Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
Republican pundits and conservative activists are debating whether they can win in 2024 with the successful Trump agenda, but without the controversial Donald Trump as their nominee.
The Democrats have a similar, but far more serious dilemma with Joe Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee in 2024.
Unlike the Trump Administration’s successful four years, Biden’s tenure has been an utter disaster. There are no policy offsets to the personal liabilities and unpopularity of Biden himself.
Biden’s liabilities transcend his physical infirmities, his advanced age, and his seeming geometric rather than arithmetic rate of mental decline.
Biden, moreover, proves daily that he is not a nice guy. His excesses, past and present, are precisely those the Left considers mortal sins.
Walking back Biden’s absurdities has become the nonstop, tiresome task of many on the Left. As they face a midterm disaster in November, many no longer see any compensating reasons not to drop Biden.
When the Republicans take the House of Representatives in 2022 there will be nonstop investigations of Hunter Biden’s alleged tax avoidances, his possibly illegal work as an unregistered foreign agent, and Joe Biden’s untaxed compensation he received from the Biden lobbying consortium.
Consider also Biden’s nastiness.
During the 2020 campaign he personally attacked a young co-ed as a “lying dog-faced pony soldier” and a stocky questioner was reduced to “fat.”
Unlike Trump’s art of the deal, exaggerations, and distortions, Biden says things that are not simply untrue, but abjectly preposterous—such as the United States currently has a lower inflation rate than major European industrial powers.
In Biden world, there were no COVID vaccinations until he took the oath of office. Vladimir Putin, or the oil companies, or the refiners, or Donald Trump are responsible for the historic crippling gasoline price hikes he caused by canceling drilling and pipeline projects.
Biden claims his negative-growth, hyperinflating economy is not disastrous but strong.
He serially lies that he drove a semi-truck. He has not been to the Middle East 38 times. He never received an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy. Nor was he a full professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The MAGA movement is not the “most extreme political organization in American history.”
In other words, Joe Biden reveals the same fantasies and plagiarism that ended his 1988 and 2008 presidential campaigns.
On matters of race and sexuality, Biden is the epitome of that for which the Left, supposedly, has zero tolerance. Biden was infamous for damning with praise candidate Barack Obama as the first “clean” and “articulate” African American presidential candidate.
In a fake patois, Biden once warned an audience of black professionals that Mitt Romney would “put y’all back in chains.”
During the 2020 campaign, candidate Biden derided a black journalist as a “junkie” and lambasted a radio host and his audience with the claim “you ain’t black” if they didn’t support his candidacy.
Spinning racialist fables like Biden’s “Corn Pop” stories would brand any conservative politician as a racist. As president, Biden still uses the term “negro,” and he called an African American advisor “boy.”
On disturbing matters of sexuality, Biden is even more coarse.
After the Justice Brett Kavanaugh hearings, the nation was lectured that “women must be believed.” But it was the Left who attacked former Biden aide Tara Reade who surfaced in 2016 to accuse then Senator Biden, her former boss, of sexually assaulting her.
Biden himself had a creepy history of invading the private space of young women—inappropriately kissing them, hugging and squeezing them, and smelling and blowing into their hair and ears.
Finally, Biden was forced to apologize—sort of—by claiming he belonged to an earlier generation when such aggression was simply normal behavior. It was not then or now.
The latest controversies whirl around the British tabloid Daily Mail’s publication of the diary of Biden’s own daughter.
From the Mail’s lurid reporting, Ashley Biden seems to suggest that she showered with her father at an age when “showers w/ my dad (probably [were] not appropriate).” And she seemed to connect Biden familial inappropriateness with her regret over being “hyper-sexualized [at] a young age.”
When Donald Trump was accused by porn star Stormy Daniels of a consensual tryst or was caught on old Access Hollywood tape crudely boasting about touching inappropriately female admirers, the resulting uproar nearly derailed the Trump 2016 campaign.
The point is not just the asymmetrical treatment that has shielded Biden’s cognitive decline, his rude outbursts, his outrageous racialist slurs, and bizarre sexual aggressiveness.
