See if you can guess who’s who.
One is a broken-down senile old goat absolutely loathed by almost sixty percent of the country. The other offers the fresh face of the forty-something young governor of an incredibly prosperous state, a man with a beautiful telegenic wife and three cute-as-a-button children who haven’t yet started elementary school.
One is a lifelong politician who’s witnessed first-hand the ominous changes occurring in America and blames Americans themselves for the deterioration of culture and patriotic conformity in his nation. In the process, this man has switched positions on practically all major issues of the day and his latest set of beliefs mirror those of the young and radical, the fist thrusting, sign waving, building burning miscreants of the George Floyd Black Lives Matter riots from two and a half years ago.
The other is a multiple medal-winning former Naval officer (served during the Iraq War as a JAG member in Fallujah) who’s lived the American dream by working his way up from a modest upbringing (his father installed Nielsen ratings boxes and his mother was a nurse) to the pinnacle of political stardom in a state everyone wants to visit, if not live. Prior to his military service, this up-and-comer was also a college athlete and baseball team captain at Yale before attending and graduating with honors from Harvard University Law School.
I know, I know, but don’t count the latter facts against him.
One had a used car salesman for a father and then, after being nearly kicked out of law school for plagiarism, somehow managed to win political office and then chummed around with Democrats Robert “KKK” Byrd and Teddy “Chappaquiddick” Kennedy in the world’s most exclusive old boys club (otherwise known as the United States Senate) for over three and a half decades before being tapped by a good-looking affirmative action candidate with a light resume and a golden speaking voice to be a major party vice president contender.
The other won election to Congress in his thirties but didn’t stay there, leaving the swamp after three terms to run for governor of the state he was born so as to help his fellow citizens achieve a political realignment that’s resulted in taking on and in most cases defeating the “woke” corporate culture in America as well as providing his constituents with freedom during the phony COVID crisis.
Still stumped? The first guy is senile president Joe Biden; the second is the lesser known but more accomplished Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Though neither has yet declared their candidacies, both are likely to run for president in 2024. On paper, the head-to-head matchup shouldn’t be close. But politics and common sense don’t often collide in the same sentence; it’s the reason the United States is in a heck of a mess today.
If the two do end up pitted against each other, who would prevail? In a piece titled “Biden faces questions over whether he can beat DeSantis”, Alex Gangitano wrote at The Hill the other day:
“Biden’s rise in 2020 had a lot to do with Trump. A big part of his campaign was that he was the Democrat best positioned to end the Trump presidency. Biden himself said he likely would not have run for the White House that year if Trump had not been president.
“Polls continue to show Biden with an edge over Trump, but the head-to-head polls matching up Biden and DeSantis give Republicans reason for optimism. A Marquette Law School poll released on Dec. 1 found Biden and DeSantis tied in a 2024 match-up, with 42 percent of registered voters picking each candidate. The poll showed Biden 10 points ahead of Trump, suggesting the incumbent president might be a bigger favorite against his old opponent.
‘Most Democrats, at least on the record, express confidence in Biden regardless of who his opponent is, though some do acknowledge DeSantis could have some advantages compared to Trump.”
Some advantages? Practically everyone I talked to over the Christmas holiday, which includes friends, casual acquaintances who were brave enough to mention politics and family members who felt safe to discuss their thoughts on Trump – to a person they expressed doubts on the former president making another try at the top job. It wasn’t because they’d changed towards # 45’s policy chops, but his personality quirks and persistent legal questions spoiled the proverbial soup.
And, somewhat sadly, I doubt the latent good impressions will be restored over the ensuing timeframe, either. Just the other day, for example, Trump semi-insulted pro-lifers, blaming them for the GOP’s midterm struggles. Can’t the man listen to someone for a change? This isn’t 2016 anymore. Alienating a key portion of the base isn’t the way to get back in conservatives’ good graces, now is it?
