Premium

I'm Really Sick of Old F***s in DC 'Running' Our Country! How About You?

AP Photo/Nati Harnik

Joe Biden, who turns 80 this year, has reportedly told people that he has now decided to seek a second term in 2024, when he will turn 82.

Bernie Sanders’ spokesman announced the other day that the wealthy New England senator has not ruled out once again running for president in 2024, when he’d be 83.

Next up, perhaps, is Nancy Pelosi, who will turn 84 that year.

Not ruling something out is among the handiest public relations tricks in today’s politics. So is, “Everything is on the table.”

At the end of the day — another cliché that annoys greatly — neither expression actually says anything. That’s probably why we hear them all the time. What those words do, though, is attract attention, get people talking about you, at no cost whatsoever. Free publicity.

According to an internal Sanders memo reported in the Washington Post, a senior advisor told supporters to be aware:

In the event of an open 2024 Democratic presidential primary, Sen. Sanders has not ruled out another run for president.

The memo was written by Faiz Shakir, who managed Sanders’ 2020 campaign that failed again. Shakir would turn 44 just before the 2024 election. So, he still has plenty of time left to not rule out maybe, someday actually managing a victorious presidential political campaign for someone born after Pearl Harbor.

Millions of Americans like myself have also not ruled out running for president in 2024. Sure, most of us wouldn’t mind becoming multi-millionaires like every modern president and most presidential candidates. Fame has a wondrous way of boosting personal wealth.

Sanders owns three homes already on his $174,000 Senate salary. If he runs in 2024, that makes one home per campaign.

A far cry from 1953, when Harry Truman went back to his little home on North Delaware Street in Independence, Missouri. For income, he had his Social Security check, then some book earnings, and not much else. Until 1959 when Congress approved a pension and office perks for former presidents.

Barack Obama got by in Illinois as an attorney for landlords and part-time state senator, until he upset the political powerhouse of Alan Keyes for a U.S. Senate seat in 2004.

 

Malcolm on the Right
Townhall Media

 

Now the ex-president is worth an estimated $70 million. He also has three homes – one in D.C., and two estates on islands that will certainly be submerged if his global-warming warnings were true.

Joe Biden was so poor, apparently, that his notorious son Hunter had to support him off his financial earnings from China, Ukraine, and elsewhere, according to angry messages Hunter carelessly left on his abandoned laptop.

Joe, who like Bernie has been on a public political payroll his entire career, is so devoted to public service that he took a pay cut to become president.

Biden doesn’t donate his $400,000 annual salary to government agencies as Donald Trump did. But he was pulling down upwards of $300K for every speech to industry groups and for not teaching a class at the University of Pennsylvania.

Watching Biden’s speaking engagements as president, one gets the sense those patrons overpaid a bit, not for the words but the face time.

As taxpayers, we’re overpaying for Biden, too. For example, here. Here. And here, when in a stunning bit of dementia theater the commander in chief shook hands with an invisible person, then wandered alone about the stage..

Having a president who’s chronically off in Delaware mentally has real-life costs. You’ll notice Vladimir Putin didn’t organize his Ukraine invasion until Joe Biden was doing the senior shuffle across the White House lawn and carpets.

Now, I’m not against old people. I’m one myself. I’m against old presidents like Biden. The Founding Fathers wisely set a minimum age to become commander in chief. People died younger in the 18th Century, so they didn’t think to set a maximum age.

As a nation, we had a good long run of middle-aged presidents. Of our 45 former presidents, 42 of them left office before their 70th birthday. Dwight Eisenhower was only 98 days past. Ronald Reagan was three weeks shy of 78 when he left. And five years later announced his Alzheimer’s diagnosis. We never saw him again.

Donald Trump was 74 when he left office. People often disagreed with him, and he disagreed back. But Trump’s work, campaign schedules, transparency, and political, diplomatic, and economic accomplishments failed to support suspicions of dementia.

If Joe Biden had been running against anyone other than that vilified incumbent, we (meaning our surrogate media in the tank for him) might have demanded a more thorough examination and explanation of Biden’s physical and mental conditions beyond a general letter from some doctor saying he was in fine shape to be leader of the free world.

He’s clearly not, and no one is doing anything about it. Even Biden asks the question, “What am I doing here?”

And more of us would have paid greater attention to his erratic behavior — the name-calling, mental lapses, unawareness of where he was, sucking his wife’s finger in public, and “work schedules” that had him regularly knocking off for the day by mid-morning.

Now, for at least the next 1,002 days (or 86.6 million seconds), we’re stuck with Joe Biden, the unidentified “they” that he claims are always telling him what to do, and ominously unfolding events abroad, as bad actors take advantage of the tempting American leadership vacuum.

Some have suggested an age limit for commander in chief. Does anyone think the old darts in Congress would buy that any more than term limits?

I tend to prefer guidelines with escape hatches, like driver’s licenses that require extra tests after 75. If a presidential candidate declined a thorough mental and physical exam by independent physicians and psychiatrists, that would be the red flag for voters – and campaign ammo for opponents.

In the meantime, even as another senior citizen, I am not anticipating an invitation to the next State Dinner in the Biden White House. I’m not a fan of chocolate pudding anyway.

Recommended

Trending on RedState Videos