by William Sullivan, American Thinker:
Channeling his inner Hillary Clinton, who just couldn’t understand why she wasn’t 50 points ahead of Trump in the run-up to the 2016 election, a forlorn Joe Scarborough told his audience after the 2024 presidential debate that he has “no idea why this race is close.”
Scarborough asks a good question, but not for the reason he thinks. Joe Biden’s approval rating of 38.7% in the 13th quarter of his presidency is the lowest in history, so he is arguably punching above his presidency’s weight in the polling. To put things in perspective for Scarborough, who claims he “will destroy anyone” who challenges Joe Biden’s record of excellence as president, Jimmy Carter’s approval rating in April of 1980 was nine points higher at 47.7%.
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There’s an interesting factoid here, of which Joe Scarborough and Co. are almost certainly ignorant. As Annie Linskey relates in her excellent article at the Wall Street Journal, there was a coordinated effort to replace Jimmy Carter on the 1980 Democrat ticket — and among the leading conspirators was none other than Joseph R. Biden.
Back then, Biden was a relative newcomer to the D.C. scene, but also an undeniably slippery and effective politician. “That man’s in trouble, politically in trouble,” Biden correctly said of Carter. He wanted a president that could keep the White House, and he wasn’t “certain that’s Jimmy Carter right now.”
The problem wasn’t that the incumbent was showing clear signs of cognitive and physical impairment, or that he had difficulty functioning outside the hours of 10AM and 4PM. Americans were undoubtedly more serious people back then, and the mere thought of such circumstances for a candidate in a tightly-contested presidential race would have undoubtedly yielded swift replacement.
No, Biden’s problem with Carter, if you could believe it, was that Carter’s budget proposal lacked the necessary reduction in government spending and a needed “pull back on taxes.” Biden also thought it best for Democrats to promote (get ready for your mind to be blown) “across-the-board budget cuts and employment ceilings” for federal agencies.
“There’s a helluva lot of fat” in those agencies, Joe Biden said at the time. His employment of such colloquial language, easily understood among working class Americans, would go on to become a staple of his long career.
In April of 1980, Biden stumped for Carter in Pennsylvania, carefully crafting his message. “Let’s face it, Jimmy Carter isn’t the finest thing since wheat cakes; he’s not the second coming,” he said, “but he’s doing a good job.”
Biden was a far less devoted lickspittle for Carter in 1980 than Joe Scarborough is for Biden in 2024, whose solemn diatribe after the debate included nearly seven minutes of such sycophantic drivel as “without any apology, I love Joe Biden” and that “Joe Biden has been the most effective president,” with only one moment to say, in a waffly sort of way, that perhaps he’s not the right candidate for this moment.
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