I don't think I'm smarter or more observant than most anyone else. But this one just seems so on the nose that I can't figure out why more people aren't seeing it.
After President Biden delivered his rare presidential address last Thursday night, Newsweek opinion editor Josh Hammer posed the question:
Hammer's following is largely conservative, so the predominant answers were unsurprising: "frightening," "satanic," "divisive," "vendetta," "Sith," "Hitleresque," "opprobrium."
"Sith" might win the award for originality, but that last one deserves credit for making me look it up.
Still, although you can make a case for any of them, I find all of those answers wanting. There's one word to describe what President Biden offered in front of Independence Hall, flanked by Marines and an unsettling lighting scheme: bait.
That's all it was. It was politics. It was gamesmanship. It was bait.
The realities on the ground are alarming for Americans: Crime rates are up, the economic strain for an insecure border is increasing precipitously, cost of living has skyrocketed, grocery costs are up, inflation has spiked, gas prices are stubbornly high, and the federal government can't stop sending billions of dollars to fund a foreign country's war. With midterm elections less than 70 days away, the party that controls all federal outposts of elected government is desperate to distract from those inconvenient truths.
But how? Even when President Biden tries to tie a pretty bow on the national malaise he has inspired, reality has a pesky way of evincing itself. For example, the very same day that the president boasted that "the economy is looking good," Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell warned that, "while higher interest rates, slower growth, and softer labor market conditions will bring down inflation, they will also bring some pain to households and businesses."
That's not an easy sales pitch to throw at voters these last few weeks before election day. But even if the modern Democrat Party can't give you any reasonable justification to vote for them, they can give you one compelling reason not to vote for Republicans: Donald J. Trump.
I'm shocked by the number of Republicans who continue indignantly scoffing at the prospect that Joe Biden could motivate 81 million citizens to vote for him in the last election. He didn't. I wouldn't hesitate to say that as many as 90% of Biden voters were driven to the polls in 2020 not to vote for him, but to vote against Trump. Whatever love and admiration Trump inspires among his loyal followers, he arouses even more resentment and hostility throughout the rest of the electorate, particularly with the all-important independent voters.
So what smarter move could the Democrat Party standard-bearer make than to declare the upcoming election is about Trump and Trumpism, not about inflation, border crises, gas prices, and staggering cost of living increases?
The public character of Donald Trump is the singular issue that Democrats want to run on. If they could put every 2022 Republican congressional candidate in a Trump suit, they would, because it's an issue they will win with the American people – particularly moderates.
Now, don't misunderstand. I don't mean to suggest that the Biden speech was good stagecraft or well delivered in the slightest. It was unsettling and just weird from start to finish: The dark, blood-red background, the condescending text, the menacing tone of voice, the squinty eyes, the negative themes, the belligerent focus on fear, the excessive condemnation of fellow Americans, and the horribly inappropriate backdrop of the otherwise unifying Independence Hall.
Although White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre had promised that the speech would be non-political, it was a monument of cynical, craven politics. Even the most impassioned defenders of the speech who allege it was nothing but an accurate, legitimate appeal from the president for Americans to pay attention to the grave threat Trump-supporting Republicans pose to our republic, are undermined by this awkward reality: The president's own party spent more than $44 million boosting those very people he condemned as dangerous in 2022 election primaries against more moderate Republicans. They wanted them to succeed because it helps Democrats raise money and win elections. Again, it's all cynical, craven politics.
The only real question left is whether or not it works. For his part, Donald Trump will certainly take the bait. In some ways, he and the Democrats are motivated by the same objective: keep Donald Trump in the news cycle. The former president responded to Biden's speech by teasing that he would issue pardons for all January 6th Capitol Hill rioters should he become president again. Partisan news media will begin dutifully carrying out their end of the corrupt bargain they have with Democrats by asking every 2022 Republican candidate if they agree.
And every second that Democrat candidates spend attacking – and Republican candidates spend defending – the latest Trump take, is a second not spent addressing the colossal train wreck Biden and his progressive allies have facilitated in both foreign and domestic policy the last two years.
Funny conservative memes aside, if that's what comes of Biden's speech, no doubt the White House will count it as a big win.
