It’s getting harder and harder to listen to the echo chamber complaining about President Biden and keep a straight face. If being old, showing your age, and misspeaking occasionally is a Biden shortcoming, then the same criteria certainly apply to Donald Trump, if not more so. Trump’s speeches are the most incoherent word salads imaginable coming from someone who is running for elected office. He jumbles words, constantly mixes up people and facts, and generally looks worse doing it than Fat Elvis ever did on stage. This weekend, he said, for like the tenth time, that he was running against Barack Obama.
Let’s ditch the age criticism of Biden. Considering who he is running against and the overall good job he’s been doing, it’s just a ridiculous issue to focus on. For Trump’s benefit, we’ll call it a draw. Let’s concede that we all wish we had two slightly younger candidates to choose from, but we don’t. I wish Trump had been impeached and convicted in the Senate for blatantly trying to subvert the will of the American people, barring him from running from office again. But it didn’t happen. Mitch McConnell and the majority of GOP senators lost their spines, got scared, and failed to vote their conscience. They all knew he was responsible for what happened. I also wish Biden would have stepped aside after one term and let someone else run to avoid all this age discussion, but he didn’t, and here we are now. Unless Nikki Haley can appeal to her party’s better angels and pull off a miracle, this will be our choice for President… the two old guys. So, for the sake of freedom and democracy here and abroad, for the sake of women’s right to control their own bodies, for the sake of our efforts to protect the environment and fight climate change, for the sake of the rule of law and national security, it’s time to get over Biden’s age. If not, you may lose all of those things just mentioned with a second Trump administration if you don’t vote for Joe just because you think he’s too old.
The stakes are too high to sit this one out or think about voting for some third party to lodge a protest vote. Granted, our political system is damaged in many ways and needs major reforms. We should all get rid of the Rs and Ds on our labels and register as independents. We need to implement open primaries and ranked-choice elections for all levels of government office to drain the resources from the extreme wings of both parties and push candidates more to the middle on issues. But unfortunately, these needed reforms won’t play a part this go around, and on top of that, this election isn’t about the regular issues we’re used to debating in the past. This election is a choice between, on one hand, freedom and democracy and, on the other hand, authoritarianism and violent retribution. As Joe Biden is fond of saying, “It’s not a joke, this is serious business.”
Even if you are feeling anger, frustration, and sadness over any one issue, particularly for a very complicated situation like the terrible war in Gaza started by Hamas’ mass slaughter, torture, and kidnapping of innocent Israeli citizens on October 7, 2023, it is still not worth withholding your support for Biden. This election is an existential threat to the future survival of our country, and what you would risk to yourself, to your family, and to the democratic / rule-of-law-based nation you live in by withholding your vote is far worse than anything that will be achieved by trying to make some point. The margins could be slim in some swing states, say Michigan. The room for error is small. It would be nothing short of cutting off your nose to spite your face.
It is time for all members of the Coalition of the Decent (the spectrum of voters from Progressives on one end to moderate-anti MAGA Republicans on the other end) who are inclined to vote for Joe Biden in the fall to stand up and say it loud and proud, “Joe Biden is doing a helluva job running the country in an incredibly challenging and crazy world.” He isn’t perfect, but he is steady, and he does deliver. Sure, he has his critics from some on the left and the right who will always be upset about this or that one issue. However, he accomplished more in his first term than Trump could have dreamed of in his first term. Trump failed to deliver on infrastructure, was unable to reverse the Affordable Care Act (which the majority of Americans support), and failed to lead on comprehensive immigration reform despite having control of both houses of Congress for a time. And how about that Build the Wall debacle, which was never a solution to the problem? As they say in Texas, Donald Trump is all hat and no cattle. He’s all talk, but not much else. What else would you expect from a disgraced reality TV show host convicted of financial fraud?
Joe Biden signed into law multiple bipartisan bills: Gun safety legislation, the Chips Act, which strengthens our semiconductor and manufacturing sector, and a monumental infrastructure bill that no president has been able to do in recent history. The Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law on August 16, 2022, has already created hundreds of thousands of jobs in the renewable energy sector, which is marching forward into the future despite the footdragging and climate change denial from the far-right minority in this country.
Biden also supported a tough border security bill crafted by conservatives’ conservative Republican Senator James Lankford from Oklahoma and backed by the organization representing border patrol agents themselves. It was gaining popularity among lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and was on its way to being passed until the Republicans got scared, and support for it was torpedoed by King Chaos himself. Trump, of course, would rather keep alive a campaign issue to run on than solve problems and help the American people.
