The US has a leadership vacuum, at least in terms of the White House.
After four years of a bitter war with Donald Trump, much of the US media establishment has returned to its old deferential approach now that one of their own is back in the White House. To them, the appearance of normality, the fake return to mainstream codes of behaviour, the fact that Ivy Leaguers are back in charge at Treasury and State, matters far more than the reality, which is that the president isn’t really presiding and that America’s constitution is once again in deep crisis.”
– Allister Heath, Daily Telegraph.
What is worth noting is that even if Biden was mentally sharp, his comments and opinions have been notable for their crassness and foolishness. He is also a plagiarist. And that was when he was younger. I fear that far too many reporters and others covering politics are desperately trying to now play down what an empty shell he is.
(By contrast, the actor Bruce Willis has had to end his acting career because of a cognitive decline problem, and I find it very sad to see the star of Die Hard and other films retire. But he’s had to be honest, and that is brave of him.)
I suppose the issue is whether all this matters very much. To some extent, the fact that Biden is too far gone to make lots of decisions might not be a bad thing. The problem is that his policy ideas, even if they are not going to be enacted, are still terrible, such as on the plan to impose some sort of “wealth tax”. Sooner or later, one of his dumb ideas could actually have very bad consequences for The Republic.
And meanwhile, in the back of everyone’s minds, is the thought “God, imagine Kamala Harris dealing direct with Xi and Putin.”
So my question to the commenters here is this: what is to be done? There are another two and a bit years to run under this man. What’s the realistic chance he will make it?
The American Presidency has become mostly a rallying figurehead.
Trump found this out the hard way; he thought he had won a position from which he could effect change in the American Federal State, but that State is self-contained and far too entrenched to be bothered by the likes of him. It flicked him away, mostly, and ran things itself as it has for several decades.
And now, with Biden, that State is in hog heaven. Once again, it answers to no one but its own consensus. But it, too, is now overcome by the woke types who value partisan zeal over technical competence. I would say it has finally over-reached.
The Master Plan
1. Sack Harris
2. Make Trump Vice-President
3. Sack Biden
Everyone’s happy.
Assuming the mid-terms go as widely predicted the theory of over-reaching will be gauged by what a Republican House and Senate actually do, as opposed to talk about, to challenge Bidens likely policy of rule by veto and executive order and whether the Supreme Court is willing to hear any resultant cases.
Does anyone seriously expect McConnell and McCarthy to rock the boat let alone John Roberts and his “less conservative than we thought” colleagues.
Biden’s physical and mental decline would make it impossible for him to run for a second term even if he wasn’t so unpopular. Harris is clearly out of her depth and would be constantly forced to defend their failures.
So, my guess is that the Dems will be looking for another Obama. They’ll use Biden and Harris as blame sponges for the next two years, letting them soak up everything that’s toxic to the party’s brand while it quietly prepares their replacements. When the primaries begin, a young, telegenic candidate with no political baggage will suddenly come to the fore. The establishment media will roll out a carefully-prepared narrative of renewal and healing, and drop the previous four years down the memory hole.
Bidens cognitive decline was already well under way before he ran for president, I would be surprised if he is put up again in 2024 but then anything is possible these days. Although all things considered I am still with (the late) Pj O’Rourke: The Biden presidency is bad but a second term of Trump would have been worse.
With his mental derangement, foot in mouth syndrome, and poor judgement, Biden behaves like the caricature image the press had of Trump (as opposed to the reality of Trump’s governance). I did read something interesting on the Jacobin website recently, which despite being a far-left outlet, did make the good point that the US press have this model of ‘presidential behaviour’, but in recent history only really held Trump to account for not meeting these supposed norms. With Biden, Obama, the Bushes, Clinton etc they were a lot more accommodating.
I should probably explain what I meant by that.
We now have pure partisanship determining staffing (and heading) of all departments. Competency gets short shrift.
When I say “overreach”, what I mean is, these departments can no longer perform their functions with any actual technical competency. Our military is weak, our “science”-based departments have lost the science, and our social-based agencies push woke crap that has been shown conclusively not to accomplish what they claim, or even what they want. They cannot even perform partisan-based governing effectively.
You do need to put some competent people in place.
Yeah, Russia might have invaded Ukraine! Oh…
Actually it is hard to see how a second term of Trump could have been worse. And after all, Trump was annoyed so many NATO members were all under the required 2% defence spend, effectively free riding on the USA… well that has abruptly changed, kind of vindicating Trump once again.
