Democrat Politician Rallies Around Democrat Nominee: What’s the Big Deal?
[guest post by JVW]
Hey, I’m as sick and tired as the next guy of the onslaught of news regarding COVID-19 and the likely economic fallout. As I acknowledged in my previous post, it’s part of the reason that I haven’t been posting much in the last month. But desperate as I am for interesting stories outside of the dreary news of the day, I am a bit flabbergasted that Barack Obama’s endorsement of Joe Biden in this fall’s election turned into such a big story. Witness:
Janet Hook reporting in the Dog Trainer:
Former President Barack Obama on Tuesday formally endorsed Joe Biden for president, a big step in helping to unite their party and marking his own entry into the fight against President Trump.
Evoking the nation’s current health and economic crisis, Obama said in a video release, “Joe has the character and the experience to guide us through one of our darkest times, and heal us through a long recovery.”
There had been little doubt that Obama would back his former vice president once Biden had a lock on the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, but Obama — one of the most popular Democrats in the country — had steadfastly withheld any endorsement during the long party contest that featured numerous contenders.
You follow that, folks? It’s simultaneously “a big step” yet one that was utterly expected.
Trevor Hunnicutt and James Oliphant reporting for Reuters:
The swell of support around Biden gives him a dose of energy and attention at a time when the American public is largely focused on the government response to the novel coronavirus pandemic, which has pushed the presidential race out of the spotlight.
“Because he is so popular and the comparison between President Trump and Barack Obama is so stark, it will be such a unifying, motivating factor,” said Terry McAuliffe, a former Virginia governor and longtime party official.
Is the “dose of energy” being supplied by the voters or by a fawning and sycophantic media? And since when has Barack Obama proven that he can deliver votes to any Democrat candidate when he is not actually the one at the top of the ticket? Does Mr. McAuliffe recall the 2010 and 2014 midterm elections?
Ex-Clinton flack Joe Lockhart spinning for CNN:
Sometimes in politics the least surprising development can be the most important.
This is a true thing that has often been lost amid the reality show-style administration of our current President. While it was expected, Barack Obama’s endorsement Tuesday of Joe Biden is still critically important to the Democrat’s chances of winning back the White House.
Let’s start with the raw politics. Former President Obama’s nod reinforces Biden’s existing strengths among the Democratic constituencies he needs to win the election, particularly black Americans. More importantly, Obama’s help on the campaign trail will motivate young people, many of whom have only recent memories of two presidents in their lives.
Uh, Slow Joe won the nomination because of his strength with black voters. Does he really need Obama’s help in that regard? Was Obama able to deliver black voters for Hillary Clinton four years ago?
Jeanine Pirro and Dana Perino on Fox News:
“When was the last time you remember an ex-president actively campaigning against a sitting president?” the “Justice with Judge Jeanine” host asked on “The Five.” “This is contrary to anything that we have seen in this country before.
“But Barack Obama hates Donald Trump so much that he is going to continue to go after him,” she added. “And it does not matter to him whether it is an empty suit like Joe Biden or a guy who does not know where he is or what he is thinking.”
Co-host Dana Perino, a veteran of the George W. Bush administration, said she could not recall her former boss campaigning on behalf of Mitt Romney against Obama in 2012 and added that she also recalled that former President Bill Clinton “laid pretty low” in the 2004 race between Bush and then-Senator John Kerry.
I’m a big fan of Dana Perino, a Colorado girl who went to college in my hometown, but the reason GW Bush wasn’t active in the 2012 election was because he knew he couldn’t help Romney among swing voters, and she forgets that Bill Clinton had major heart surgery two months before the 2004 election which prevented him from seeking the adulation on the campaign trail that he so desperately craves.
One person who agrees with my unenthusiastic reaction to the news is Nathaniel Rakich at FiveThirtyEight. In a roundtable discussion, he acknowledges the utter ordinariness of the endorsement:
How best to put this … Obama’s endorsement is simultaneously completely unsurprising/pro forma and also an important part of political pageantry.
Like, obviously no one doubted that Obama would endorse the eventual Democratic nominee. And I don’t think it will really matter in terms of winning Biden votes in the general election (although I expect we’ll debate that below).
But it is still a nice little bit of free media for Biden and has come to be an expected part of the modern presidential campaign — the old party leader draping his arm around the new one. Certainly without that moment, Biden would have had a problem, as the question of “Why hasn’t Obama endorsed?” would hang over his campaign. So it’s important in that respect.