Joe Biden is Supporting our Nato allies and Ukraine, who are fighting to defend freedom and democracy against a murderous dictator, Vladimir Putin. We’ve already wisely invested billions in helping the Ukrainians defend the Russian invasion of their sovereign territory for the last two years. But Trump and his isolationist MAGA morons in Congress seem not to understand the lessons of history. Tainted by Trump’s peculiar and perverted obsession with the authoritarian thug Putin, they’d be content it appears to let Russia just roll across Europe, putting us in the position of having to spend even more money and fight the Russians firsthand eventually, anyway. Donald Trump is pushing for an idiotic, reckless, and dangerous foreign policy stance that diminishes the standing of America in the world.
What happened, Republicans, to the principled positions you used to hold near and dear? With all of the dangers facing the world, why would you choose to embolden the enemies of Western democracy and freedom? And speaking of principles, how could you continue to support someone who, on numerous occasions, has insulted and disparaged our wounded military veterans? How could you ignore such disgusting sentiments from someone wanting to be Commander in Chief again? With all of the brain power and talent that exists in the party, how could you continue to choose this fools-gold plated buffoon over Nikki Haley or any number of other options?
Joe Biden is overseeing one of the most successful economies we have ever seen. America is experiencing record-low unemployment and record corporate profits, and the stock market is at all-time highs. Rich people are richer than they ever have been. Their stock and real estate portfolios are doing better than ever, so spare me the whining and crocodile tears about the economy, at least those coming from the wealthy. This talking point about a bad economy from Trump and MAGA world is disingenuous and laughable at best and, at worst, is maliciously deceitful and highly delusional. Make no mistake about it, Trump was hoping for a recession or worse before the election to aid his chances. Just like the immigration issue, he would rather things be worse for the American people if it helps him out.
Sure, prices on some things are still up, but they go up year over year anyway. They’re never going back down to prepandemic levels, but inflation has decreased significantly. Supply chain issues, shortages, and frankly, corporate greed (companies using the pandemic and existing inflation as an excuse to raise their prices beyond what their cost increases justify; this is one of the biggest underreported aspects of the inflation story) were the main factors pushing up inflation. Those have mostly worked themselves out, except for the corporate greed part. That’s a significant contributing factor to the record profits companies have been seeing; it’s not a coincidence. It’s all very complicated, but the bottom line is that inflation is not Joe Biden’s fault. Let’s be fair and honest here. Trump bungled the pandemic response, making the economic fallout worse than it would have been. He then also passed a pandemic relief bill, which played some part in stimulating the economy (as intended) and driving up inflation slightly, just as the Biden administration’s package did. So let’s not forget it wasn’t just Biden delivering economic stimulus.
So, let’s all slam back a tall glass of tasty reality here. Donald Trump is almost the same age and is demonstrably more mentally confused than Biden. He is also crazy and not in a good way, and is very dangerous to the safety of our country and the world at this critical juncture in history. Also, let’s dispel the myth that Donald Trump, the king of bankruptcy, the fuhrer of financial fraud and inflated assets, is better for the economy, for American workers, for the stock market, or anything else for that matter. He is not. This is a false perception held by some Americans, but it will shift as more and more people become aware of the facts. In general, among American voters, their finances are improving. Unemployment is low, and wages are up; these are some of the facts of Biden’s economy. One final point regarding the economy: the last time I checked, it wasn’t particularly good for the health of American business or the stock market to be normalizing and promoting national violence, undermining the rule of law that should apply to all of us, and overthrowing the democratically elected government of the United States. When were any of these things that Trump regularly promotes good for any of us?
If the choice we are still left with in November is these two old guys, then we all need to remember what the stakes are and tune out the noise about the age thing, considering it is a wash for both candidates. The news media should report more of the facts regarding the strong economy under Biden and less about Americans’ perceptions which can change quickly. We all need to honestly and thoroughly consider the records and moral characters of both men. There are stark differences between the two. If that happens, I’m confident that most Americans will vote for sanity and President Joe Biden again, just like they did in 2020 by over 7 million votes. I wonder if Trump will remember who he is running against when he gives his next rambling, hate-filled MAGA campaign speech. Will it be Biden, or will it be Obama or Hillary? Maybe this time, it will be Romney or even John McCain he thinks he is running against. Poor, poor Trump. He’s just more confused and desperate by the day.