Here’s thinking we’ll be talking about Trump’s peculiarities a lot in the current year (that being 2023). The discussion is likely to center on a number of issues, some real and others whipped into a frenzy by the establishment media. It’s funny how several of the Democrat consultants interviewed for Gangitano’s article talked about Biden’s “accomplishments” that he could pitch to the 2024 electorate, yet neglected to refer to senile Joe’s and the Democrats’ disastrous immigration, foreign policy, COVID, energy (under the guise of “climate change”), gun snatching, fiscal and crime policies, all of which will provide rich fodder for DeSantis or any other Republican to base an entire campaign on without even mentioning that Biden’s been lying through his chattering teeth for over fifty years in Washington.
Biden is a walking, talking, doddering, hair sniffin’, women’s shoulders massagin’, nude swimmin’ (in front of female Secret Service agents), prodigal son protectin’, female staffer molestin’, Afghanistan pullout bustin’, crooked deal makin’ – gaffe machine who supplies more than enough material for the evening news every time he steps to the microphone -- if only the media would use the quotes and report fairly.
But even the biased establishment media won’t be able to cloak Joe Biden’s problems in a one-on-one competition with someone like Ron DeSantis. The two are as different as night and day, or the Yankees and the Dodgers or Tom Brady and… well, every other guy who’s ever played quarterback in the NFL. One’s a sleazy politician loser who can’t do anything else; the other’s a brilliant man who happened to enter politics.
The most glaring departure between the leaders is obviously age. Biden isn’t just 80-years-old, he’s an “old” 80-years-old. All of us know and have known people who’ve lived four score years and more who are lucid and capable and energetic as the day they turned twenty. Not Joe Biden. He’s had two brain surgeries, can’t remember details of his own background and probably doesn’t recall what he had for lunch at his 3 o’clock staff briefing.
Ron DeSantis goes home at night and the sounds of children greet him at the front door. DeSantis is grounded in reality by circumstance as well as by nature. Joe Biden dwells in a liberal fantasy world of “diversity” and “inclusiveness”.
Speaking of, why doesn’t he and Dr. Jill acknowledge Hunter Biden’s illegitimate son he fathered with a stripper? Wouldn’t that be “inclusive”?
Then there’s the Trump factor. If there isn’t Donald Trump to lie about and trash, what will the fool fill his debate talking points with? Like with Trump, Ron DeSantis doesn’t mince words, yet the polished lawyer and adept Florida governor instinctively knows how to phrase his thoughts. Ron understands public relations and working to win folks over. Joe Biden’s second name should be, “Mr. Platitude”.
Another comparison fits here: Biden is famous for demagoguing COVID to smear Donald Trump during the 2020 campaign, where he blamed the then president for the nation’s COVID response while promising to put an end to the pandemic if he were elected in Trump’s stead. DeSantis achieved national notice by working against the dictates of the federal bureaucrats (embodied and led by the awful liar Dr. Anthony Fauci) to keep businesses open, senior citizens alive and kids in schools.
Civil liberties mean something to DeSantis. Perhaps it was Ron’s time at Guantanamo Bay in the Navy JAG corps where he fought to ensure the rights of detainees there that ingrained a notion of the value of freedom in him. Sometimes being on the other side of an issue clarifies its true meaning. Biden wouldn’t know liberty if it walked up from behind him and kicked him on his backside.
It's too early to tell whether the 2024 presidential election will boil down to a choice between Joe Biden and Ron DeSantis. We don’t even know if either name will actually appear on a ballot. But if such a competition comes to pass, only the most ardent of partisans would insist that Biden has the clear advantage. It’s just one of many mysteries 2023 will help solve.
Joe Biden economy
inflation
Biden cognitive decline
gas prices,
Nancy Pelosi
Biden senile
January 6 Committee
Liz Cheney
Build Back Better
Joe Manchin
RINOs
Marjorie Taylor Green
Kevin McCarthy
Mitch McConnell
2022 elections
Donald Trump
2024 presidential election