Why I'm sticking with Joe Biden
If you dropped in here today hoping I would throw rocks at Joe Biden for his performance in this week's presidential debate, you can move along. Four months out from the most important election of our lifetimes, I simply have no damn time for that reactionary childishness, silliness, or you.
If you are looking for that kind of toxic write, I’ll be the bigger man and point you to The New York Times and The Washington Post where their ace columnists are currently falling all over themselves, and using their keyboards like steam shovels to bury Biden for good.
These are good times over at The Big Two, where their smirking gloaters are having a time of it pouring gasoline on the fires they have helped start, and telling us how sorry they are to do it.
On a day that the Radical-Right, 6-3 Supreme Court is using a flamethrower to do some very real and long-lasting damage to our vulnerable country, our national newspapers of record have decided to marshal their editorial forces to obliterate Joe Biden for his inability to crack through the barrage of steady lies that came at the American public from all directions last night by the sociopathic fascist the Republicans are running as their best bet to wreck this country for good.
Donald Trump hulked over his lectern and doubled down on his support for the deadly KKK rally in Charlottesville, saying “it was made up,” … the people who attacked our country on January 6, saying “What they’ve done to some people that are so innocent, you (Biden) ought to be ashamed of yourself. You’ve destroyed the lives of so many people,” … and saying that immigrants are “taking Black and Hispanic jobs,” which was undoubtably music to the ears of every bigot in this country.
Trump lied about everything last night. As a colleague of mine put it, “He lied about the economy. He lied about foreign policy. He lied about his record. He lied about his crimes. He lied about women’s rights. He lied about immigration. He lied about his lies. He lied about our soldiers he disrespected. He lied about law enforcement attacked by his supporters. He lied about who he has had sex with. He lied about his racism. He lied about our country.”
Trump told more than 50 big lies during the debate, which over the course of 90 minutes works out to more than one every two minutes. This is roughly on par with the 30,573 lies he told during his disastrous presidency that we barely survived from 2016-2020.
Why isn’t this is the most noteworthy thing people are talking about this morning? Have we really normalized projectile lying and vomiting?
For those of you who have stayed and are still reading, I also want to make it clear that I am not here to gaslight you: Joe Biden did not look good last night, particularly at the outset, when it was clear he was packing plenty of disgust, but not near enough statesmanship and decorum to rise above the raging dumpster fire on his left.
Biden too often looked like the repulsed grandfather at the dinner table, who would have rather been anywhere else than listening to the crazy, old racist with the dead ferret taped to his head seated across from him spitting all over everybody’s carefully prepared meal.
It was hard to watch.
The repulsive Trump did and said nothing that should have surprised Biden, yet it took him fully half the debate before he’d finally had enough, and started laying into the America-attacking racist, who’s steady barrage of heated, noxious lies were beginning to melt the silverware.
I am not sure how to explain this, except to say this very good man looked and sounded old because he is, which was the least surprising thing I saw last night.
His campaign said he had a cold, which is certainly plausible, but they would have served themselves (and us) better if they let us know that before the debate, and not during it.
It just sounded like a cheap excuse this way.
Have we heard yet from the Republican Party why Trump looked and sounded like a racist, who had just emerged from getting an orange spray tan from David Duke?
I’ll wait …
So Biden had a bad debate. Barack Obama had a bad debate in 2012 against Mitt Romney, and there are still four-letter adjectives hanging in the air over my den where I watched that colossal disappointment.
Romney hammered Obama, who did and said virtually nothing. It was truly shocking.
Not one Democrat or liberal columnist from the two papers I mentioned above called for Obama to step down the next day. We all wanted — needed — him to improve during the next debate, and sure enough he did, walloping Romney twice before winning the election in a landslide.
“Bad debate nights happen. Trust me I know,” Obama said this afternoon. “But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself.”
Amen.
It doesn’t feel like it, but there is still plenty of time before November, and I will bet everything I have that Biden will rise to the occasion and do what is necessary to win the election.
Losing is not an option.
To give up on him now after one tough night, would be pathetically shortsighted, and do enormous harm to the unified approach we will need to prevail on this mine-strewn political battlefield.
You have to be old and wise to remember this, but the split Democratic Conventions in 1968 and 1980, resulted in devastating losses for Democrats, and ushered in Republicans Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.
Who in their right mind wants a repeat of that?
Just this morning, Biden spoke at a rally in North Carolina and acknowledged, “I don’t debate as well as I used to, but I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done. The choice in this election is simple. Donald Trump will destroy our democracy. I will defend it.”
Any disagreements there, folks?
South Carolina’s king-making congressman, James Clyburn, also came out this morning and put all this Biden stepping down bullshit to bed saying, “(Democrats) should chill out, and stay the course. He’s the best Democrat we got.”
Like many of us, Clyburn called Biden’s poor performance, “Strike one, but if this were a ball game he’s got two more swings.”
I’ll reference again, the Obama-Romney contest. Four months is an eternity in politics.
Not to be outdone, the great Nancy Pelosi put it this way today: “(Biden) got off to a bad start, but I thought he came through OK on the issues later,” before adding, “I think that on his worst night, his presentation of integrity was far better than the other guy’s dishonesty.”
Now you can say that Pelosi and Clyburn are old, and you’d be right, but if that is your reason for doubting their judgment, then maybe there is something else at play here, and if that’s the case, that is an ugly indictment on you, and not them or Joe Biden.
Four more years.
NOW READ: ‘This was awful’: Congressional Dems deflated after Biden debate disaster
D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. Follow @EarlofEnough and on his website.