The takeaway is obvious, or should be.
The takeaway is obvious, or should be.
A few days after that historic presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, I thought I would try foreign-media sources to get their reaction. Mostly it was to get away from the hysterical screaming of America’s liberal media. The Irish Times’ Inside Politics podcast brought on its Washington, D.C., correspondent, who along with the host and another political reporter began discussing what they had seen.
There was an “absolute meltdown across liberal media,” host Hugh Linehan noted, before speculating that we would not know the full story behind the debate “until the books come out.” And there was an attempt at formal analysis, how the televisual format did Biden no favors. There was some shock that Biden’s debate preppers hadn’t practiced out of him his “slack-jawed expression.” And then in an attempt at fairness, they noted that Donald Trump’s answers had been aggressively fact-checked and found wanting. But very quickly, it was agreed across the panel that the spectacle was “difficult to watch.” Donald Trump was standing next to someone “not really in the room.” Someone who was “a frail, elderly man.”
Partly, being foreigners, they are at a remove from the consequences of the American election, and their politics, egos, and past statements are not as implicated in the outcome. Partly, being Irish, the contrast is more obvious. The man they saw on Thursday was not like the American president who visited their nation a year ago. And so the most natural response was the most obvious one: Joe Biden should not be in this position.
If a long period of rest and preparation brought us that version of Joe Biden on debate night, then his physical and mental capacities are simply not reliable enough for him to continue in the presidency. In a previous column I covered the constitutional abuse at work in his remaining in office. But there is also, significantly, a matter of personal abuse.
First, if reports are true that Hunter Biden, the president’s troubled son, is now acting as a top adviser, consigliere, and gatekeeper, we are in a world of danger. This is a further blow to Joe Biden’s reputation. The elderly need to be protected from those who would prey upon them, even their own children. This is why people sign wills only when deemed mentally competent — so that lawyers, courts, or third-party executors can interrupt even the appearance of abuse that is possible among family relatives.
Second, America may be obsessed with youth, but caring for our elders means taking from them burdens that they should not have. That includes the awesome powers and trials of the American presidency. Joe Biden’s debate prep began with two full days of recovery and rest from a European trip, then days starting at 11 a.m., followed by a midday nap. This is the pace of a man whose late afternoon should be one glass of red wine and Matlock reruns, followed by a light fish dinner, plenty of water, and an early bedtime. That is what Joe Biden deserves simply because of his age and condition.
Third, Hunter and Jill Biden may be acting as they are, gatekeeping the president himself, precisely because the president feels vulnerable to manipulation from below. The federal government has already been bedeviled by the fact that the president is technically in charge of millions of workers, whose senior staff often have motive, prerogative, incentive, and means to defy their boss, or — in extraordinary circumstances — to undermine and manipulate him. Again, this emphasizes the fact that once Biden was no longer fully in command of his faculties, the only course of action was to resign the presidency and let a competent, duly elected vice president take over.
Right now, decent people should be lining up behind the idea of saving Joe Biden, that is, rescuing him from the presidency itself. He may stubbornly be a willing hostage, but again, the proper thing to do, for his own sake, is to spring him — even against his will — from the trap he is in, and in which we will otherwise sink, too