During an event held in honor of D-Day soldiers, alongside French President Emmanuel Macron, the leader of the Free World, President Biden, appeared to have a ‘senior moment’ as he stooped awkwardly, leading some to speculate that he may have had an unfortunate accident. The same thing happened a few days prior when he was taking questions from the White House press on his way to the presidential helicopter. Videos and images went viral on X and other social media platforms, inviting scorn and responses sympathetic to President Biden and suggesting that Dr. Jill Biden and the Democrats were subjecting him to elder abuse.
Back to Europe: at a G7 event to witness the skill of paratroopers, President Biden seemed to wander after a paratrooper had safely landed. The Italian Prime Minister politely rescued him, brought him back a few steps, and nudged him to face the cameras. Biden, with a practiced pair of hands, immediately hid his face behind aviator glasses. Later, when the Pope visited the G7 meeting, Biden greeted him unusually by touching his forehead to the Pope's, clearly causing the Pope to cringe.
When Biden speaks in public, he often ends up mangling the words off the Tel-e-prompter so badly that they appear complete gibberish. Speaking at the Juneteenth White House event to celebrate African-American history, he said the following, according to a transcript released by the NY Post:
0:00 : she know long she knows so long as that
0:02: she was denied or Freedom can never be
0:05: secured she know long she knows so long
0:08: as was denied our freedom can never be
0:11: secured she know long she knows so long
0:14: as was denied our freedom can never be
0:17: secured she know long she knows so long
0:20: as that she was denied our freedom can
0:22: never be secured
The world sees a near-senile chief executive struggling to hold his own in front of short-duration press conferences where some of the questions appear to have been revealed to the White House in advance. Biden has slipped and fallen so many times while climbing steps to board Air Force One that his aides now make him use the shorter flight of stairs at the rear of the plane.
As we noted in an editorial earlier this week, Special Counsel Robert Hur released a damning report billing him as a 'well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.' Numerous critics suggested that Biden's unusually energetic State of the Union speech was possible only because he had popped stimulants to keep him active during the ceremony.
These critics haven't silenced Biden's loyal cabinet officials, who are constantly on TV, insisting that Biden is directing administration decisions on such ground-breaking and novel questions as using interest payments on frozen Russian assets to package a loan for Ukraine or preparing America to respond to aggressive actions by Russia, including the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons.
Speaking on Face the Nation, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan continued to name-drop Biden as if Biden was really in charge. The interview seemed surreal. Two examples:
On Israel: Look, Margaret, by far the most effective, certain, and right way to get all of the hostages out is to get a comprehensive cease-fire and hostage deal that President Biden described in public a few days ago, that Israel has accepted, and now that we are awaiting Hamas to respond to.
On the US permitting Ukraine to use US weapons to be fired into Russia around Kharkiv: What I will just say is this, from the President's perspective, this was common sense. What was happening up around Kharkiv, which was new just in the last couple of months, was a Russian offensive where they were moving from one side of the border directly to the other side of the border, and it simply didn't make sense not to allow the Ukrainians to fire across that border, to hit Russian guns and emplacements that were firing at the Ukrainians. So, the President authorized that.
The White House has had a history of hiding presidential illnesses from the public to project an image that Presidents are healthy, able, and active. Woodrow Wilson's stroke in 1919 was largely kept secret from the public. His wife, Edith Wilson, and his physician, Dr. Cary Grayson, played significant roles in concealing his condition. Franklin D. Roosevelt's declining health during his fourth term, when he suffered from polio and cardiovascular disease, was not fully disclosed to the public. When Dwight D. Eisenhower had a heart attack in 1955, it was initially downplayed as an upset stomach.
But, in President Biden's case, his doctors tell us that he is healthy enough to run for a second term and complete his term in office, although he would be 85 years old when he hands over the presidency to the winning candidate in the 2028 election. No responsible individual can accept the idea that President Biden is currently in charge of the White House's important domestic and foreign policy decisions, far less the idea that he can serve another four-year term.
Biden's public appearances have made America a laughing stock as the world's wealthiest democracy continues to weaken in its global standing. Most of the world, other than G7 leaders, believes that America is needlessly pursuing a war in Ukraine, propping up a leader in Zelenskyy whose elected term expired on May 19. Further, most of the world is critical of the way the rudderless White House has conducted diplomacy and the war in Gaza.
In Biden, the world sees a weak leader in the White House who is neither trustworthy nor stable in his convictions or mental faculty. It was no surprise to many when Saudi Arabia announced that it would not renew its 50-year petro-dollar deal with the United States, which expired on Sunday, 9 June 2024. Just a week earlier, the Kingdom had announced that it was joining BIS and a China-led central bank digital currency project to move oil trading away from the dollar.
The Biden campaign has engineered a tightly controlled debate environment at CNN on June 27 to dispel fears that Biden is incapable of remaining president. Two reliable moderators who have been bitter critics of Trump—Dana Bash and Jake Tapper—and an environment where microphones would be automatically cut off after the allowed time are intended to help Biden. There will be no audience to cheer or jeer, so Biden can recite memorized words regardless of the questions asked.
The world will be watching.
