Buying An Election

President Biden delivered the last State of The Union address of his current term the other night. Seen by many as a "put up or shut up" moment in the debate about his mental acuity, he mostly put up. Of course, it was a scripted speech. Of course, he has been at this for so long that he could do this in his sleep. And, there's the specter of "better orating through chemistry" lurking - many have joked that Biden was on the best Adderall money could buy. All that aside, at least in the eyes of those inclined to support him, he did well enough to allay many doubts about his senescence.

And not just in the high-energy teleprompter reading. The old Bully-Boy Biden persona burst forth a couple times. Again, something he's been at for so long that it's probably encoded deep in his lizard brain.

I broke my "no watching" rule last night and actually took in the whole thing, mainly because it happened to coincide with one of our gatherings-of-friends at our country house. I didn't pay too much attention to the pre-speech glad-handing. All that performance art fades from the political sandbox pretty quickly. I also ignored the endless applause breaks and the "who's clapping and who's sitting" mockudrama.

The speech itself and the tone of delivery are what matters. The transcript can be found here.

Both communicated an aggressive, divisive, pandering, fear-mongering, and deceitful message, and an overt declaration of continued class warfare on multiple fronts.

He opened with a grossly offensive message, imagineering his political opponents as the second coming of the Third Reich. That offensiveness is dampened only by its frequency - scream "Fascist" often enough and it loses its power to shock. Yes, yes, he was talking about Putin, but the Democrats have been thumping the "Democracy itself is at stake" drum about Trump and his followers so hard that the conflation is rather clear. If you don't support Joe, you are a Putin-loving fascist. Sure enough, Biden later on referenced Trump's reference to not caring what Putin does to other nations if they don't live up to their NATO commitments - so, yeah, Biden's channeling of FDR on the eve of WWII is not just about Putin.

That open was followed by a primary and recurring theme of the speech: Spend more money!

The other recurring theme: Brazen but carefully crafted dishonesty.

He staked out a prime spot in the abortion debate, first by calling out the Alabama Supreme Court's ruling that "shut down IVF treatments across the state," (false in text but true in consequence... but already overruled by the state's legislature), and then by throwing shade at the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision. Which was the correct decision - and which could have been made moot at any time in the half century since Roe v Wade by Congress enacting laws that codified the Roe rules. The Democrats have had ample opportunity to make abortion legal across the nation, but instead they opted to leave it as a political football.

In his abortion diatribe, he quipped, "My God, what freedoms will you take away next?" Hold that thought.

He then spring-boarded off the seismic disruptions of the COVID lockdown, ignored his party's major hand in it, and credited himself for the return to normalcy. He bragged about the vaccines, no matter that Trump's the one who fast-tracked their emergence. He took credit for people returning to work, as if his policies created all those jobs out of nothing. He then sought to make the "built in America" message that is at the heart of MAGA populism his own. Again, hold that thought.

Intermixed in his rah-rah about the economy was a lot of tub thumping about how federal spending is at the heart of it all. Another thought to hold.

Then, the speech turned to a spate of campaign promises. See if you can spot the theme.

• Haggling prescription drug prices.

• Continuing Obamacare.

• Subsidizing health care premiums for the favored.

• Spending money on women's health research.

• Tax credits and eliminating title insurance fees for home buyers.

• Subsidizing home building.

• Universal preschool.

• More spending on elementary school tutoring.

• Expanding Pell Grants.

• More money for minority students.

• Student loan forgiveness.

• Raises for public school teachers.

• Paid sick and family leave.

• Home care and elder care for seniors.

• Social Security left untouched.

• Medicare left untouched.

Yep, it's all about Other People's Money. Spend, spend, spend, but not for everyone - just those whose votes seem buyable.

How to pay for it all?

Soak the rich, of course.

Here's where it got truly brazen. Despite a mountain of data to the contrary, Biden asserted, over and over again, that the rich aren't paying enough in taxes. Sneaky, misdirecting stats, capped off with a new form of Alternative Minimum Tax on billionaires. Those who remember history understand that the original AMT didn't work "as intended," and only started throwing more revenue when it started impacting the middle class.