Damn, please stop, I don’t even particularly like Trump but yet again I find myself having to defend him 😀
Spot on. Its noticeable in Western ‘democracies’ that candidates suddenly appear fully formed out of nowhere and are magically propelled into positions of power, usually when the masses are getting restless and look like voting for an outsider. Macron comes to mind. The Establishment Borg cannot countenance someone from outside their ranks gaining power, even nominal power. I suspect thats why in the UK they closed ranks against Corbyn, not because of his policies (they were grade A Leftist ones that the Establishment had no problems with), but because he wasn’t an insider, he might have gone off piste.
It is my worst fear that the process will be somewhat as follows:
1) Commie LaWhorish will be removed using some pretext. I have no idea what that might be, whether fake “health” reasons, corruption charges, whatever. It would not startle me to see her assassinated by left-wing operatives which is then covered up by accusing the right-wingers of having done it, complete with “evidence”, and I would guess that this has been discussed, but discarded. They’ll simply do something to remove her or blackmail her into resigning.
2) This allows “Biden” (Ron Klain et. al.) to appoint a new Veep. This is the toss-up as to who that might be. Obama? He could be appointed, and then when Step 3 is activated he could move right back into the Presidency without violating the twice elected clause. Moochelle? There’s a terrifying thought; I’ve rarely seen a more evil and meaner woman in my life. But whoever is appointed and then rubber-stamped by the Dem-wing Senate will be the next POTUS.
3) They’ll 25th gropey dopey Joe. Whoever replaced LaWhorish as Veep moves up a notch, and then gets to appoint yet another colletivist, statist authoritarian as the next Veep, who will be groomed for the 2024 election as POTUS.
Too conspiracy minded? The problem is, that almost everything that used to be a “conspiracty theory” for the last 6 years has turned out to be reality. Even the Babylon Bee can’t make stupid stuff up fast enough to keep abreast of reality today.
The easiest path to that would seem to be for Trump to become Speaker of the House, impeach Harris (reasons should not be hard to find), and remove Biden based on the Amendment whose number i don’t remember.
However, Trump has not declared an interest in running this year.
Well…not everyone.
Like who?
Why do you think that the least bad candidate the Dems could find in 2020 is a demented crook?
If we leave McConnell and McCarthy in leadership positions it will not matter if we win back all of congress. They are die-hard swamp rats and will sell us out in a New York minute. We all know Romney, Collins, Murkowski and Grahame will take turns torpedoing any useful laws or rules to bring us back toward Constitutional law. Then step up to the mike to tell us how lucky we are to have them in power. It’s sickening and gross! we just can’t seem to rid ourselves of the rino.
You know, Perry, about hating the sin but not the sinner.
In the same way, you can love the policies but ignore the personality of the man who pushed them. And i love Trump’s policies, not least because they made America more (Northern) European — in the areas in which (Northern) Europe is better, not in the areas where the US is better.
That is not to say that Trump did not make major tactical mistakes. Already in 2016, he should have announced that, should he win, he would appoint an independent commission investigating voting fraud by both parties; and should have challenged Hitlery to make the same commitment, and agree on who should lead the commission.
Trump actually DID few things of note. He was important for his tone, for the direction he gave, for the fear he inspired in the communists here, much less than for what he accomplished. He was more of a shot-across-the-bow than an actual invasion.
He was the only possibility without an actual constituency of his own, leaving the next presidential election still wide open to all of the competing Dems. Placeholder.
We’ll have you in a TRUMP! hat eventually.
Funny thing about Trump. No one really has huge problems with the things he did. Heck, he was a moderate Democrat most of his life.
They simply hate the sinner, but didn’t mind the sins.
https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendment/amendment-xxii
Okay…but could he be made VP?
But he (Obama) wouldn’t be constitutionally ineligible to the office of President since if he took over for Biden he wouldn’t be “elected”; merely assume the office by right of legal constitutional succession not election.
https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendment/amendment-xii
He could fill out the rest of Biden’s term (after he resigned/impeached/25th Amendment) but not be allowed to run again.
Sorry…but forcibly replacing Harris with Barack Obama then force Biden out doesn’t look like the worst case scenario to me. Comments welcome.
Because all Democrat politicians are demented and/or crooks. Most Republicans as well.
