By Matt Dole
Back then, in 1979, it was inflation, high gas prices, and embarrassing diplomatic defeats.
Now, in 2021, it’s… huh — inflation, high gas prices, and embarrassing diplomatic defeats.
What’s old is new again.
Back then, Jimmy Carter gave a speech that defined an era of low morale and American dis-spirit. It was officially the “crisis of confidence” speech, but people remember it for a phrase that didn’t even appear in the script. It was Carter’s “malaise” speech. Presidents ever since have refused to even get close to Carter’s tone in a speech.
Joe Biden wants to be talking about a breakthrough on a funding bill, which he marketed as an investment in “infrastructure.” That word does appear in the massive and wide-ranging spending bill, but only sparingly.
Seeking to avoid Carter’s example, Biden hunkered down at Camp David as the terrorist-fostering, Anti-Western Taliban swept over Afghanistan and threatened even the capital city of Kabul where Saigon-esque photos of Americans being rescued by helicopter filled the news. Biden quickly lost even his allies in the liberal press who suggested that Biden’s absence was being noticed and it was announced that he would return the White House for a national address.
I’d like to think Biden left Camp David by climbing to the roof and boarding a Chinook helicopter by rope ladder in solidarity with those in Kabul. Or maybe he motorcaded to the airport to cling to the landing gear of Air Force One like the Afghans at the Kabul Airport whose assessment of the situation indicated that clinging to the outside of an airplane meant almost certain death while remaining behind to face the Taliban removed any uncertainty as to their fate.
Biden used his speech to blame everyone except himself. One of President Biden’s chief defensive tactics is to lash out at others when he feels threatened. It’s sort of Trumpian. In blaming others, though, Biden can’t erase the fact that this crisis in Kabul is so closely tied to his administration’s decision to withdraw forces.
It’s malaise 2.0.
After the speech he immediately returned to Camp David, comfortable with the image of running the country at an empty conference table starring at a video conference screen. A photographer captured it as if it would serve as a timeless moment of strength and leadership. It more closely resembled a Hollywood pitch for “Weekend at Bernie’s III: Vacation at Camp David.”
So, what to do about it?
Sadly, this is where the comparisons to Jimmy Carter end. In 1979, Jimmy Carter was in the third year of his presidency. He was about to face a challenge from Teddy Kennedy, the first serious challenger to an incumbent president in a hundred years. After he’d turned back the Kennedy challenge (done-in partly by Teddy’s own malaise in the aftermath of Chappaquiddick), Carter faced Ronald Reagan and was soundly defeated.
We’re just a few months into the Biden presidency. It seems longer if you count by the number of head shake-worthy verbal miscues, but it’s only been seven months. That means we have 41 months left.
Perhaps the nightly news anchors can put a counter on the screen like they did during Carter’s Iranian hostage crisis. Day 211, 212, etc.
Those who want better for our country do have the midterm elections towards which to look. Breaking Democrat’s total control of the presidency, House and Senate might send a message to Biden and the liberal wing of his party that they need to be as willing to negotiate with Republicans in Congress as they are negotiating with terrorist regimes.
Instead, we get statements Like Nancy Pelosi’s, praising Biden’s “clarity of purpose.”
Conservatives crushed Pelosi for that, but she wasn’t wrong.
Biden has shown a clarity of purpose. It’s clear, for instance, that he doesn’t care about the Afghan people. It’s clear that our military and diplomatic corps in Afghanistan were pawns — expendable in Biden’s plans. It has come into laser focus that the Biden administration purposefully allowed both flanks to be turned. One was overrun by the fringe left of his party when he gave into their demand to end the war on terror even as Islamic terror was gaining a foothold. The other, now, overrun by the Taliban seeking both a psychological and a tactical win against the great western power.
Americans today don’t even have the last ditch, malaise-lifting act of patriotism Carter sought to harness. In early 1980 the USA hockey team lifted the country’s spirit in their defeat of the Soviet Union at Lake Placid in New York. The winter Olympics next February are being held in China, of all places, and the Taliban don’t play ice hockey.
Maybe Biden will invite them to Camp David for some Pickleball diplomacy.
Matt Dole is a communications consultant based in Columbus.
