In “Blueprint for Collapse of Joe Biden’s White House,” Michael Goodwin offers an engrossing sketch of the imminent breakdown of Biden’s presidency. Biden’s sagging poll numbers, his widely perceived mishandling of the economy, and his signs of dementia would all seem to indicate that his presidency is collapsing. Biden’s other “predicament,” according to Goodwin, is the “gathering storm related to his son.”
“The obvious fact that Hunter is getting favored treatment from his father’s Department of Justice has broken through the media’s Praetorian Guard and the public doesn’t like the smell of it,” he wrote.
Goodwin believes the congressional testimony of Devon Archer, Hunter’s former business partner, who was involved in the Burisma scam, will prove Joe’s undoing. By proving the president’s illegal entanglement in these dealings, according to Goodwin, Archer will help lay the groundwork for the “big guy’s” impeachment. At the very least, Biden’s reelection campaign will be ended after Archer’s testimony. Although Biden may hang on to his office for the remainder of his term, this disgraced president will be in no position to run again: “If the Democrats stick with Biden under those circumstances, they’ll be inviting the second coming of Trump.”
As much as I would like to believe what Goodwin is saying, unfortunately I can’t. For one thing, I don’t think the “media’s Praetorian Guard” has been broken, nor am I sure that most Americans will notice the scandal that Goodwin and I do. In fact, I doubt that our MSM will be reporting Archer’s testimony, as opposed to ranting against Trump’s supposed violation of the Espionage Act. We should also continue hearing about how our president, a caring father, is helping his son who has been dealing with an addiction problem. And let’s not go bonkers over a two-tiered system of justice and utterly corrupt Attorney General! The media will show us what lies behind this apparent crisis, namely, Republican partisanship and Congressman Comer’s vindictiveness.
Since 47% of Democrats in a recent Gallop poll believe that white nationalism is America’s “greatest threat,” and since most Americans favor stricter gun control laws, the media Praetorian Guard stills seem to carry weight. Despite his patently disastrous presidency, Biden is still at 42% in his approval ratings. That is quite an accomplishment for which the MSM and secure Democratic constituencies should be given credit. If a majority of those polled think Biden has become mentally unfit for his office, that doesn’t mean that none of them would vote for him against a Republican opponent. In hypothetical matchups with Republican contenders, our generally unpopular president either wins or trails by very little.
Moreover, from conversations with my Democratic acquaintances and relatives, I wouldn’t even know that Goodwin’s “predicaments” are a problem for Biden. For these Democrats the major dangers we face are Ron DeSantis’s censorship of books in his state, Republican attempts to set up a Christian theocracy, antiblack bigotry and the “gun lobby” causing crime to explode in our major cities. These same fellow citizens insist that Clarence Thomas should be removed from the Supreme Court for accepting bribes and for having a spouse who is an “election denier.” I suspect that Democrats of my acquaintance would consider Devon Archer, if they learned who he is, to be a Republican plant working for theocrats and racists. We may like to think of such people as inhabiting what philosopher of history Eric Voegelin described as a “second reality,” one that in no way communicates with our own. But I wouldn’t underestimate the number inhabiting that second reality as we plan for next year’s presidential race.
This brings me to my last point in responding to what may be Goodwin’s excessively optimistic message. Why should I believe Biden will be a one-term president, just because his poll numbers are presently underwater? He is an asset to those who are pulling his strings, and neither his senile dementia nor his venality will lessen his value to those who want a malleable puppet. By next year the media should be able to invent a scandal about whoever the GOP nominee is which will lower his poll numbers. If Trump is the nominee, moreover, then our media Praetorian Guard will push him into a blunder, perhaps saying something that will hurt him among independent and especially among his inevitable bane, suburban women. Through a combination of media distortion and Democratic trickery the next election may well turn out like the one last year.
Finally, if presidential candidate Biden is running somewhere in a tight race against his Republican opponent, Democratic state administrations will pull out all stops for their candidate. Of course, the MSM will then attack anyone who complains about these practices as a crackpot Q Anon member. If 2020 taught the Dems anything, it was that they could get away with any scandal that the media and Deep State would allow them to. I also wouldn’t rule out seeing more planning sessions among tech giants and the surveillance state of the kind Molly Hemingway discusses in Rigged. This too should help the Dems cover the blunders of their grossly unfit candidate. Contrary to what Goodwin suggests, the Republicans must be prepared for war, not easy victories.