Instead, the Left now fears Biden’s terrible polls and a worse record—and the resulting damage he is doing to the Democratic Party.
In such a losing political context, Democrats will soon find no further reason to cover for Biden’s own serial abhorrent personal behavior on matters of financial probity, sex, race, and truthfulness.
No wonder they are growing desperate to find ways to cut him loose—without making Kamala Harris his successor.
Another of Biden’s biggest and most obvious lies is that he claims to have made a deal with his son Hunter never to discuss Hunter’s business deals. But the logbook of visitors to the White House reveals an endless parade of visitors who also happen to be foreign business partners of Hunter Biden. There are numerous emails documenting meetings between Hunter’s business partners and Joe Biden. But we are expected to swallow the story that Joe Biden was unaware of any aspect of the business that was going on between Hunter and all of these people he personally met with. Why has it taken the U.S. Attorney in Delaware so long to resolve the case of Hunter Biden’s shady business practices? Whereas, any tiny, vague mis-step by Michael Flynn, George Papadopoulos, and even Roger Stone were severely punished after being subjected to ruinous Federal prosecution. The corrupt targeting of Federal prosecution of political adversaries must be stopped as well as the disposal of any legal consequences for those favored by the left. It is bad enough that lobbyist money has corrupted both major parties. The corruption of our legal process by partisans cannot endure unchallenged. The best step we can take is to limit this illegal behavior is to demolish the Federal bureaucracy. We can begin to do that by moving Federal offices from D.C. to states around the country, as suggested by VDH. Obama created a deep state monster over his 8 years in the White House. It must be dismantled.
DC and NorVA are as rife with decayed old corporate consultants as any area in the USA. 93% of DC voted for Biden in 2020 – a number approaching Brezhnev and Kosygin back in the 70’s and 80’s, when the people of the USSR were invited to vote for their premier and party leader. Fact is, the DC/NorVA elitist-wannabee bureaucrats struggled under Trump, who didn’t need their self-serving theatrics sucking the teet of SugarDaddy. Moving the FedGov to Kansas City (KS) sounds like a sterling idea, and would serve to limit the time party apparatchiks/consultants/honorary appointees for whatever, etc., would even want to spend golfing, hitting the bars, and taking the usual bribes from soros/raytheon/ge/PRC/lower Slobovia/maybe a few bucks leftover from JaneFonda’s Weathermen (a new member joining soon from the DA’s office in SF) and the SLA. Hell, there’s even nice quarters for VIPs at nearby Fort Leavenworth to accommodate self important figures doing business with our fearless reps and senators. Not that I hate DC (I was born there), but its been sucking since 1993.
Kansas City Star, that’s what i r.
It wouldn’t work. If the swamp creatures moved to KS, the swamp would simply move with them. Including all the bars and golfing.
just impeach the court jester.harris as successor no longer worry point.impossible to eclipse the farcial,currupt,law breaking j.o.we have come to loathe .personally he joins a very small list of mine.ex.pol pot,idi amin,mao,stalin,hitler,jane fonda,robert deniro,sean penn kerry,and the adoreable greta iceberg.too many to name & a logistical nightmare to rank.since you havent gotten in touch(shame on you)a lot has happened.ill just pique with hearing from a 3rd circuit clerk.hmmmm missing all the fun vic.if you havent groked it yet im a resrticked known quantity(VERY FEW AS I NEVER WANTED ATTEN.)POLYMATH
forgot.why havent they,whoever they are split the enormous 9th with i thind over 10,000 cases waiting appeal.nows the time t.theres virtually parity therenow.also lest we forget state is still obstructing release of req.doc.on afghan debacle
Huh?
Might want to go easy on the vodka Skippy.
With Corrupt voting… all the super-evil leaders of Europe keep getting re-elected. The bad operators could elect, and keep re-electing anybody in the US who is maximum repulsive and evil. The fix is in.
I do hope there will be a reckoning after the November midterm elections.
Well, let’s do an experiment, let’s make lists of the names of all the republican traitors that helped pass the democrat’s egregious gum control legislation. Let’s see how many get re-elected.
I’m thinking all of them but in the end, the end be known.
