Joe Biden is back at the G20, this time being hosted in New Delhi, India, and it wasn't long before the embarrassment started.
The president faced criticism prior to the trip after stating that he had "a lot going on" when challenged on why he still hadn't visited East Palestine, OH. What he has going on doesn't seem to be helping the United States, though.
Things started off with a repeat of something that seems to happen to Biden every time he meets with world leaders. Namely, he gets confused while appearing for just about any photograph.
It's not even really the bit of confusion that strikes me the most about that clip. Rather, it's just Biden's general feebleness. He walks like you'd expect a nursing home resident to walk, being led into position by the President of India. Even his attempted smile for the camera is just odd. He constantly projects as someone who isn't all there.
But that's not really the embarrassing part. Rather, it was Biden's introduction of and interaction with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
I keep suggesting to the president's handlers that they need to bar him from ever trying to pronounce anyone's name, and they just won't listen. Regardless, the abject confusion shown by Biden is just a bad look for the United States. If he can't read his notes, stop putting him in positions where he has to read notes. "At any rate, I'm gonna stop there" needs to become him just not starting at all.
Now, let's get to the interaction between Biden and the Saudi crown prince because, as a matter of coherency in U.S. foreign policy, it matters.
A handshake is a handshake, but this one happened with a lot of history behind it. One of Biden's primary foreign policy planks was standing up to Saudi Arabia. On the 2020 campaign trail (what little the president was on it), he made proclamations that Mahommed bin Salman was the "pariah" of the world. That was related to the Democrat Party's opposition to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
So what changed? The Saudis are still cozying up to Russia and screwing us on gas prices. Khashoggi is still dead. Did Biden just forget about all his rhetoric?
That's not to say the American alliance with the Saudis shouldn't be maintained. It is to say that the president should be more coherent and consistent in how he approaches it. Not doing so makes the United States look weak and timid. Biden can either approach the Middle East from a realpolitik position or rant and rave about his supposed moral clarity. He can't do both.
Nevertheless, there's a lot of G20 meetings left, so this is likely just the beginning for Biden's less-than-stellar performance.