I think that Mr. Rakich has it right. To the degree that yesterday’s endorsement qualifies as important news it is because people want to discuss something other than COVID-19 or because the media wing of the Democrat Party wants news about Joe Biden that doesn’t cause one to think immediately of his recent disjointed and inarticulate public addresses from his home library. I suppose if I were a Democrat I would be pointing out that Donald Trump is unlikely to receive the endorsement of two of the three living previous GOP nominees (Bob Dole, good soldier that he is, will probably endorse President Trump again this time around). Yet I wonder how many centrist and left-leaning independents — not loyal Democrats who presumably were bound and determined to vote this year no matter who the nominee — are going to respond favorably to a party establishment candidate being backed by the party establishment.
Fortunately for Mr. Obama this is something of a no-lose scenario. Should his former Vice-President win in November he can take a victory lap and steal credit for the result. Should Mr. Biden lose, the 44th President can shrug his shoulders and grumble privately at what a horrible candidate the party was left with. But I contend that the endorsement and those of Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, John Kerry, Al Gore, and whomever else might rear his or her ugly head is virtually meaningless.
– JVW
Today both Elizabeth Warren and Valerie Jarrett endorsed Joey Cuddles, a development that I am sure means a great deal to blue collar workers in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
And this also reminds me that we’re going to have to suffer though a summer and fall of various celebrity endorsements, because deep down inside we all care to know for whom Jon Bon Jovi and Bo Derek plan to vote.
JVW (54fd0b) — 4/15/2020 @ 4:29 pmIt’s like the opposite of Pence. It’s probably not possible to not upstage Biden these days.
anybody sharing the spotlight with him will make democrats start to wish they were the candidate instead of Biden.
All the democrats need to show America is calm, patriotic, competent. That’s it.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 4:44 pmBut desperate as I am for interesting stories outside of the dreary news of the day, I am a big flabbergasted that Barack Obama’s endorsement of Joe Biden in this fall’s election turned into such a big story.
Think back, wasn’t Obama’s every utterance, every stutter covered with an attitude of awe and reverence?
And now they have the Bulwark and the Dispatch losers to help push a confused Joe Biden across the finish line.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 4:49 pmGotta support those Obama values, right?
NJRob (41b884) — 4/15/2020 @ 4:57 pm“Think back, wasn’t Obama’s every utterance, every stutter covered with an attitude of awe and reverence?”
You’re projecting.
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:10 pmYou’re projecting
No, it’s more a case of organic dysfunction and memory loss on your part.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:17 pmOr was it just because it made sense and he was articulate.
Oh the good old days, when English was the native language of presidents, not Orange-o-tan.
Dan Quayle is a certifiable genius, it’s the theory of relativity, relative to Trump any basic numbskull is a genius.
What I’m saying is Trump’s a moron, mentally unfit to work the fryer at the knockoff MacksDonald, needs help tying his shoes, A) because he doesn’t know how, and B) because he’s so fat.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:23 pmDavethulhu forgets the media putting a halo around Obama and acting as stenographers for his every utterance.
NJRob (41b884) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:24 pmI miss Obama.
nk (1d9030) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:27 pmSo does Tingles nk, so does Tingles.
Fox News has a report up that this virus comes from bad controls at the Wuhan bio lab.
NJRob (41b884) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:34 pmYep, they’re saying the “wet market origin” was invented out of whole cloth by the ChiComs as a distraction. Chinese authorities silenced the medical people who had knowledge of it, continued to lie and spread disinformation, withheld data that would’ve helped the rest of the world prepare and do battle with it.
And now that China’s actions have cost the world tens of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, what needs to be done about it? Our own people (e.g., the head of the NIH) came to China’s defense and assured us this was not possible.
China must be held accountable.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:48 pmThat’s because there was this moron on TV today stoking the other morons.
He’s on TV a lot spouting lies, nearly everything he says is a lie.
It was a bioweapon, now it’s just an accident.
Even if true, it’s not, is the virus here now, are people dying in America, right now?
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:51 pmTrump’s every action is also treated with this worship. It’s just a different set of people. It’s the same problem though.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 5:54 pmobama throwing in the towel, setting up a Newsmen Cuomo 2024 race.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:01 pmmittens is weak as a girl she could be joezymers 2020 date
mg (8cbc69) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:03 pmEven if true, it’s not, is the virus here now, are people dying in America, right now?
