Explaining Joe Biden

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While the James Webb telescope probes the depths of uncharted space in search of (among other things) extraterrestrial life, it's also possible to find weird and confusing alien lifeforms much closer to us.
The topic of this topic is looking for an explanation of what's going on with de facto President sleepy Joe.

>1 Kuiperdolin: You mean the playful president who pretend-nipped his wife's finger as a joke when she was speaking and waving her hands in front of him? Yeah, because a husband and wife being playful together (non-sexually) in public is a BAD thing. Did you also think the video of Ocasio-Cortez dancing while in college was disturbing?

Not the same thing to lick women in public while running for POTUS and to fool around in college (especially at a party school).

Is that one his wife too?

> 3 Obviously not his wife, but equally obviously not inappropriate unless you've got leanings the wrong way yourself. He's looking over the girl's shoulder at a set of signing pens, with her sitting probably on his knee. And, he's SURROUNDED by people. There is nothing wrong with that, other than the sickness instilled in our society regarding men showing non-sexual affection towards children or other adults.

As far as "licking women in public" -- really? Nipping her finger is "licking women in public"? I guess kissing your wife, or hugging her in public is also inappropriate? That is a very sad world.

I should add, all of this is not to say that I think Biden is perfect. I think he's made a number of women uncomfortable with overly familiar gestures. I've seen the same in a lot of older folks - but that doesn't make it okay. If the person at the other end feels uncomfortable, you shouldn't do it.

This thread reminds me of the hoopla over the Obama's fist bumps... well back before the Surreal years during which a FLOTUS refused to live with her notoriously abusive husband.

Anyway, what is that photo from? A Google Images search says it's showing a silly moment in Jill Biden's introduction of her husband at a campaign stop in Iowa, at the end of 2019.

Wasn't that when the loudest conservatives were pretending Joe Biden was nowhere to be seen? Is that why the photo is being shared now as it's new?

It is nice to see a public couple which contains two people who actually connect with each other in a personal way. Biden is not a crazy orange-faced dude and Jill is not a human mannequin playing an arm-candy role in a dude's public life.

Rather than obsessing about old photographs, why not address issues? How about this one?

Biden’s failure to address press freedom issues on Mideast tour leaves journalists more vulnerable

The Committee to Protect Journalists expressed dismay Monday that President Joe Biden failed to meaningfully address press freedom and journalists’ rights during his Middle East tour last week. “The U.S. effectively shrugged its shoulders over the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, did not push for the release of journalists jailed in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and did not commit to an FBI-led investigation into the killing of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh”...

I'm always comforted when the right-wing thought machine instructs its willing pawns to attack someone like Biden. It's usually a good indication of their fear. See, for example, their attacks on Obama and both Clintons. All of them flawed, all of them deeply effective, all of them attacked mindlessly by people who believe what they're told to believe and completely incapable of independent thought. And Biden is really no exception, as you can tell from the attacks on him.

However, I did have cause to worry last week when I saw a story in the Times suggesting that Biden had actually made some sort of deal with the Kentucky Tortoise over judges - something to do with a nonentity called, if this isn't too perfect, "Chad Meredith". If Biden is willing to trust McConnell to stick to any deal he makes, I do have to wonder if maybe it's time for him to step aside. Not because he's "too old", but because he's too decent. He wants to trust McConnell because maybe once upon a time McConnell was a human being, and he doesn't realize that those days are long gone.

I do believe Biden could be too old for a second term. He is also too 'old school' and too cautious for the type of era the GOPers are foisting on America in their power-at-any-cost cult mission. The present-day GOP is not the party our grandparents may have supported.

>9 kiparsky: Part of the problem is people who tend to vote democratic do respond to these attacks too. It's about perception and also getting at voters who haven't registered as either democratic or republican. A for instance is the worry over whether Sanders for instance could beat the republican nominee because he's a 'socialist' whatever that term means to whoever. He certainly would fall a bit short of that in some if not most European countries but the scrutiny here is such that that really strikes home with a lot of people. So that worry upgrades among Democrats too and yet as soon Biden/Harris become a thing they become socialists too and as nonsensical as that is (when looking at their histories) on the right at least that sticks. Whatever fear there is on all sides gets spread around. People should understand the things they want from their government....the kinds of policies they'd like to see and/or the possibilities of what any individual candidate might do for them.

The Republican Party has given up on any forward thinking policy. If it means getting elected they would turn us into a theocratic ethno-state. They don't believe in Climate Change. They believe in God. They don't believe women should have rights or gay people should exist. They believe in God. They don't talk about infrastructure. They talk about their gun rights. Christian religiosity, male domination, white supremacy and guns. That's just about their entire shtick. Our Sharia Court is more than happy to fall in line with that.

>11 lriley: Part of the problem is people who tend to vote democratic do respond to these attacks too.

