https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/16/puzzle-joe-bidens-unpopularity/
Read Fareed Zakaria’s clueless column about Biden’s unpopularity. Zakaria opens by admitting “I find President Biden’s unpopularity puzzling.” He reminds me of New Yorker columnist Pauleen Kael, who famously wondered how Richard Nixon could possibly have won the 1972 election. As she supposedly explained, “Everyone I know voted for McGovern.” And I imagine that everyone Fareed Zakaria knows voted for Joe Biden and still supports him, and therefore Biden’s rapid fall in popularity is a complete mystery to the WaPo columnist.
Zakaria claims that “Biden is a genial, likable person.” I’m sure he is likable, to all those who like him. But then there are all those who chant “Let’s go, Brandon!,” who are clearly not enamoured of our current prez. That’s not my chant, but I find Biden to be transparently hokey, in both its meanings, which Merriam-Webster defines as 1: CORNY; and 2: obviously contrived, PHONY.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hokey
More seriously, Biden is simply too old and weak and frail to lead this dynamic nation with the energy and enthusiasm that it requires and deserves. And that over-the-hill persona which is so visible and evident almost every time Biden appears in public is, I believe, a major source of his unpopularity.
Zakaria takes note of the fact that “The timing of [Biden’s] biggest slide in popularity – this summer – coincided with the withdrawal from Afghanistan, the rise of the delta variant and the onset of inflation.” But Zakaria absolves Biden of any responsibility for the incompetent abandonment of bases, equipment, and people as Americans fled Afghanistan. And the Biden administration’s role in producing the worst inflation in forty years is quickly minimized: “For a variety of reasons – some of which can be blamed on Biden – we are seeing more inflation than in decades.” Yet, perhaps out of an unwillingness to admit that he misjudged the man, Zakaria concludes that Biden “has mostly handled his job with intelligence and decency.” And besides, he concludes, Biden “is paying the price for the complicated times that we are living through.”
To which I would respond:
“The fault, dear Fareed, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”