Biden’s latest gaffe is deadly serious

NO AMOUNT of spin from the White House press officers will disguise the fact that US president Joe Biden showed the entire world on Wednesday that he’s losing it, for whatever reason.

The 79-year-old president, the oldest ever elected to a first term, was speaking at a conference in Washington and asked if representative Jackie Walorski was present. Trouble is, Jackie Walorski died in a car crash almost two months ago.

‘Jackie, are you here? Where’s Jackie?’ asked

Biden live on camera – the perennial questions that would have been achingly funny if they didn’t also reveal what appears to be a developing tragedy for the Biden family.

Biden’s gaffe plays right into the hands of that outrageous narcissist, megalomaniac and danger to democracy Donald Trump who has been painting a caricature of the president, like Peig Sayers, as somebody with one foot in the grave.

During the 2020 election campaign Trump said Biden hadn’t a clue. ‘He doesn’t know where the hell he is. This guy doesn’t know he’s alive.’ And since then, unsurprisingly, a stream of Republicans have questioned president Biden’s mental health and his ability to govern.

As leader of the free world Biden’s mental and physical wellbeing is of crucial interest to all democracies, considering the obvious threats from Russia and China, and the pivot internationally towards authoritarianism. Concerns inside the United States are growing and, during the summer, the New York Times published a survey saying Democrats didn’t want Biden to be the party’s candidate in the 2024 election because of his age.

Which, of course, prompts the thought – the sooner his promised visit

to Ireland takes place, the better.