Biden’s record, behavior concerning
Neither he, nor Sanders getting any younger
Wherever Democratic Party leaders meet to make decisions and call the shots, there must be high anxiety this morning.
Remember when they had so many presidential candidates — female, black, gay — they needed two nights to complete a debate?
Now only two remain, both of whom are white septuagenarians who’d reach 80 midway through their first term in the White House.
One, Bernie Sanders, is an amusing yet frightening old coot who zealously harrumphs his view of an America in which blessings once garnered through hard work and ingenuity would be handed out willy-nilly like Halloween candy.
But it’s the other one, Joe Biden, who has to be of enormous concern to Democratic honchos, especially now that the departure of all other candidates has left him and his resume increasingly exposed to aggressive scrutiny.
Joe’s resume is troublesome enough.
As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee he incurred the wrath of women everywhere who were incensed by what they saw as the trashing of Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas Supreme Court justice confirmation hearing.
That was in 1991, and Joe’s conduct then was so egregious — refusing to hear witnesses who would have supported Hill; allowing Republicans on the committee to eviscerate her — that he was still apologizing at the start of this 2020 campaign, admitting to “Good Morning America” that “She did not get treated well and I take responsibility for that.”
Then there was the matter of plagiarism, and repeated accounts of creepy behavior with women, and the incendiary issue of how his seemingly unqualified kid landed a very lucrative position on a Ukrainian energy board.
But it’s Biden’s personal bearing that has to be of greatest concern this morning.
Watching him has become painful, telling audiences he’s a candidate for the Senate, instead of the presidency, and is looking ahead to the “Super Thursday” primaries, which of course were held on Tuesday, and mistaking his sister for his wife with the cameras looking on.
Innocent mistakes? Maybe. Campaign fatigue? Perhaps.
But then watching him become totally flummoxed while alluding to the Declaration of Independence at a campaign event in Texas — “We hold these truths to be self-evident. All men and women created by, you know, you know, the thing.” — was frightening to see from a political point of view, but heart-wrenching for anyone experiencing an agonizing sense of deja vu, remembering what it was like when a loved one’s behavior became a cause for concern.
Is that unfair? Is it being an alarmist?
No, not to anyone who’s been there, who’s taken the keys, who’s eventually had to acknowledge what was becoming increasingly obvious to everyone else.
That’s why Joe Biden, the candidate, is of much less concern here than Joe Biden, the man, a thought that must be permeating high places this morning.