“Increasing confidence” that it occurred naturally in the lab, but botched the handling of it. They cut domestic flights in and out of Wuhan, but allowed international flights to continue. Erased data, destroyed samples, disappeared people, exposed the rest of the world to this Chinese virus…
We should know more over the next few days.. “the sources are not from one place”, per Bret Baier.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:12 pmI think you guys are raising a good point. One reason that the media cares so much about this story is because quite clearly they loathe Donald Trump and they are no doubt incredibly disappointed by Joe Biden being the party nominee. The Obama Administration is their Camelot, that magical time when the charismatic President used to smile at them and White House staff would feed them self-serving stories that they were all too happy to print. Those halcyon days when the President of the United States had their back and they in return had his. Oh sure, Fox News would be treated as second-class citizens and every now and again one of their colleagues might be ratted out to her bosses and have her computer hacked, but that was a small price to pay indeed to have hip, progressive government.
JVW (54fd0b) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:14 pmIf true, will that scatter and quiet the American excuse makers who lap the dogsh*t up from China and regurgitate it in the form of “news” and commentary?
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:16 pmDustin is correct :
And I would add that, so convinced that their views alone are right, neither side sees or understands that they are doing this.
Dana (0feb77) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:22 pmI’m kinda the other way. I simply cannot trust or credit politicians. I just dislike them all very much. It’s probably just as irrational logically. But I’m right.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:25 pmOh, and I believe the Fox News story about the virus being from a Wuhan lab. I don’t think it’s a bioweapon (it sure doesn’t work properly if it is). I think it’s a natural but maybe ‘bred’ super virus, pursued for economic reasons.
We’re in a cold war with China. Yet we’re economically subjecting ourselves to them. It’s as though we had the Soviets make our medicine to save a few bucks. Obviously this is crazy.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:27 pmDitto, Dustin. A healthy cynicism coupled with a realistic view of those with their hands on the levers of power – including both sides of the aisle – is the way to go. But we have become so divided, and pressed to pick a side.
Dana (0feb77) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:29 pmTrump’s every action is also treated with this worship. It’s just a different set of people. It’s the same problem though.
To an extent, by many of those who voted for him. In Obama’s case, it was those who voted for him, and then different sets of people… all of the MSM, Hollywood (arts and entertainment in general), academia, federal bureaucracy, Silicon Valley, etc., etc., ad nauseum.
Gosh, he even had elementary school choirs singing his praises.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:34 pm‘But I contend that the [Obama] endorsement and those of Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, John Kerry, Al Gore, and whomever else might rear his or her ugly head is virtually meaningless.’
Johnny-come-latelies; agree.
“I was really rooting for you, Butch.” – Flat Nose Curry [Charles Dierkop] ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’ 1969
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/15/2020 @ 6:48 pm“Gosh, he even had elementary school choirs singing his praises.”
Eleven years after the fact and you’re still mad about it. Hilarious.
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/15/2020 @ 7:32 pmThat was actually really annoying though. Kids singing to the dear leader. That is not good civics and really a professional president should cringe at the thought. The word “president” was picked specifically to avoid these kinds of devotionals.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 7:41 pmEleven years after the fact and you’re still mad about it. Hilarious.
No, more a sense of amazement that adults in America would ape North Korea and Romania in indoctrinating their young and most vulnerable in a Cult of Personality.
Very sad, comrade.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/15/2020 @ 7:51 pm“No, more a sense of amazement that adults in America would ape North Korea and Romania in indoctrinating their young and most vulnerable in a Cult of Personality.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIXCMLz4PsE
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/15/2020 @ 7:52 pm“Cult of Personality”
Also, I died of irony poisoning.
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/15/2020 @ 7:56 pmmany comrades suffer mental fatigue
mg (8cbc69) — 4/15/2020 @ 8:10 pmJoe & $ Son / 2020
I agree with both of these remarks. I don’t trust politicians to do anything except for advance their own personal interests and accumulate power. Use them like we do capitalism where we ensure our interests coincide with their interests. That actually works in a great degree with the current occupant of the White House. It doesn’t work with leftists because I have nothing in common with them.
And as for China, how does this affect trade. When you have a nation that sells you junk and steals your technology and intellectual property, how do you engage in “fair trade” with it?
NJRob (4d595c) — 4/15/2020 @ 9:54 pmDeduct that amount from any monies going to California.
Evil.
