March 9, 2020
After Joe Biden’s unexpected Super Tuesday victories, he has edged out Bernie Sanders as the likely Democratic nominee for president. While a disturbing percentage of Democrats prefer a socialist, it appears that most have decided to play it safe and prop up Biden.
Just last week the nomination was looking to be in reach of Sanders’ grasp. Biden’s poll numbers were down, and he performed abysmally in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada. But, an endorsement by the highest-ranking African American Democrat in Congress, Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), helped to secure a win in South Carolina. Then on the eve of Super Tuesday endorsements started flowing-in. Former Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), former candidate Beto O’Rourke, former Democratic leader Harry Reid, former US ambassador to the UN under Obama, Susan Rice, and most recently Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) all announced their support.
This coalescing around Biden’s nomination catapulted him to victory on Super Tuesday-winning ten out of the 14 states. Biden only has about 75 more delegates than Sanders, but he is heavily favored to win many of the upcoming states. FiveThirtyEight’s primary forecast predicts that Biden has an 91% chance, Sanders 1%, to win a majority of the pledged delegates.
However, is the 77-year-old former vice president the saving grace which Democrats are hoping for? There was a reason why his poll numbers plummeted and he lost the earlier races. Biden is not the same man he was while he was Barack Obama’s vice president. Yes- he has always been gaffe-prone. But, the frequent memory lapses, bizarre responses and befuddlement can not be explained away as just “Joe being Joe”.
Too many of Biden’s campaign speeches and debate performances have been riddled with strange remarks and a glaring lack of mental acuity to be chalked up to innocuous brain snafus.
Just last week at an event in South Carolina Biden referred to himself as “a democratic candidate for the US Senate.” He also referred to Super Tuesday as “Super Thursday”. This is not just misspeaking,
Recently, at an event in Texas, while attempting to repeat a famous phrase from the Declaration of Independence he stated “We hold these truths to be self-evident. All men and women are created by the {awkward pause} go, you know, you know the thing.” The “thing” is “equal” . All men and women are created equal. Any normally functioning adult could have finished that sentence.
Almost all of Biden’s debate performances have been mired with nonsensical statements, and a glaring inability to speak in fluid sentences.
During the last Democratic debate, Biden claimed that 150 million people in the US have been killed by a gun in the last 15 years. If this were true that would mean almost half of the country had been shot dead. It is not just a gaffe for the former vice president to not know, or to forget, approximately how many people reside in the US.
One of Biden’s most ridiculous responses during an earlier debate was in response to a question about segregation and slavery reparations. Biden gave a garbled nonsensical answer about playing the “record player” at night for young children to improve their vocabulary. To any sentient being, Biden’s incoherent word salad and “record player” recommendation were sad and shocking.
Biden has also displayed bizarre outbursts of anger at some of his campaign events when challenged by voters. One such exchange occurred at a town hall in Iowa this past December. When a voter questioned Biden about his son’s dealings in Ukraine, and whether his age was a disqualifying factor, Biden lit into him, calling him “fat” a “damn liar”, then challenged him to an IQ test and push up contest. Watching this interaction is beyond cringe-worthy.
Biden also has a long history of lying and plagiarizing. During his first run for president in the 1988 election, he proved to be so dishonest that he was forced to end his presidential run in disgrace.
On multiple occasions, while campaigning in the late eighties Biden recited verbatim, phrases as if they were his own, from speeches given by Robert F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, and British Labor party leader Neil Kinnock. The lifting of Kinnock’s speech was particularly disturbing because it contained personal details of Kinnock’s family. Kinnock spoke about being the first in his family to go to college, and about his coal miner family. Biden plagiarized this segment of Kinnocks’ speech, despite not being the first in his family to go to college, nor having coal mining family members. Dishonesty on so many levels.
It appears that Biden has a long history of deception. While in law school he plagiarized five pages from a Law Review article to write a fifteen-page paper. Further, a clip from a 1987 exchange with a reporter asking Biden about his academic credentials has recently resurfaced. Biden boasted that he had “..a much higher I.Q.” than the reporter. He claimed that he graduated from law school “in the top half of my class”. He added that he received “three degrees”, and was the only one in his class to receive a full academic scholarship. Reality- Biden received a half scholarship, based on financial need, not academics, he graduated with one degree at the bottom of his class. He ranked 76 out of a class of 85.
Unfortunately, Biden’s penchant for lying has not changed with age. Just recently, while on the campaign trail in his latest bid for the presidency, he claimed that he was arrested thirty years ago in South Africa as a result of attempting to visit Nelson Mandela. He added that after Mandela became president of South Africa he visited Biden in Washington and thanked Biden for getting arrested while trying to visit him.
There is no evidence to back up either the arrest or the Mandela visit. The left-leaning Washington Post fact-checker branded both claims “ridiculous”. The Post’s Glenn Kessler wrote, “There is no evidence for either claim; neither appears remotely credible.”
It is unimaginable how a man with a life-long history of dishonesty, who is now suffering from age-related cognitive impairment could ever effectively lead the most powerful country, with the largest economy in the world. Biden is having trouble mentally and physically just keeping up with the rigors of the campaign trail. Undeniably, the demands of the presidency will be exponentially greater.
Recently, speaking at a campaign event Biden told a crowd “We can not get re-elected. We can not win this election. We can only elect Donald Trump.” He probably didn’t mean to say this. But, I couldn’t agree more.
