If nothing else, we’re talking optics, here. Disastrous optics. Then again, when has the out-of-touch-with-reality Biden White House ever demonstrated it gives a damn about Bidenoptics™?
I mean, it’s not like where Joe is has anything to do with what Joe does — or doesn’t do — but the message is our intrepid “leader” is far more interested in heading home to Delaware and his favorite ice cream shop for the weekend and far less interested in at least appearing to give a damn about confronting the unspeakable horrors being visited upon the brave and determined people of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin.
Too harsh an assessment? Please.
So, as was the case last weekend, when he flew to Deleware for the weekend to “attend a family funeral,” Biden was scheduled to “take off for Delaware” at 5:35 p.m. on Friday and “arrive at the family home in Delaware for a relaxing weekend” at 6:40 p.m. For those of you keeping score at home, Biden has spent 35 weekends in Delaware since taking office on January 20, 2021.
As noted by The Washington Times on Friday, the House and Senate have also “recessed for the weekend, despite bipartisan calls for immediate congressional action on an emergency aid package for Ukraine.”
The House and Senate have recessed for the weekend despite bipartisan calls for immediate congressional action on an emergency aid package for Ukraine. #TWTFrontPagehttps://t.co/9uXwqPbrVM
— The Washington Times (@WashTimes) March 4, 2022
But, hey — Biden was already on it before news of his weekend travel plans “broke.”
As reported by The New York Post, Biden’s intrepid Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, declared on Friday that the NATO alliance is “ready” for conflict with Russia — if necessary.
“Ready” for conflict? This comes after Russian forces bombed Europe’s largest nuclear power plant in Ukraine, which the U.S. embassy in Kyiv promptly labeled a “war crime” — but we’ll get to that in a bit.
Anyway, one question for Blinken: Hasn’t the “necessary” ship already sailed, leaving the hollow “ready” proclamation smothered by Team Biden’s failure to act when action might have had a chance of succeeding?
As RedState reported on January 24, after Russia warned that “the countdown [to invasion] has begun,” Blinken incredibly told CNN’s Jake Tapper that the time for sanctions had not yet arrived.
When it comes to sanctions, the purpose of those sanctions is to deter Russian aggression. So if they’re triggered now, you lose the deterrent effect.
What deterrent effect? Blinken got even more ridiculous.
All of the things that we’re doing, including building up in a united way with Europe, massive consequences for Russia, is designed to factor into President Putin’s calculus and to deter and dissuade them from taking aggressive action, even as we pursue diplomacy at the same time.
One of the worst parts is that these clowns aren’t embarrassed in the least — not only while they’re saying stupid crap, but how really stupid they look after it blows up in their faces. Yet here was Blinken yesterday, after everything that has transpired over this past week, prior to a meeting with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg in Brussels:
Ours is a defensive alliance. We seek no conflict. But if conflict comes to us, we are ready for it, and we will defend every inch of NATO territory.
“NATO” territory. Ukraine is not a member of NATO. Hence, Blinken’s previous hollow support for the war-torn country and its brave people has been little more than a meaningless word salad.
And as Joe no doubt packed for his weekend in Delaware, Blinken’s State Department urged U.S. embassies across Europe not to repost a tweet from the US Embassy in Kyiv that called Russia’s attack on the previously mentioned nuclear plant “a war crime,” according to multiple reports, noted The New York Post on Saturday.
The embassy’s quote was clear:
It is a war crime to attack a nuclear power plant. Putin’s shelling of Europe’s largest nuclear plant takes his reign of terror one step further.
And it was correct.
It is a war crime to attack a nuclear power plant. Putin's shelling of Europe's largest nuclear plant takes his reign of terror one step further. #TheHague #Zaporizhzhia #StandwithUkraine
— U.S. Embassy Kyiv (@USEmbassyKyiv) March 4, 2022
Yet Blinken’s State Department appeared in near-panic over a statement of fact by one of its own embassies, via The Post:
All — do not/not retweet Embassy Kyiv’s tweet on shelling of the facility being a possible war crime. If you have retweeted it — un-retweet it ASAP.
Why so? A State Department spokesman later told The Post it was “assessing the circumstances of this operation.” Why it almost sounds like Team Biden was afraid to further anger Putin, huh? Surely not. [sarc]
Last but not least, The New York Times on Thursday ran a piece titled The Biden Administration Asks Congress for $10 Billion to Support Ukraine. Setting aside the reality that this is yet another “too little, too late” reality of Biden’s disastrous handling of the Ukraine invasion, let’s take a look at “the rest of the story.”
That “$10 billion to support Ukraine” breaks down thusly, per The Times (emphasis, mine):
The $10 billion request includes $4.8 billion in additional funds for the Pentagon, to cover the deployment of U.S. troops to NATO countries, increased intelligence and cybersecurity support, and to replenish the weapons the Defense Department has already sent to Ukraine, such as stinger missiles.
It also includes $4.25 billion in new funding for economic and humanitarian assistance for Ukrainians, including the one million refugees who have already fled from the bombarded nation in the first week of Russian President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion.
The request additionally includes money to enforce some of the economic penalties the Biden administration has already imposed, including on Russian oligarchs and on high-tech goods.
In other words, zero of the requested $10 billion is even remotely related to aiding Ukraine’s valiant efforts to stave off the Red Army. But that headline sure looked might-promising, huh? Again, please.
The bottom line.
The Democrat Party, the Biden administration, the lapdog liberal media, and Biden apologists across the fruited plain can put as much lipstick on the Joe Biden pig as they choose, but it’s still a pig. It will always be a pig — from Ukraine to Afghanistan to the southern border of the United States and everywhere in between.
Oh, I almost forgot. Don’t try to apply that lipstick on most weekends. Chances are those lips will be covered with melted ice cream. Somewhere in Delaware.
Related on RedState:
The White House Hands Vladimir Putin Another Massive Gift
As More of Ukraine Falls, Congress Flees from Washington (and Responsibility)
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