Absolutely infuriating, but totally expected. This "make others pay" is at the heart of modern American socialism. Old school Soviet socialism gave government ownership of industry. Modern European welfare-state socialism collects taxes from everyone in order to pay for everything. Leftist American socialism, on the other hand, promises everything to the majority by making a minority pay for it all.

He then got to talking about inflation. If you were still shell-shocked by his brazenness as to taxes, you may have not been ready for the next OFFS moment.

You see, the inflation that has sapped one fifth of your dollars' power during Joe's term is the result of corporate greed. "Shrinkflation" was promised center stage, and Biden delivered. Ditto for those annoying fees that airlines, ticket sellers and others charge.

Yeah, that's the problem.

And, if you thought that his shamelessness on taxation and inflation were high, next came immigration. The Dems pulled a nice stunt on the GOP by putting forth an immigration bill that would eternalize many of the things that are at the heart of the migrant wave, and Biden had the brass to blame the GOP rather than his hundred or so Executive Orders for the deluge that has imperiled his Presidency.

He replayed the conflation with exalted history that opened the speech by bringing up echoes of Selma and the Civil Rights Movement.

Then trotted out a big basket of fear.

• Voter suppression.

• Election subversion.

• Dark money.

• Extreme gerrymandering (he should talk to the Democrats in New York).

• Book banning.

• Transgender rights.

• Worker's rights.

Next on the plate, climate change.

Did you think he'd skip over his party's biggest economic obsession?

But, surprise, he gave it only a moment's bragging about how much has been spent on it before moving onto crime. He touted some sketchy statistics, then bragged about police reform and more spending before getting to guns.

Remember my first "hold that thought?" The one about "what freedoms will you take away next?"

• Ban assault weapons.

• Ban high capacity magazines.

• Pass universal background checks.

"None of this violates the Second Amendment or vilifies responsible gun owners."

False. Sorry Joe, you are flat-out wrong. None of these policies would do anything to reduce school shootings or gun violence. These are all increments toward the real agenda - totally disarming responsible gun owners.

Biden then entered fantasy land. He pandered to the anti-Israel and Jew-hating segments of his party while pretending to have Israel's back, then declared - oh surprise! - more spending on a "pier" in Gaza by which to deliver humanitarian aid (that, trust him, won't get sopped up by Hamas to use against Israel). Oh, and "a two-state solution." No matter that Hamas, Hezbollah, Fatah, and the Palestinians in general don't want a two-state solution. No matter that the "from the river to the sea" chant that the left side of his party regurgitates non-stop is an overt rejection of a two-state solution.

No, Joe's got the answer, and if he just says it with enough amphetamines coursing through his veins, it's bound to come true. Just like the rest of his "make it so" policies.

Closing out, he...

Talked tough on China. Remember the second "Hold that thought?" Bully-Boy Biden's trumpier than Trump on China now.

Fight fentanyl.

Conquer cancer.

Defeat Skynet.

Spend more money on everything.

Soak the rich, in case you forgot.

And, most of all, defend democracy from He Who Must Not Be Named. Biden referred to Trump as "my predecessor" thirteen times, but did not mention his name once.

The speech accomplished what it was intended to, which was assuage the fears of those who want to vote for him that they wouldn't be voting for a cadaver. The rest of us? We saw nothing to cheer about. His platform of policies are destined to continue the nation's debt spiral, will do nothing to unite us, will erode our rights and cement the second-class-citizen status of those of us who aren't bending the knee to unrestrained government.

The third thought I told you to hold? At the heart of everything Biden promised was Other People’s Money. Naked pandering to the portion of the populace happy to sell their votes and their liberties to the highest bidder.

I saw nothing to assuage my fears of a second Biden term, and virtually no policy promises that I'd favor.

His contempt for the Court is probably my biggest concern. The delegitimizing campaign against the only branch that still understands government is supposed to be limited may, if the down-ballot goes wrong for the GOP, might lead to a packing of the Court and the end of America as we know it.

With roughly half the nation cheering him on.

Truly depressing.