Merlin , How does the DNC solve their conundrum ? – Tusitala
My question, is what kind of country allows people whose overwhelming concern the last month was Johnny Depp to vote? People who run up hundreds of thousands of dollars for stuff they “want”, people who can’t balance a checkbook without an “ap”, people who make decisions purely on raw emotion.
Answer, a country near death.
stupid people have as much right sa you and me.sounds to me that you would like curtailing them. Why /their only products ifeggregious govt schools.the solution is to abolish ALL govt.schools &return the funds to parents.in one generation the chang would be instant.we hire only smart,screened teachers.the systems,already incompetent &uncaring will simply DISSAPEAR.Seldom known is s.korea after soaring gang violence and drug use DISAPPEARED UNTOLD THOUSANDS ABOUT 40 OR 50 YRS AGO.rESULT?SAFE CITIES,RARE CRIME BUT FREE AND PROSPEROUS PEOPLE.UNLIKE STALIN 7 MAO S.K.ONLY ELIMINATED real criminals.DRASTIC TIMES CALL FOR DRASTIC MEASURES.Can you think of one parent who not love this.citizens DO,or should dictate policy and fix things that need fixing.by any means.
Always such strange commentary. The Republican party Is dead without President Trump. They and the Dems have been selling us out for decades. You and the rest love Reagan because he kept the status quo and further destroyed America. Amnesty to millions of illegals, playing games with the Iranians, instituting the green card lottery system, no promotion of industry and more. A vicious, nasty do nothing hiding behind folksy sayings. He and his nasty wife went to our church. Their perspective and attitude toward people was dispicable. Nervous laughter and blank faces from others followed their statements. Doesn’t matter what you and the rest of the incapable, destructive blowhards say. President Trump has saved our country and he continues to. HE loves America and her people. HE is honest and full of goodwill. He has been working behind the scenes non stop since he was overthrown. He is behind all the positive actions that have taken place since Jan 2021. Your sour putfowns and back handed compliments are embarrassing. You show such envy toward
an extraordinary man. He is one in a trillion.♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️
President Trump 2024 and forever.♥️
Let us revisit a couple issues, first, Trump essentially abdicated his presidency and turned it over to Fauci and Birx who in turn, in an unprecedented action, shut the United States down over the “pandemic”. I asked in a letter to Trump why he didn’t assemble a panel of the world’s foremost scientists, researchers etc instead of completely entrusting only two partisan vermin to the task, surprisingly I received no answer. The repercussions of Trump’s allowing “15 days” to become two years will be felt for a generation or more.
Trump’s “warped” vaccine: in the period from 12/14/20-5/13/22 VAERS statistics are as follows:
Vaccine deaths: 28,141
Serious (permanent) injuries: 82,544
Adverse reactions: 1,268,008
Reportedly VAERS is still buried in such reports yet bizarrely, Trump still touts his “vaccine” as being safe and effective.
Trump did do the US some good but in terms of oh s..ts vs. attboys, Trump need to cede his presidential aspirations to one more qualified.
Isn’t it evident that Biden became the Democrat presidential choice over Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker et al, because Joe could be easily manipulated by the previous administration? (If Biden was in his right instead of left mind, would he choose Kamala as his VP?) The DNC propped up a fake candidate with a fake reputation to win an election based on fake votes. The pResident’s policies have been designed to repeal everything Trump did to restore prosperity and initiate the Green New Deal, CRT, Trans-sexualism, Trans-humanism, Trans-borderism and Trans-vaccinationism to fundamentally TRANSform America .
Mayday – roger that. No pan-pan, this is a real emergency.
Agreed, xiden is a suit with a head of sorts attached. I’ve said before that obama or etc has their hand way up in an unmentionable place causing his mouth to open and close, nothing more.
Here in Oshkosh victor want visit Hillsdale can you ask l arne tell him I am leaving large sum in my will for Hillsdale I would ll e in various to wns fishing all summer he can email me
Horrible drive once igot near Chicago 2hr parking lot in100 temp truckers said it’s every day I’d kill myself remember truckers blocking highways to protest 55 mph why not do it now over diesel prices