WRT the OP, i have some additional comments:
Can you look at yourself in a mirror and tell yourself that other people making lots of decisions for Biden, without assuming any responsibility for said decisions, might not be a bad thing?
Decouple from the US.
It should be obvious by now that every US ally is only one election away from being sold down the river.
One election away? We already had that election.
Shouldn’t Hunter take over from dad, North Korea style? After all, he has extensive experience negotiating with America’s enemies.
PS. It’s April the first.
Stick a fork in the US and the West in general. Demographics is destiny.
Biden was nothing more than a symptom of the ills plaguing the West. The stolen election has revealed all the festering problems. An entrenched, hostile bureaucracy and elite, a diverse population that is being pulled apart by ancient, historical forces, the woke-ism of progressivism taken to its extreme.
Millions voted for Biden. That’s how stupid the US has become.
“…..imagine Harris dealing directly with Co and Putin.”
Shirley, every man enjoys a blow job?
Still to suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome at this stage is pathetic. This is – very obviously – the reverse of the truth. A second term had a real possibility of draining some swamp (witness, for example, what Durham has managed to achieve even under Biden) – which was why it was an existential threat to the swamp leading to so openly-stolen an election.
I thought at the time in 2017 that Trump was very unwise to let the Dems step on his attempt to investigate the 2016 fraud. (That, for example, their attempt to find pro-Trump fraud in Michigan had to be hastily abandoned after they found ballot boxes reporting hundreds of votes for Hillary, but only some 50 ballots inside, made a natural stepping stone.) He thought, of course, he would win on his markedly superior economic and foreign policy record, and so devoted his time to achieving that. Without the pandemic’s excuse for blatant vote fraud, he would have won – and I no more foresaw the pandemic than he did. But it was a rash hostage to fortune not to put better defences against fraud in place.
Think of woke university admissions officers, explaining that all these technically-able Asian Americans they exclude have such personality flaws, whereas their BAME applicants may have (much) poorer test scores but got in on their superior, pleasanter more-rounded personalities. I offer the suggestion that this narrative is not merely exaggerated – it is the reverse of the truth.
Trump ran against Hillary Clinton and then against Joe Biden. The narrative told us how vile his personality was and how wonderful theirs were. I suggest to certain commenters here (Mila S in spades, of course – Snorri very much less, although I used his quote) that you think you saw through the whole narrative, but in fact some residual effect remains.
If that effect were cleared away, you may still be left thinking that a raffle of “dinner with Trump” to fund anti-vote-fraud efforts would see you deciding to donate your money directly instead. 🙂 You may still think that Donald-“you’re-fired”-Trump has traits sometimes useful in business and government and sometimes tedious in social interaction.
I too find myself having to defend him – and don’t feel the urge while doing so to ‘virtue-signal’ that I don’t like him (‘virtue-signal’ is too harsh for Snorri’s comment, not nearly harsh enough for Mila S’s – but it is the right phrase to clarify the point I am making).
Read my link above if you want to decide whether I don’t do this or just do it much more quietly. There are several reasons for that and one is that I feel the absurdity of doing it when the political ‘peer group’ is Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and the swamp.
A whole overview of Trump would indeed cover many points. I offer the suggestion that when brief comment responses to the claim that Biden’s first term is better than Trump’s second term would have been nevertheless feel the need on this blog (where everyone knows we’re not so keen on politicians in general) to affirm dislike of Trump, then it says more about the power of the narrative than about Trump.
When the primaries begin, a young, telegenic candidate with no political baggage will suddenly come to the fore.
Like who?
How about Swalwell? He’d be perfect, I mean he’s in bed with the Chinese already! (badoom-TISH!)
A telepromptergenic candidate would be a start!
Thinking of Biden always reminds me of the book The Throwback by Tom Sharp. They kidnap a taxidermist, get him drunk and he helps them to build an animatronic version of the deceased old godfather of the Flawse family. Think how much robotics technology has moved on since that was written.
There used to be an attraction in Disneyworld called the Hall of Presidents where animatronic figures bow in date order following which Lincoln and the current incumbent deliver short speeches.
The animatronic Biden would be a notable improvement on the real thing.
In the situation where a president is deemed “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office” under the 25th amendment the VP merely becomes acting president, not actually president. There is no vacancy in the office of vice president for one to be appointed, even if everyone involved believes there is no chance the president will ever be declared competent to resume his office. Harris has actually served as acting President already for an hour or so when Biden was under anesthesia for a medical procedure.
