Jun
16
2024

Like Sands Through the Hourglass

So Are the Days of Our Lives

If you prefer words to go with that, Mr. Ramirez suggests Byron York's column in the Jewish World Review: The Biden issue that won't go away

On Monday evening, the president attended a Juneteenth concert on the White House lawn. It wasn't a complicated event, as presidential appearances go. All President Joe Biden had to do was walk out of the White House, join the crowd listening to the music, and make some brief remarks.

It didn't go well. As the music played, Biden took his place on a front row that included Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Douglas Emhoff, actor Billy Porter (wearing a "rainbow sequined caftan … accessorized with bedazzled ankle boots," according to Women's Wear Daily), and, next to Biden, Philonise Floyd, the brother of George Floyd.

It didn't go well. As the music played, Biden took his place on a front row that included Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Douglas Emhoff, actor Billy Porter (wearing a "rainbow sequined caftan … accessorized with bedazzled ankle boots," according to Women's Wear Daily), and, next to Biden, Philonise Floyd, the brother of George Floyd.

Everyone was standing and swaying and clapping to singer Kirk Franklin's performance. Everyone, that is, except Biden. As the scene unfolded around him, the president stood still and absolutely motionless, his hands hanging by his side. His face had a frozen expression, and his eyes seemed fixed, staring straight ahead. This went on for about a minute.

Look at your watch or phone and set it for a minute. It's a long time. Biden was briefly engaged by Floyd, then resumed staring. Finally, he seemed to come out of it, ending the episode.

And the video in question:

I have to confess, I somewhat sympathize with Frozen Joe. I'd probably not want to embarrass myself by pretending to boogie either.

And in our weekly look at Election Betting Odds, there's finally some movement at the bottom: RFKJr has dropped below our 2% inclusion threshold, but Kamala and Gavin have risen above:

Candidate EBO Win
Probability		 Change
Since
6/9
Donald Trump 54.4% +1.8%
Joe Biden 35.5% -2.3%
Michelle Obama 3.2% -0.4%
Gavin Newsom 2.7% ---
Kamala Harris 2.2% ---
Other 2.0% -2.0%

And Bone Spurs opened up an additional 4.1 percentage points in his probability lead over President Wheezy.

And yes, that's as exciting as Sunday mornings get around here at Pun Salad Manor.

Also of note:

  • Useful questions followed by depressing answers. George Will has some Questions for the Biden-Trump ‘debate’ that might be useful. Number One:

    The Social Security Trust Fund will be exhausted by 2033. Under current law, benefits then will be reduced 21 percent. The Biden-Trump consensus includes vowing not to diminish the entitlements (Social Security, Medicare) that are producing deficits that just added $1 trillion to the national debt in eight months. Would you favor a multitrillion-dollar tweak: infusing Social Security with more borrowing, meaning debt? (Tax revenue is insufficient to cover the other government expenditures.) If not that solution, what?

    Other topics: protectionism, Constitutional fidelity, Taiwan, Ukraine, the filibuster, illegal immigrants, DC statehood, Israel's war tactics, military enlistment, tax cuts, the SALT deduction, threats to democracy. Check it out, imagine the likely answers, try not to do anything unhealthy as a result.

  • Another reminder of my political homelessness. Coming from Rikki Schlott in the NYPost: We’re libertarians who refuse to vote for the party’s ridiculous presidential candidate.

    I’m a libertarian, but I’m totally turned off by the party. And I’m not alone, especially now that Chase Oliver is its 2024 candidate.

    Although libertarian ideology has mass appeal, the party has consistently alienated voters with outlandish antics and out-of-touch nominees, and this election cycle is no exception.

    Since Oliver won the Libertarian primary late last month, the former Georgia Senate candidate has been going viral for some of his more lefty stances.

    In resurfaced clips, the 38-year-old has been dragged for publicly advocating for defunding the police “until [they] restore trust with the people,” describing drag queen story hours as “performance art,” advocating for open borders and defending gender-affirming care for transgender kids as “the status quo.”

    And in other news… well, actually kinda the same news … our local party finds Oliver has failed their ideological purity test:

    You know what they say: when you've lost the LPNH, you've … just lost the LPNH.

  • Attention must be paid. Ann Althouse claims a new record has been set: This is the stupidest thing I've ever seen in The New York Times.

    I'm reading "A Hollywood Heavyweight Is Biden’s Secret Weapon Against Trump/The longtime movie mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg always sought scary villains for his films. Now he has found what he considers a real-life one in Donald J. Trump."

    Trim and wiry, intense but amiable, Mr. Katzenberg at age 73 still exudes a kind of ambitious, animal energy as if he were one of his movie protagonists. He is famous around Hollywood, and now Washington, for rising at 5 a.m. and riding an exercise bicycle for 90 minutes while simultaneously reading four newspapers before taking as many as three breakfast meetings — and waffles or eggs-and-extra-crispy-bacon breakfasts, not the leafy California kind. “The guy eats like a horse and he doesn’t gain any weight,” his close friend Casey Wasserman, the sports, music and entertainment mogul, groused good-naturedly.

    Are Biden supporters in such deep delusion that they would take comfort from this "secret weapon"? This inane filler says: Time to panic!

    Apparently the idea is to have Katzenberg engineer the Biden campaign as if it were a Disney movie. (One of the good ones, not Lightyear or The BFG!) Putting Donald J. Trump into the villain role, like Jafar or Ursula, or…

    Or something. Problem is putting Biden in a hero role. Do you see him as Aladdin? Or more like Pinocchio? Or maybe Dumbo?

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