August 20, 2024

THE NO-LONGER READY FOR PRIMETIME PLAYER: The Accidental President Shuffles Off the Stage.

It was less a roar than a long series of shouts, a reheated collection of his greatest hits from the period since he reemerged as a presidential candidate in 2019. Biden pointed, hectored, bellowed, and glared. The president had been done dirty by his own party and the convention organizers, and he wasn’t interested in hiding his peevish mood.

“You can’t love your country only when you win.” “There’s no place for political violence in America! “We finally beat big Pharma!” “[Trump] never built a damn thing!” “Great jobs, right here in America! With every new job and new factory, pride and hope are returning to America’s communities!” “Wall Street didn’t build America! The middle class built America! And unions built the middle class!” “‘Suckers and losers!’ Who does he think he is? Who does he think he is?” “We just have to remember who we are! We’re the United States of America, and there’s nothing we cannot do when we do it together!” *

Our Noah Rothman noticed that a lot of Biden’s rhetoric was recycled from his “remarks about the continued battle for the soul of the nation” at Independence Hall in September 2022. Other parts felt recycled from this year’s State of the Union Address.

Perhaps the most significant line was one that was ad-libbed: “Those protesters out in the street, they’ve got a point.”

In one final, absurdly shameless insult from his party, Biden took the stage at 11:26 p.m. Eastern time, pushed out of the prime-time window by an inordinately long list of can’t-miss Democratic Party all-stars like Secretary of Commerce Gina M. Raimondo, childhood friends of Kamala Harris Stacey Johnson-Batiste and Doris Johnson, Maryland representative Jamie Raskin, Texas representative Jasmine Crockett, Kentucky governor Andy Beshear, Georgia senator Raphael Warnock, and Delaware senator Chris Coons, before we got to Biden’s wife Jill and daughter Ashley.

Now, West Coasters might be shrugging, but there was a time when finishing by 11 p.m. Eastern was important for the local news and, after that, The Tonight Show. And even today, all other things being equal, you would rather that audiences in the Eastern time zone — you know, in states like Pennsylvania and Michigan and Georgia and North Carolina — could watch your best featured speakers.

The not-so-subtle signal was that Democrats didn’t want anyone to watch Joe Biden’s speech live. And it’s hard to begrudge them that trepidation, as his last appearance in prime time was such an unmitigated disaster that it led to him quitting the race.

I’m sure Joe’s late speech was merely a coincidence; a victim of bad planning and long-running speeches throughout the day. I mean, just ask Nancy what happened to John Gill: Pelosi Admits She Put Old Joe Out to Pasture When He Was No Longer Useful.

* And: Biden Repeats the ‘Very Fine People’ Line in His ‘Hero’s Goodbye.’

Which seems like an odd thing to bring up, given that (a) the smear against Trump has been debunked by Snopes, and (b) referencing it yet again reminds people that it’s Charlottesvilles all the way down in Joe Biden’s America:

Related: Daniel Greenfield on [INSERT SCARY MUSIC HERE] The Night of the Living Democrat Dead.

UPDATE:

Posted at 10:35 am by Ed Driscoll