For a new vice president to be nominated the current VP must either resign or die (as was the case when Agnew resigned), or be sworn in as president after the death or resignation of the president (as was the case when Nixon resigned and Ford was sworn in as president).
Note that this means the Democrats cannot confirm a new VP at the moment without at least one Republican vote, as there cannot be a sitting Vice President to cast a tie-breaking vote in the Senate.
Even at his age, I think it is relatively unlikely that Biden will die in office before his term expires. Standard unisex mortality tables would put it around 10% or so, and his access to the best medical care and overall apparently good physical health should at least balance out the fact that he’s a man. I do think that if things got to the point where Biden was clearly incapable of continuing to serve that there would be enormous pressure for him to formally resign rather than be forcibly removed from office via section 4, specifically to allow the nomination of a new VP.
A final historical note – the original constitution did not actually specify whether the Vice President actually became President after the death or resignation of the President or simply took over the duties of the office in his function as Vice-President. The first time it came up, John Tyler declared that he was now President, and the precedent was accepted for obvious reasons, but that is why section 1 of the 25th amendment is a formal statement that the Vice-President becomes President in these situations.
He can be removed temporarily by a majority vote of his own cabinet for a period of I think 21 days. After that Congress pretty much would have to impeach him to remove him permanently. He (Obama) might just be able to persuade Biden to resign for “the good of the party” and spare himself the humiliation of being the only President impeached and removed from office. A Republican Congress (after November) just might in favor of say Barack Obama as VP (better than Harris). He (Obama) would be the ultimate “lame duck” unable to run for a third term and effectively hindered by a hostile Republican Congress.
I think Trump did have some solid achievements as president. He was very good with the US-Mexico border issue. If you don’t believe me, look at the train wreck Biden-Harris created there as soon as they reversed Trump’s policy. Despite obvious ideological differences, Trump seemed to have a better relationship with President AMLO in Mexico than Biden has as well. AMLO came out and put the blame for the border crisis on Biden’s policies, saying they caused the surge of migrants heading for it. Some have pointed out that Trump’s border policy would have been a standard democrat policy 25-30 years ago, which may be true, and suggests how far left the democrats are now.
Trump also managed to avoid getting the US involved in any further military conflicts. And he managed relations with China, Russia, North Korea, India, and most of the Middle East better than Grandpa Simpson currently in the White House is, despite the latter supposedly being surrounded by ‘the adults in the room’ (deep state apparatchiks).
I didn’t mind that much that he supposedly insulted many US allies, because many US allies have in the past few decades shown a combination of ungrateful dependence as well as at times embarrassing subservience to the US. Trump was right to call out that outside a few exceptions, NATO was treating the US taxpayer as a schmuck. He was completely right to point out the absurdity that America had thousands of soldiers in Germany to protect a country from Russia that handed over hundreds of millions of euros to Russia for energy, while underfunding its own military (and it could hardly claim poverty as it has spent the past twenty years rigging the eurozone to its own benefit).
He was also a lot smarter on trade and energy independence than his recent predecessors and successor.
Mr Joseph Biden was always a Big Government man, and he was always horribly corrupt.
Like so many politicians Mr Biden justified his corruption by holding that he “helped the people” and was just taking a bit off the top for himself and his family – a tiny percentage of the money he got “for the people”. But like Mayor Curley of Boston more than a century ago (after whom the “Curley Effect” in local government is named) – this defence is based upon a falsehood, the falsehood that Big Government “helps the people” – when it really HARMS the people, makes worse the poverty and social decay it claims to be fighting.
Now there are two other factors.
Mr Joseph Biden is now hopelessly senile – it is insanity (utter insanity) to have such a person as President of the United States, especially at this very sensitive time.
Also – Mr Joseph “the Big Guy” Biden’s long record of taking bribe money from interests in the Ukraine and the People’s Republic of China, makes it utterly unacceptable for him to be President of the United States at this time of war in the Ukraine (Mr Putin’s invasion) and the terrible threat of the People’s Republic of China to Taiwan and so many other nations.
Mr Joseph Biden must go – he has to go.
“But Paul – that means President K. Harris and she is awful” – I know, but that is what it will have to be.
President K. Harris it will have to be – till January 20th 2025.
As I think Martin well understands, that supposition was just the MSM and people like Angela Merkel colluding on their shared narrative – that was obvious on November 9th 2016. Trump wasn’t ‘one of us’ for either group and that was the ‘insult’.