When Barack Hussein Obama entered the White House, millions of Americans were hopeful that a new chapter of the American story was being written: our first “black” president and his wonderful opportunities to heal old racial divisions and wounds. It didn’t work, obviously, but the hope was there. Obama’s foreign policy was sold as “minimalist,” or the harder to comprehend, “leading from behind.” The operating theme, though, throughout the West Wing, was summed up as “Don’t do stupid shit.”
Obama thought the war in Iraq, for example, was stupid, as were other actions in Syria, Afghanistan and Yemen, among others. One might speculate if his concerns were national or Islamic, but the directive applied: Don’t do stupid (stuff).
As cute as it sounded in its simplistic wisdom, the directive didn’t seem to take, generally. If the admonition were backed by real intent, it might be assumed that the new administrators were well-advised to not do stupid stuff anywhere, foreign or domestic. Yet, within a few months the somewhat narcissistic new President felt compelled to opine on the arrest of his friend, Louis Gates, in Cambridge, Mass. Although proper police procedures had been followed, including asking Mr. Gates to leave the house, a potential crime scene, Gates resisted sufficiently that he was taken into custody until facts could be ascertained. To some, particularly Gates, a Harvard professor, the arrest was racially motivated: white cop, black suspect. Obama, when queried by a reporter, declared that it was racial and that the “police had acted stupidly.”
Don’t do stupid (stuff), Mr. President. Hadn’t you heard that directive? Obama’s very thin veneer of racial healer dissolved, if it ever really existed in the heart of someone who didn’t respect the U. S. Constitution, to which defense he had so recently sworn. Along with dozens of Cabinet and other appointments, like Eric Holder as Attorney General, the ability of the chief administrator to do stupid (shit) was never again in question. From the A. C. A., to opening the southern border, gifting the Queen of England with a DVD of his own speeches, passing “stimulus” legislation to finance “shovel-ready jobs,” to making Hillary Clinton a Secretary of State, even his selection of Joe Biden as V. P., stupid stuff became the hallmark – if not the bulwark – of the Obama administration. The Paris “accords” and the illegal Iran Nuclear Agreement, never mind removing Muhammar Qaddafi from Libya, the “Arab Spring” and Benghazi, are levels of stupidity that we need not plumb to confirm our Prudent assessment.
Joe Biden’s only flirtation with executive authority was his eight years as Vice President with Obama. Contrary to the 2009 directive, Biden absorbed the active experiences of the Obama administration: do all the stupid stuff you can if it irritates Republicans and bitter clingers to guns and Bibles.
The miraculous victory of the Biden-Harris ticket in 2020, against all odds and voter registration statistics, simply unleashed a later version of the Barack Obama administration: Communism on the cheap, one could say. The utter stupidity pattern is freshly released upon an hopeful public, ready for a non-abrasive, non-Tweeting, insider-friendly, nearly non-verbal President. A few mistakes are expected of every new administration; signing 40 stupid, somewhat illegal Executive Orders is right in line with what millions of people were taught that Donald Trump had done. Hey, it’s old Lunch-bucket Joe’s turn to be stupid – he and Kamala “won” the election – or the certifications, at least – and “elections have consequences,” as Biden’s Constitutional Professor of Stupid once declared during an earlier Republican irritability phase. Joe has paid his dues, Democrats think, we think, for nearly 50 years, and he’s always wanted to be president, after all. So, it’s like, his turn. “C’mon, man.”
Given the inherent competition among politicians, there seems to be a race between Good Ol’ Joe and his nearly black benefactor of eight years’ duration. So long as invisible Rasputins keep placing executive orders beneath the Presidential pen in 2021, Joe will win the stupid-shit race he imagines he’s in. Among the 40 or so executive actions he’s already signed, Biden has reversed well over 100 policies that president Trump had put in place – policies that were working well and enabling a phenomenally dynamic economic expansion, while increasing national security: “America first.” There are barely enough electrons available to catalog the “stupids” that Ol’ Joe managed to effect in only two months. Congratulations, Joe! Looks like you won another election.
Just winning, however, is never enough for “progressives:” they have a need to rub their opponents noses in the stupid (stuff) they do. For his part, Joe is never to be outdone. Indeed, he has decided to lie about the stupid stuff he does, even if he’s not completely certain what that is. Do you suppose it’s his opinion that we’re ALL stupid? Maybe. Surely he wouldn’t appoint people to tell him to lie about stupid shit they talked him into, would he? After all, if HE believes what he says is true it can’t actually be a lie, can it?
Say it ain’t so, Joe! Say it ain’t so…