but Carter, unlike Biden, was a man of intelligence who realized he was screwing up even as the screw-ups were in progress. Doesn’t make him better, just more humane. Then again, Carter was not in a state of advanced dementia. As catastrophic as the Presidency is, though, I find it far more catastrophic that perhaps half the nation is blind to the catastrophe, dresses the catastrophe up as triumph and celebrates it.
I struggle, friends. I struggle all the time.