I completely agree! In fact, I think that's the point of them, they are meant to undermine confidence in someone by instilling irrational concerns about them.
The term for this in software is "FUD" - the aim of the attack is to sow "fear, uncertainty and doubt". This was originally coined, if I remember right, to refer to attacks on open-source software: "open-source software won't work, who's going to maintain it, who's going to fix the bugs, how can you trust this stuff?". (Of course, it turned out to be nonsense, but it worked, to a degree, for a time)

We talked about books in "Explaining Donald Trump" and think we can do the same here.

I don't know as much about these works. They come up in recommendations but not as much in conversations. (I usually avoid reading full books about politicians except when they're picked in homeschooling lessons.)

I see in a LT site search that Jill Biden wrote the children's picture book Joey: The Story of Joe Biden. (How cute! Imagine doing this for your spouse after hitting Bestseller lists for other books.)

(Former Vice) President Joe Biden himself is credited with several autobiographies, including Promise Me, Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose (2018) about his family's struggles with Beau Biden's fight and loss against brain cancer.

>8 John5918: That picture's more recent than your journalist's alleged murder. You're obsessed.

>14 Kuiperdolin:

In my post I refer to journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, a US citizen who was killed by Israeli forces on 11 May 2022. Last time I looked, 2022 was more recent than 2019.

You also referred to the Jamal Khashoggi which was 2018.

Anyway here's a fact: Joe Biden was born closer to Abraham Lincoln's presidency than his own.

Many people don't know that.

>17 Kuiperdolin: Is there a point you're trying to make here? Or is this just the sort of trivia you come out with when you've planted your foot squarely in a turd of your own devising and feel a sudden burning need to change the subject?

>17 Kuiperdolin: I didn't previously know that. I checked the math, and, yes, it's true.

1942 - 1865 = 77 years
(specifically, ~76.6 as that's Nov - Apr)

2021 - 1942 = 79 years
(or, as his inauguration was in Jan, its ~78.2)

78 > 77

Joe Biden is also almost a third the age of the United States of America (created in 1776)!

For comparison with another person, Donald Trump (b. 1946) is about three and a half years younger than his presidential successor.

I think such math facts suggest that widely known historical events are closer, likely more influential, than many people feel they are. As another example, both Biden and Trump came of age during the civil rights movement in the 1960s, while Barack Obama was still a young child in the very new state of Hawai'i (est. 1959).

No idea how any of this "explains" anything about the current president, though.

somehow posted twice

Quit Underestimating President Biden
Newt Gingrich | November 30, 2022

If Republicans are going to successfully work through the next two years in Congress – and win the presidency in 2024 – we need to look much more deeply at what worked and what did not work in 2020 and 2022...

https://www.gingrich360.com/2022/11/30/quit-underestimating-president-biden/

>21 margd: I would suggest to Newt---quit overestimating republican extremism. Such as his democrats 'grossly exaggerating the threat to abortion rights'. Really the fact is Newt has always been about cultural warfare.....and he's always been very thin on real policy and his party has just gotten more and more extreme. This battle against the 'woke' what does it even mean? It's just a code word for a bunch of unreal bullshit that's supposed to gin up anger amongst their base. If you're not part of that base critical race theory for instance isn't a thing at all. If you're not part of that base someone deciding to live a transgender lifestyle is their fucking business and you leave them alone to do what they want. Even if I were still religious I wouldn't feel my religion threatened by that at all. Why would it be? Why do so many christians feel threatened by the Jewish or Muslim religions? The extremism of so many republicans these days are anti-people---whether it's women, the gay community, black people, hispanics---particularly Mexicans and Central Americans, Asians, Jews, Muslims and he thinks it's Joe Biden? Sure Biden has been a breath of fresh air since Trump but who wouldn't have been? Again the canard that Joe Biden is some kind of a socialist. Would that he really were! Keep on telling yourself and anyone who'll listen this shit Newt. Grimgrich is nowhere near the truth on anything. His analysis is just more lying to himself. Maybe he should take a look at the clowns in his own party. A serious look at Trump or MTG---his pal Herschel.

>22 lriley: Oh, I know! Just thought it amusing that Newt at least realizes Rs were swatting at gnats (Joe's "eccentricities", Hunter's laptop) while the elephants (Dems) ran by. Crazy / demented like a fox? (Or at least capable of picking good staff--and listening to them.)

>23 margd: They can win in rural areas and rural states. They can win in the South....at least most places. They can win with voter suppression and redrawing districts to their own favor......but they're not going to win a majority of the population nationwide and the further out their ideas go the more people they'll drive away.

^ OP, etc.

What if sleepy Joe gets reelected? And what if Pepto Abysmal finally gets his just desserts and winds up wearing a matching orange suit?

What then? Will you fade away then, like a gorilla in the mists? Or will you hang around and keep on Karening up the place?

You bore normal people.