Does the United State actually have a president? The answer to that question largely depends on what day it is. Sometimes, Joe Biden will show up to give a pre-written statement to the media, and once every three months or so, he’ll actually answer questions from hand-selected reporters. Other than that, though, he has a habit of making himself scarce while his handlers gaslight about how hard of a worker he is.
Biden has provided another example of that with an inexplicable decision to send Kamala Harris to the Munich Security Conference, where the President of the United States normally speaks.
As far as I can tell, it’s unusual to send a vice president to the Munich Security Conference. But even if it’s happened before, it hasn’t happened in a moment where Europe is on the verge of war, and Germany is playing a key role in stopping diplomatic progress. If there was ever a moment the president needs to show up for work, this is it, and Biden decides to just…not go.
The entire thing is incredibly odd and opens up the door for yet more questions about the president’s constant disappearing act. Biden has spent nearly every weekend of his presidency in Delaware, but he’s not capable of jumping on Air Force One and going to Munich during this all-important, incredibly volatile time? To be frank, that just doesn’t add up, and I don’t believe he’s just got better things to do. Blame it on his senility or something else, but this is the moment a president is expected to be a leader, not dump his duties into the lap of an inexperienced, ineffective vice president.
And that brings me to the second and most important issue here: Kamala Harris is terrible at her job. Even if you look past the unusual nature of the president skipping out here — during a time when it should be all-hands-on-deck — to send Harris smacks of malpractice. What exactly in her resume says she can go to Europe to articulate and enforce US interests? Is there going to be no attempt to try to put pressure on the Germans to stop doing the bidding of Russia while they threaten to invade Ukraine? If not, that only serves as more evidence of this administration’s complete lack of strategic ability.
In the end, I’m sure we’ll get all the usual excuses from the White House (he’s just so busy!), but the fact remains that there’s something really weird and unsettling about having a president who so often decides to go AWOL in the biggest moments.