“As Leah reported earlier, President Biden made comments while on his swing through Asia about how the United States would react to a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan and, as a result, the White House is springing into action — yet again — to do damage control.
Speaking at a news conference in Japan, Biden said “yes” when a reporter asked whether he’s “willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan if it comes to that.”
Confirming the president’s position, the reporter again asked: “You are?”
“That’s the commitment we made,” the president responded.
Biden’s words, according to The New York Times, “surprised some members of Mr. Biden’s own administration watching in the room” and set off another round of quick clarifications from West Wing aides about what the president *meant* to say.
…“The White House quickly tried to deny that the president meant what he seemed to be saying,” The Times added in their dispatch from Tokyo. “‘As the president said, our policy has not changed,’ the White House said in a statement hurriedly sent to reporters. ‘He reiterated our One China Policy and our commitment to peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait. He also reiterated our commitment under the Taiwan Relations Act to provide Taiwan with the military means to defend itself.'”
But, as The Times notes, Biden’s statement “went beyond simply reiterating that the United States would provide Taiwan with arms, because the question was posed as a contrast to what he had done with Ukraine.”
…While the White House has done its apparent best to limit the number of Biden gaffes — especially ones that sound like the president is trying to wade the United States into some sort of World War III on two fronts — they’re just not able to keep up. Even after moving Biden’s events from the Oval Office in the actual White House to a Truman Show-esque stage in an adjacent auditorium, aides still can’t keep their boss from muddying the waters on critical topics of international impact.“
There a world of difference between this sort of Biden gaffe…
…and those of the garden variety:
The latter is the stuff of late-night comedy, Right-wing ridicule and YouTube videos; The former has already proven a green light for war, unimaginable destruction and the indescribable suffering of millions.
Q: Mr. President, quick question: What have your health advisers told you your level of concern should be about monkeypox and the cases that are in the United States and around the world?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, they haven’t told me the level of exposure yet, but it is something that everybody should be concerned about. We’re working on it hard to figure out what we do and what vaccine, if any, may be available for it. But it is a concern in the sense that if it were to spread, it’s consequential. That’s all they have told me.
Biden made those remarks on Sunday. If you read Thursday’s Morning Jolt, you know that monkeypox is not “something that everybody should be concerned about.” It is nowhere near as contagious as Covid-19; infections occur from “close contact with respiratory secretions, skin lesions of an infected person or recently contaminated objects”; we’ve had several travel-related cases in past decades that did not turn into significant outbreaks; those who are old enough to have been vaccinated against smallpox likely have some protection against monkeypox; the existing smallpox vaccines are effective against this virus; and the most recent outbreaks in the U.K. are among men who have sex with other men — who may well have “prolonged face-to-face contact.”
All of that runs counter to the notion that, “It is something that everybody should be concerned about.”
They keep telling us President Biden is well-briefed and quickly updated, but he doesn’t speak as if he is. Either what the president is getting briefed on is completely different from public reports about the monkeypox cases so far, he isn’t getting very detailed briefings, or he can’t remember what he was briefed on.
…while paying sky-high prices for gasoline and every other commodity despite sitting atop the largest oil reserves in the planet is somehow in the best interests of the average American?!?
“Here’s the situation. And when it comes to the gas prices, we’re going through an incredible transition that is taking place that, God willing, when it’s over, we’ll be stronger and the world will be stronger and less reliant on fossil fuels when this is over.” Biden said, seeming to justify or praise those sky-high prices Americans face at the pump.
Yes, because, in Biden’s utterly unachievable renewable utopia, fossil fuels will no longer be needed for transporting every commodity Americans consume, no longer necessary for the manufacture of plastics and countless other essential products and materials, no longer required for generating electricity. Not to mention any foreseeable “green” energy future puts America and the world at the mercy of Russia and Communist China for the rare earths and minerals which are vital to its even marginal viability.
Other than that, it’s a great plan…assuming your goal is the destruction of the nation!
Since we’re on the subject of totally detached Dimocrats (as if they come any other way!), NRO‘s Jim Geraghty tells us of one’s incredibly tone-deaf response to the undeniable fact…
Only after Rep. Katie Porter put bacon in her cart at her local grocery store recently did she notice that its price had spiked to $9.99 a pound. Reluctantly, she put the package back.
When Porter gave an emotional speech about how inflation has been hitting her family for months during a private House Democratic Caucus meeting last week, she said it seemed like the first time the personal toll of high consumer prices had sunk in for some lawmakers in the room.
“Too often, Congress recognizes issues too late,” Porter, a top GOP target this fall in a swing district, said in an interview. “I had a colleague mention to me, ‘We’re not seeing it in the polls’ . . . . Well, you don’t know what to ask.”