NJRob (4d595c) — 4/15/2020 @ 10:21 pmCan you imagine searching for a job and realizing your state is sending checks to non-citizens who drop the pay and conditions below what’s even legal? Unemployment will always stoke this frustration.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 10:59 pm“non-citizens who drop the pay and conditions below what’s even legal?”
It’s actually the companies that hire them that are dropping the pay and conditions.
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/15/2020 @ 11:24 pmThat’s true, Davethulu. I stand corrected on your logic.
My point was that by having this underclass, they are exploited by the greedy with jobs that they claim jobless Americans won’t do. But the real choice would be to pay a lawful amount for jobs I bet a lot of Americans would be grateful for, and at the same time, Mexico’s relief valve for its systemic failures has really prevented Mexico from being prosperous.
I’ve always thought the USA should be open to pretty much anyone who follows the law and doesn’t need welfare services. The latter requirement is really existential. If we were as rich as we pretend to be perhaps that wouldn’t be such a big deal, but we can’t just import recipients of our debt forever.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/15/2020 @ 11:29 pm“Cult of Personality”
Reaganoptics.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/16/2020 @ 12:13 am‘I’m a big fan of Dana Perino, a Colorado girl who went to college…’
College? a Trump University annex, perhaps:
“What Cuban Missile Crisis?” – Dana Perino
‘Dana Perino and the Cuban Missile Crisis-
Dana Perino was born in May of 1972, a decade after the Cuban Missile crisis, and even though age should not be a factor in qualifications for the job of White House Press Secretary, knowledge of our history should be.’ – https://www.digitaljournal.com/article/247229
“Appearing on National Public Radio’s light-hearted quiz show “Wait, Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me,” which aired over [a] weekend [in December,2007], Perino got into the spirit of things and told a story about herself that she had previously shared only in private: During a White House briefing, a reporter referred to the Cuban Missile Crisis — and she didn’t know what it was.
“I was panicked a bit because I really don’t know about . . . the Cuban Missile Crisis,” said Perino, who at 35 was born about a decade after the 1962 U.S.-Soviet nuclear showdown. “It had to do with Cuba and missiles, I’m pretty sure.” So she consulted her best source. “I came home and I asked my husband,” she recalled. “I said, ‘Wasn’t that like the Bay of Pigs thing?’ And he said, ‘Oh, Dana.'” – DailyKos 12/10/07
Ohhhhh, Dana, indeed.
“Ding-Dong! Avon calling.”
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/16/2020 @ 12:34 amEvery thing is a big deal because what is not a big deal is millennial support for joe the sexual assaulter biden! Latest polls have trump and biden tied with many millennials planning to vote third party. Democrat establishment tells bernie to convince his bro’s to vote biden or else! Or else what? Millennials say.
asset (05c5a1) — 4/16/2020 @ 1:58 amBidens humility was left in the Ukraine when he canned the rooski in charge, with his coke addict son in tow.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/16/2020 @ 3:27 am“I’m sure people are very happy to get a big fat beautiful check with Newsom’s name on it.”
nk (1d9030) — 4/16/2020 @ 3:39 amDonald Trump Probably Is the Only Person Who Could Fill My Shoes
Dave (1bb933) — 4/16/2020 @ 3:44 am– Rush Limbaugh
With what?
nk (1d9030) — 4/16/2020 @ 4:16 amWhat is more surprising is the (for him) enthusiastic endorsement of Biden by Sanders and putting his own supporters on the spot:
AP Interview: Sanders says opposing Biden is ‘irresponsible’
Bernie Sanders said Tuesday that it would be “irresponsible” for his loyalists not to support Joe Biden, warning that progressives who “sit on their hands” in the months ahead would simply enable President Donald Trump’s reelection.
….
He seemed to distance himself from his campaign’s former national press secretary, Briahna Joy Gray, when asked about her recent statement on social media refusing to endorse Biden.
“She is my former press secretary — not on the payroll,” Sanders noted. A spokesman later clarified that all campaign staffers were no longer on the payroll as of Tuesday, though they will get a severance check in May.
Sanders said his supporters have a simple choice now that Biden has emerged as the presumptive nominee: “Do we be as active as we can in electing Joe Biden and doing everything we can to move Joe and his campaign in a more progressive direction? Or do we choose to sit it out and allow the most dangerous president in modern American history to get reelected?”
He continued: “I believe that it’s irresponsible for anybody to say, ‘Well, I disagree with Joe Biden — I disagree with Joe Biden! — and therefore I’m not going to be involved.’”
