After waiting more than four months to agree to meet with Speaker McCarthy and discuss the debt ceiling, Joe Biden finally spoke with Congressional leaders yesterday. The White House tried to put some positive spin on the story, saying that “some progress” had been made, but they still remain “far apart.” And now he’s jetting off to the Pacific for a meeting in Japan that will likely be little more than a photo op. He did postpone a couple of planned stops in the Australian region, supposedly so he could return home and do more haggling over the budget. But is anything really going to come of that? The clock is ticking and we’re supposedly going to be up against the wall in as little as two weeks. It may be time for Uncle Joe to delegate this to someone with a bit more cognitive clarity. (CNN)
President Joe Biden is canceling his upcoming visits to Papua New Guinea and Australia due to the ongoing debt ceiling negotiations in Washington, the White House confirmed Tuesday.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement Biden spoke to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese earlier Tuesday to inform him he will be “postponing” the trip and invited the prime minister for an official state visit “at a time to be agreed by the teams.” Jean-Pierre added that the “President’s team engaged” with the prime minister of Papua New Guinea.
Biden will still travel to Japan starting Wednesday as part of what was supposed to be a weeklong trip through the Pacific region for a gathering of the Group of Seven leaders.
If Biden plans on throwing a fit and trying to blame the GOP because we’re getting too close to the cliff, he can spare us the whining. Kevin McCarthy said on an almost daily basis that he was ready and willing to talk. It was Biden who refused to pick up the phone all winter or invite the Speaker to the White House to see what might be managed.
In the meantime, the House GOP managed to actually pass a budget that would keep funding levels close to the same while reducing some excess spending. But it won’t make it through the Senate without Biden’s public support and he’d probably just veto it anyway. Yes, the MSM will still try to blame the Mega MAGA Republicans as always, but if this process crashes and burns, that’s on Joe Biden’s shoulders entirely.
Returning to what I mentioned at the top, is there anyone in Biden’s inner circle who could pull him aside and suggest that someone else take that meeting on his behalf? You’ve heard him speaking recently and watched him wandering around, unable to complete even basic tasks without someone leading him by the arm. Is he really even capable of holding a discussion about something as complex as the budget and arriving at a mutually agreeable deal? I have my doubts.
But who could he hand that task off to? Certainly not our cackling Vice President. Perhaps the House Minority Leader and Chuck Schumer could step in. If Biden’s handlers gave them a couple of sweeteners that might get McCarthy to give a little ground, they could conceivably pull this off.
But without Biden in the room, what’s to stop him from forgetting what he previously agreed to and going back to the “My Way or the Highway” approach he’s been taking up until now? Perhaps the real lynchpin in this evolving debacle isn’t just a question of different spending priorities. We way be looking at an existential crisis stemming from the fact that we have a cognitively diminished (if not collapsed) person in charge. And he wants to keep the job for four more years? Give me a break.
