When I first met Joseph Biden as a newly elected Senator in 1974 he was absurdly young and looked younger, but he had already suffered two tragedies: the financial downfall of his father from elegant affluence to poverty, and the far greater tragedy of the death of his wife and one year-old-daughter in a car accident.
He had just arrived at the Senate and obviously had not done anything of any importance — but already Tip O’Neill, who would himself become an influential Speaker of the House, said that Biden would remain a Washington political leader for decades. One reason he gave was that the State of Delaware only had 600,000 inhabitants, so that a Senator could meet a high proportion of the voters during his six years in office, ensuring his re-election if there was no scandal. But the other was Biden’s exceptional self-control, which he demonstrated after he lost his very young wife and infant daughter.
In later years, I had multiple occasions to see Biden’s self-discipline at work as he set out to become an influential figure in shaping US foreign policy, starting as a junior on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He rose to become the Committee’s Chairman — a role that can be of very great importance in shaping US foreign policy when a serious conflict is underway, and opinions are divided. Many on the committee knew much less about foreign affairs than he did, but Biden carefully refrained from exposing their limitations — as I saw for myself when called to offer my own opinion.
But it was Biden’s eight years as vice-president for Obama that tested his self-discipline to the very limit. After serving on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, hearing both officials and experts speak at length on the issues of the day, he had accumulated impressive expertise on the most important issues of the day.
During that period, it was by speaking with Obama himself that he could be most influential — but only if Obama listened to his advice. But he did not. That was most unfortunate because on the two largest issues, Iraq and Afghanistan, Biden was 100% right and his opponents including Dr General Petraeus, the darling of the media, was 100% wrong.
Biden’s position on Iraq was that Iran would control the entire country unless its influence was limited to the Shi’a parts, by separating a Sunni regional government in addition to the Kurdish regional government. Obama, however, ignored Biden’s advice, and the result is that Iran now does what it wants in Iraq. It was the same in Afghanistan, where Biden maintained that the US would gain nothing from the billions of dollars and lives of the US soldiers it was losing to train the Afghan Army. He insisted that it was a total fraud, that Afghanistan’s so-called officers bought promotion with bribes; he knew that Tajiks only fight for other Tajiks, Uzbeks for Uzbeks, Hazarahs for Hazaras, and never for the abstraction called Afghanistan.
In the end, it was Biden who paid the price politically when Kabul fell after zero resistance by the “Afghan” Army. Biden needed tremendous self-discipline not to react when he saw the superficial Obama applauded by the US elite while he himself was ridiculed — for being right.
But it is now in the twilight of his presidency, 33 years after his first presidential bid, that Biden’s self-discipline has met its greatest test: he must resign instead of pursuing re-election.
Immediately after last night’s television debate with Donald Trump, a number of senior Democratic experts, one after the other, declared that Biden cannot continue his campaign for another four years as President. Several openly hate Trump, who was certainly too rhetorical and insufficiently factual. But they could not dispute Trump’s claim that he could govern, while Biden repeatedly and very visibly slipped into moments of senile confusion that only lasted a few seconds, but which can only get worse. Judging by last night’s performance, it seems extremely unlikely that he could function as President for as long as two years, let alone four.
For the Democratic Party, the huge problem now is that both of its leaders must be cast aside if they are to have a chance of winning against Trump in November, because Kamala Harris is simply not considered electable as a President, even though many of her views are perfectly sensible. But for now it is Joseph Biden who must save himself: he must abandon his political ambitions and enjoy his remaining years with his wife and family.
Disclaimer
Some of the posts we share are controversial and we do not necessarily agree with them in the whole extend. Sometimes we agree with the content or part of it but we do not agree with the narration or language. Nevertheless we find them somehow interesting, valuable and/or informative or we share them, because we strongly believe in freedom of speech, free press and journalism. We strongly encourage you to have a critical approach to all the content, do your own research and analysis to build your own opinion.
We would be glad to have your feedback.
Source: UnHerd Read the original article here: https://unherd.com/