Tim Blair: Joe Biden burns his bogus caring elder credibility

Is blundering Joe Biden the worst US president in living memory – or the best David Brent impersonator ever to occupy the White House? Tim Blair dives into the bizarre world of US politics.

As Donald Trump was being arrested in Georgia last week, US President Joe Biden’s official X account sprang into action.

“Apropos of nothing,” it cheerfully announced, “I think today’s a great day to give to my campaign.”

Now, I’m no ABC-approved fact checker or government-appointed misinformation analyst, but it may well be that Biden was not the author of that little note.

Consider the evidence.

Firstly, operating an effective online account requires a basic awareness of one’s surroundings and an ability to place events in some form of broader context.

US President Joe Biden was widely panned for his words in Hawaii. Picture: Mandel NGAN/AFP

That’s Biden out of the frame almost immediately.

Secondly, when it comes to campaign donations, Biden has little need to beg. Why would he, when President Joe can always draw from a plentiful “10 per cent for the big guy” fund set up by his methed-up moneybags son Hunter?

And thirdly, Biden in his present diminished condition would likely not use the word “apropos”. Even hearing it, he’d probably think someone was offering him some apples. Or ropes. Or apes. And he’d say yes to all three.

Yet the mystery of who wrote Biden’s social media message may never be solved. Particularly because the mainstream press, generally supportive of left-leaning politicians, is wedded entirely to their darling Joe.

Donald Trump’s official mugshot after surrendering himself. Supplied: Twitter.

It’s a long-observed truism that, in US media terms, bad things are caused by conservative Republican politicians. They’re active agents of badness.

By contrast, bad things merely happen to lefty Democrats, the media’s eternal angels of innocence.

Trump was therefore blamed for Covid. “The US president’s actions have exacerbated the pandemic that has killed more than 200,000 people in the United States,” Nature magazine howled in October 2020.

The journal claimed Trump “rolled back environmental and public health regulations, and undermined science and scientific institutions”.

“Some of the harm,” Nature warned, “could be permanent.”

But Biden then took Trump’s place, and the great healing began. Except it didn’t. Under Biden, who had the advantage of multiple vaccine availability once he came to office, people kept on dying at rates that were the same or worse.

US President Joe Biden tours the Maui fireground with wife Jill and Hawaii officials. Picture: Mandel NGAN/AFP

After Biden hit the same Covid body count in the same pandemic time frame as did Trump, a December 2021 Washington Post opinion piece remarkably excused the former but excoriated the latter: “President Biden’s competent, ‘adult in the room’ approach to the pandemic has now killed nearly as many Americans as President Donald Trump’s pandemic infantilism.”

Identical outcomes. Different verdicts. It’s an established pattern.

Readers of a certain age will recall that Republican President George W. Bush was found guilty of being conservative at a time of disaster when Hurricane Katrina struck.

A US News and World Report piece published in 2015, on Katrina’s 10th anniversary, said Bush “didn’t pay attention to the biggest news story of the moment because he was on vacation and allowed himself to get isolated”.

Bush will forever be judged by the media’s anti-conservative standards. Biden, on vacation when wildfires ravaged the Hawaiian island of Maui earlier this month, is receiving notably gentler treatment.

When news video clearly showed a smiling Biden saying “no comment” to a question about the fires, much of the mainstream press actually came to his aid.

“Eleven days after President Biden drew criticism for appearing to brush off a query about the deadly wildfires in Hawaii with a ‘no comment’, a White House spokeswoman said on Thursday that the president never heard the question,” The New York Times reported.

The Times helpfully added: “To critics, Mr Biden’s remark seemed unusually insensitive for a president who prides himself on empathy.”

Damn those critics. Can’t they let a man enjoy his holiday in peace? Like he’s done for almost 40 per cent of the time since becoming president?

But even the most loyal of Biden’s lapdogs couldn’t cover for him once the president eventually made it to Maui and started talking.

“No comment” would’ve been a wiser move. Instead, Biden tried out some of his homespun empathy crap on a crowd that at the time had lost more than 100 people, with some 850 reported missing.

“I don’t want to compare difficulties,” Biden said, preparing to compare difficulties. “But we have a little sense, Jill and I, of what it’s like to lose a home.”

Oh no he doesn’t. He’s merely got a sense of what it’s like to cop a lightning strike at home that briefly lit up the kitchen. Biden’s told this story often, and it’s almost as frequently been debunked.

“To make a long story short,” Biden told his shattered, grieving audience, “I almost lost my wife, my ’67 Corvette and my cat.”

Dear God. Biden later went with: “All kidding aside …”

Apropos of nothing, this blundering bloke is either the worst US president in living memory – or the best David Brent impersonator ever to occupy the White House.