For at least the third time this year, a wave of mainstream media reports paint a picture of a Biden Administration adrift and under fire from its own party.
Summary
For at least the third time this year, a wave of mainstream media reports in Politico, CNN, and The Washington Post paint a picture of a Biden Administration adrift and under fire from its own party.
- The CNN piece is a throwback to the great “palace intrigue” reports from the Trump Administration, chock-full of juicy details and anecdote after anecdote of mistakes, incompetence, and the indecision that is seemingly paralyzing the Biden White House.
- “Debra Messing was fed up.” Democrats believe “mismanagement [is] permeating the White House.”
- A Democratic member of Congress called the White House “rudderless, aimless and hopeless” and another official described their policies as “throwing spaghetti at the wall.”
- The White House counsel was assuring staff the Supreme Court wouldn’t rule on abortion on the very day Roe v. Wade was overturned. The White House had weeks to prepare for the ruling yet was apparently caught completely unprepared.
- The Biden folks, meanwhile, think the criticism amounts to “presidential fan fiction” from a generation of liberals raised on The West Wing.
- Politico spoke with numerous top Democrats who believe Biden is “missing the moment” and displaying a “lack of urgency” on “the defining issues of the moment” – guns, the Supreme Court, abortion, and so-called “escalating threats to democracy.”
- The Washington Post identified the “alternative voices” garnering more attention as the President falters in the eyes of his own party.
- Unlike Biden, who “seems unable or unwilling to respond” to what Democrats view as a “full-blown crisis on a range of fronts,” Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s “fiery” response to the Highland Park shooting seems to have captured Democratic hearts.
- Besides Pritzker, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren have all adopted more aggressive rhetorical postures than Biden in response to mass shootings and the end of Roe.
- A top crony of the late Democratic Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid described the Democratic Party as suffering a “leadership vacuum” that Biden is not filling.
- Should Biden not right the ship, the prospect of a serious primary challenge the likes of which the country has not seen since Sen. Ted Kennedy challenged President Jimmy Carter in 1980 gets more likely by the day.
- The New York Times interviewed Jimmy Carter’s economic advisers, who warn the Biden Administration they have “few tools to tame prices” and to expect “political peril.”
- Politico is already ready to move on to the “shadow 2024 race” between California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), “two young governors [who] have captured the attention of their respective parties.”
- NBC News interviewed billionaire Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D), the beneficiary of his own 2024 presidential boomlet in the media, who warned it was “certainly possible” Biden could face a primary challenge.
- National Review labeled the wave of stories “the circular firing squad” and concluded, “the word is definitely out that the president’s stock is going to zero – and it’s time to get out while you still can.”
- The Commentary Podcast put it simply: “they’re turning on Biden.” A roundtable of Commentary writers, Bloomberg columnist Eli Lake and Washington Free Beacon editor-in-chief Eliana Johnson discuss the implications of the “strange emergence” of the latest round of anti-Biden stories.
- The Washington Free Beacon found another Democrat “hiding from Biden”: Ohio Senate candidate Tim Ryan. Biden is to speak in Ohio Wednesday on the economy, but the state’s leading Democrat is nowhere to be found.
Author’s Take
The latest round of Democratic dissension against a president of their own party calls to mind a famous (and probably apocryphal) Voltaire quote: “Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies.”
In just the past seven months:
- Jan. 14 – Senate Democrats derailed Biden’s voting rights push by refusing to abolish the filibuster
- Jan. 30 – A wave of leaks from top Democrats unveil a Democratic Party in disarray.
- February 8 – A Biden cabinet official resigned after leaked reports of mistreating staff.
- April 6 – Biden ended COVID-era asylum limits, provoking a firestorm of criticism from vulnerable Democrats
- May 20 – Democrats criticized the administration’s scattershot attempts to address the baby formula crisis it helped create.
- June 3 – Another brutal wave of negative mainstream stories painted a portrait of an “adrift” Biden as a hostage to “a rolling series of calamities.” He called for an assault weapons ban, predictably it went nowhere.
- June 23 – Congressional Democrats gave Biden’s doomed gas tax holiday scheme the Heisman.
Yesterday’s Monmouth poll found that 57 percent of Americans believe “the actions of the federal government have hurt their family.” Biden’s job approval sits at a dismal 36 percent while 58 percent disapprove. A whopping 88 percent of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track, while a paltry 10 percent think things are moving in the right direction.
Nearly 9 in 10 Americans believe the country’s going in the wrong direction? That’s everyone in America who’s awake right now. Only 74% of Democrats approve of Biden’s performance. With poll numbers like these, at what point does a primary challenge become inevitable?
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© Dominic Moore, 2022