Did a Democratic member of Congress really tell Porter that polling was not indicating that constituents were worried about inflation? There are three possible scenarios: that Porter is exaggerating or making this up, that certain Democratic lawmakers are walking around utterly oblivious to the worst inflation in 40 years, or that they believe that Americans are just fine with inflation between 8 and 8.5 percent.
“Early demands from the National School Boards Association to the White House included calling for the deployment of the Army National Guard and the military police to monitor school board meetings, according to an early draft letter the organization’s independent review released Friday.
…The NSBA had originally sent a letter to President Biden in September 2021 that asked for parents protesting at school board meetings to be federally looked into, saying school officials were facing threats and violence at meetings. Most significantly the NSBA requested in its original letter that parents’ actions should be examined under the Patriot Act as “domestic terrorists.”
Then, on Oct. 4, Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a memorandum instructing the FBI to collaborate with state and local leaders to address “threats against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff.” He went on to say that this collaboration “will open dedicated lines of communication for threat reporting, assessment, and response.”
The NSBA’s early draft also called parents speaking out “plotters who are targeting schools and educators.” Another removed portion cast doubt on whether critical race theory is being taught in schools. It said, “An increasing number of public school officials is facing physical threats because of propaganda purporting the inclusion of critical race theory within classroom instruction and curricula.”…”
“Following the leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, the Left unleashed a campaign of intimidation that included moving protests to justices’ homes.But liberal officials overseeing jurisdictions within more conservative states aren’t taking any chances.They are promising that if the left-wing intimidation campaign fails to flip any votes, they are prepared to take an even more drastic step to protect abortion: simply refusing to enforce the law.
…What’s happening here is pretty clear. For many decades, when liberals couldn’t get what they wanted passed through the legislative process, they would turn to the courts. This is central to the sinister legacy of Roe. But now that they are losing their stranglehold on the courts, they are turning to prosecutors to impose their policy preferences.
Republican legislators who are preparing legislation for the possibility of Roe getting overturned need to take this reality into account. They should craft laws to make sure that it will be too risky for any abortion provider to defy the law in hopes that they will be bailed out by activist prosecutors.“
Here’s hoping GOP legislators at the state level are more on the ball than their Congressional counterparts.
Then there’s another sextet of specially-selected items certain to pique the interest of inquiring Conservative minds:
(3). Courtesy of Objectivity is the Object via the Geffoir, Judd Garrett poses the question Whose Life Matters?, before providing the answer:
(4). In a related item, Dennis Prager explains why Joe Biden’s Buffalo speech was the speech of an indecent man, an indecent, reprehensible man intent on dividing Americans rather than uniting them, following in the footsteps of his past and present…
(6). Charlie Cooke wonders WHAT was State Farm THINKING, as the insurance giant is already paying a price for forgetting “it exists to insure people, rather than to wade into hot-button political issues”. Here’s hoping everyone out there takes their business to another carrier.
Which brings us, appropriately enough, to The Lighter Side:
Then there’s these from Balls Cotton…
…the lovely Shannon…
…Speed…
…and G. Trevor…
…and last, but certainly never least, Brenda Berry:
Finally, we’ll call it a wrap with the Health Section, courtesy of Jim Geraghty, who notes:
During the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, a lot of Americans had to learn or realize that, whatever you felt morally about a homosexual’s behavior in the bedroom, no one deserved to die a painful death because of those actions. AIDS was not God’s judgment on gay people; a loving God doesn’t sit around thinking up new ways to inflict pain upon His creations, even for violating His commandments. We had to separate our views of particular actions and their morality from the need to help the suffering.
And then Covid-19 came along, and it became really socially acceptable to pass moral judgment on those who contracted a dangerous contagious disease. Some of us argued against this, over and over again, but there were plenty of finger-wagging, self-righteous social-media scolds who insisted that those who had caught Covid-19 must have failed to wear a mask, or failed to social distance, or had somehow failed to follow the rules. Until hyper-contagious Omicron came along, that is, and then all kinds of people — including those who perceived themselves as the good, righteous, and rule-following people — caught it and spent a week or so home sick.
Another important point which ought to be high up in the sometimes-alarming-sounding stories: “The monkeypox cases so far have been mild, with no deaths reported.”
Here’s wishing a pox on ALL…
…their houses!
Magoo
P.S. As evidenced by our Quote of the Day and accompanying cartoon at the top of the page, we cannot BEGIN to describe how good it is to have the great Stilton Jarlsberg back!
Video of the Day
Laura Ingraham tells it as it is. Say what you want, but Xi is certainly getting his money’s worth.
Tales of The Darkside
John Stossel relates why Big Government is always the problem rather than the solution.
On the Lightweight Side
Yeah, Joe Biden understands what Americans are going through: What he’s planned from the moment he illegitimately won the 2020 election. BTW, if Karine Jean-Pierre isn’t the poster child for the perils of diversity hiring, no one is.
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