You have to hand it to the artless dodger. Trump managed to get an insurance company to put up a bond for the 83 million he owes E. Jean Carroll in a defamation settlement so that he can appeal the decision. Now for someone to come up with the 435 million he owes New York in the fraud settlement. He already has been trying to move assets out of the state so that New York officials can't seize them but Trump Tower is pretty hard to move.
Meanwhile, the list of infamous persons who feel that Trump has been wronged grew this week to include conspiracy theory emeritus Oliver Stone. It's rather ironic as just four short years ago, Stone described Trump as a "mad King Lear," noting that there is something "vastly wrong with his ego." Sounds like a movie is starting to swirl around in Stone's addled mind.
The list of distractions doesn't stop there. RFK Jr. announced to the world that he will be presenting his Vice-Presidential nominee on March 26. Those shortlisted include New York Jets quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, an outspoken antivaxxer, and Jesse "The Body" Ventura, for no apparent reason. I would think Rodgers a long shot, as he is committed to play for the Jets this fall unless of course he goes down in the first game of the season like he did last year after suffering an ignominious sack.
This reminds me of the old Reform Party that Ross Perot started back in 1995. It's still around if you can believe it. Ventura had been a potential candidate back in 2000, as had Donald Trump, but eventually conservative pundit Pat Buchanan got the nod after Perot decided not to run again. Kennedy would fit in perfectly with this crowd but has chosen to run as an independent.
Looking at this from the outside, I just have to scratch my head and wonder how any American could vote for these idiots. Sure, Joe Biden is old, but these guys are just plain wacky. At least Joe can hold himself together for an hour while delivering a speech and not drift off onto numerous tangents that leave you wondering if this guy is alright.
I thought Joe knocked his SOTU address out of the park, as did most mainstream political pundits Thursday night. Throughout the speech, Republicans catcalled Joe and tried to throw him off stride, but he deflected each and everyone of the hecklers, most notably Marjorie Taylor Greene. Not only did Old Joe say Laken Riley's name, but he held up the pin MTG had given him earlier, and personally addressed Laken's parents in the television audience. However, the Republicans called his speech divisive and highly partisan. Hmmm?
The biggest takeaway from his SOTU address was that he was in full command of his faculties, not the "well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory," as Robert Hur described in his report. Of course everyone has a different take on the transcripts that were released last week in anticipation of a House investigation into Hur's report. Republicans were angry that Hur found no grounds to press charges. Democrats were angry that Hur went to such great lengths to characterize the president. And you had your Mister In-Betweens who like to play both sides of the argument. First impressions may stick and Republicans will take away what they want from these transcripts. However, the SOTU address dispelled any notion that Biden isn't up for the job.
Not so sure about Trump or Kennedy or Cornell West or the slew of other candidates trying to unseat him. Even Jill Stein is running again after making a shameful spectacle of herself back in 2016. She was caught at the same Moscow dinner party with Putin as was Michael Flynn, which makes you wonder where her allegiances lie.
Then like now, Putin appears to be bankrolling a number of candidates, hoping to siphon votes away from Biden while elevating his main man Donald. Of course Vlad has been coy about it. Very coy in claiming he would prefer Biden, hoping that this might turn off a few voters in "purple states" like Wisconsin. Every little bit helps as Biden only won the state by 20,000 votes in 2020. In 2016, Stein garnered 31,000 votes. Just enough to tilt the state in Trump's favor, assuming her votes would have gone to Hillary.
The biggest fear Democrats have going into November is that these third party and independent candidates can play spoilers as they did in 2016. Hard to say who they draw from most. Kennedy with all his heavily laden conspiracy theories would seem to draw votes away from Trump but Cornell West might erode Biden's support among Black voters. As such, the DNC has set up a special committee to attack these insurgency campaigns, which they discounted eight years ago.
Meanwhile we see all these quixotic polls with Trump up one day and Biden the next. I was trying to remember where I last saw something like this and it was 2012. Throughout most of the year Romney led Obama in the polls, but then came Mitt's infamous 47 percent speech, in which he called nearly half of the nation freeloaders. His poll numbers plummeted but then he gave a fiery first debate performance and he was back up again. This was October mind you. Many thought Obama would go down in November but he won by pretty much the same margins as in 2008, taking both Ohio and Florida if you can believe it. Mitt certainly couldn't. He thought he had Ohio in the bag. A stunned Karl Rove was notably perturbed when Fox called the state for Obama relatively early in the evening. Obama won Ohio by more than 150,000 votes. Not only that but the Democrats held onto the Senate despite having to defend 22 seats to the Republicans 11.
Safe to say you can't count the sitting president out until all the votes are counted. This was certainly the case for Harry Truman back in 1948, perhaps the biggest upset in presidential history. Many pundits are now comparing Joe to Harry and saying he can very well pull off a similar sweeping victory in November. Truman clobbered Dewey, and given all the bad press Trump will be getting this summer that very well may be the case again.
Trump can say what he wants and he can get shameless pariahs like Oliver Stone to defend him, but here is where "first impressions really stick," and that is that Trump is a liar and a fraud and a sexual abuser and a great number of other things, none of them positive.
Biden was very smart to strike an optimistic note in his SOTU address and compare his forward thinking message to Trump's vengeful anachronistic message that he was wronged in 2020. That's because Americans prefer optimism and this is something Trump is incapable of giving. His has always been a politics of retribution, much like his pal in Moscow.
Give 'em hell, Joe!
Comments
Post a Comment