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/16/2020 @ 9:48 am……
Sanders did not outline any specific plans to begin helping Biden in earnest, though he noted that he held dozens of rallies for former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton four years ago and would be at least as active for Biden. In the short term, he said he’s essentially “incarcerated in his home” because of coronavirus social distancing guidelines and did not know when he would return to the campaign trail.
……
“I will do everything I can to help elect Joe,” Sanders continued. “We had a contentious campaign. We disagree on issues. But my job now is to not only rally my supporters, but to do everything I can to bring the party together to see that (Trump) is not elected president.”
#9
I don’t.
Knowing what I know now about Trump and matching it up to Obama’s two tenure… I’d vote for Trump with a clear conscious.
whembly (c30c83) — 4/16/2020 @ 10:16 am44… agreed, my vote too. Some Windy City thronesniffers have a special affinity for overbearing politicians.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/16/2020 @ 10:24 amhahahahahaha you’re saying this in defense of Donald Trump wanting to broadcast on his fanboy radio program after bragging about the “big fat checks” with his name on them we got, after [insert list of a billion stupid and overbearing actions]
I ‘miss’ 2004 Obama. He had a lot of potential to be a game changer for our country, but it was just BS. 2008-2016 Obama? Well obviously a pretty unaccomplished president, but very self aware. He was able to communicate more or less effectively.
Instead of uniting us, he tried to pressure us by being dismissive of the views of a lot of flyover Americans. This didn’t have the effect Obama wanted in reshaping us. It just pissed off a lot of David Duke fans. It’s easy to blame these old weirdos, and I do, for the despair Trump’s idiot administration has predictably caused the first time we encounter a real problem. But Obama could have made a real mark on history. He talked about it. He failed to overcome the cheap points and retail democrat politics. And here we are.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/16/2020 @ 10:35 am44… agreed, my vote too. Some Windy City thronesniffers have a special affinity for overbearing politicians.
Oh, yeah? When was the last time California produced any politician, R or D, who was electable nationwide? And to have New York, of all places, still able to do it? Tank-topped surfer boys!
nk (1d9030) — 4/16/2020 @ 11:28 amIt’s all part of the show. Literally, this is all theater. The worst part is that it’s so bad. Especially given the production budget. The Bernie endorsement was below the standards of an average youtube video. It looked like Bernie was doing it from an empty coffee shop with bad lighting. Biden was trying and failing to read from the teleprompter and I felt bad for him when you could see him just lose focus. For BO’s they were at least smart enough to not put BO and Biden in interactive mode.
At least with the last Star Wars trilogy, the special effects were ok. No plot, bad acting, bad writing, etc but things exploded. The American Political Show Season 2020 has bad writing, bad acting, and bad special effects.
Trump is no better. Instead of trying to put on a 3rd rate Masterpiece Theater production, he’s going for WWE.
frosty (f27e97) — 4/16/2020 @ 11:45 am@37 In all fairness to Dana Perino, nobody in my age cohort was taught anything after WWII in school, including college, and you were lucky if they got that far. If we learned post WWII history it was because we were personally curious or through cultural osmosis.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/16/2020 @ 12:43 pm@49. Fairness has nothing to do w/it. Given the gig she held, a sound knowledge of history – particularly a crisis centered in the very building involving the very office she was acting as press secretary for– is essential. She was too stupid for the gig; thus, a prime candidate to be employed at Fox.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/16/2020 @ 1:06 pmIf she was stupid, she’d host on CNN or MSLSD, Airless McNair…
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/16/2020 @ 1:12 pm“With what?”
Best comment in the thread, imo.
Davethulhu (36eb8f) — 4/16/2020 @ 1:15 pmTank-topped surfer boys!
Jussie Girls
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/16/2020 @ 1:16 pm@50 I don’t know that the expectation for WH press secretary is a poli-sci or history degree is reasonable. Of course, I don’t really expect the Millenials to know that much about the fall of the Berlin wall, either.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/16/2020 @ 2:12 pm@51. What do you mean- “was.”
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/16/2020 @ 3:55 pm@54. Point is, if she was flipping burgers at MickeyDees or a guide at Universal Studios it wouldn’t matter. As press secretary for POTUS, it does.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/16/2020 @ 3:58 pmToo many jackasses on TV to count, and you focus on a nice lady who takes a gentle, fair-minded approach to every subject.
Based on what I’ve read from you, I’ll leave it at bless your heart.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/16/2020 @ 4:47 pm