By James Moore
Joe Biden, an American president, went to a war zone to show support for an ally and to reinforce the western alliance against Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
Consider a couple of recent presidents on the matter of war. George W. Bush landed a commission to fly jet planes with the Texas National Guard because he didn’t want to go to Vietnam and end up like 56,000 of his generation, which is, to say, dead. Bush got into the guard because his daddy was a congressman and a rich oil man and a Republican operative. Somebody else’s kid died in W’s place; it’s that simple. The closest Georgie came to a Vietnamese was at a restaurant in Houston.
Let’s not overlook Trump, either, whose evasion of service was even less subtle than W’s. His rich daddy got a doctor to give Donny a prognosis of bone spurs, which meant he couldn’t be a ground pounder toting a gun because his footsies would hurt. He chased women, got access to his rich daddy’s money and contacts, and built a comfortable, faux life in New York City. The fact that he became president still redounds to the absurdity of the American political process. There has never been a more self-involved human, nor a less qualified person to lead this nation.
Then there’s Joe Biden. He reminds me of that line about how men don’t make history and history makes men. Too many people wrote him off because he was old and collegial. The general feeling was that he didn’t understand the politics of this day and he came from a senate of genteel relationships and handshakes. How could he lead a nation torn asunder by lies and a degree of partisanship that made any accomplishment seem impossible? But old Joe strikes me as a man for the moment. He has built a coalition of European nations to support Ukraine and has reassured the world the US will not, as Donald Trump wanted, leave NATO. We will honor our word and commitments. That’s what world leaders are seeing from Biden. And the fact that with the narrowest of political margins in congress, he has passed some of the most significant legislation of the modern era. The Republicans who bitched about the Infrastructure Act are now running home to their districts and trying to take credit for the projects they voted against.
Joe has pulled off wins that no one might have ever suspected. He held the country together during Covid and made certain there was money to support businesses that could no longer open their doors, and guaranteed access to vaccines for anyone who had enough sense to protect themselves from the virus by using modern medicine. Unemployment is at near-record lows and more people have jobs than at any point in American history. The guy has passed historic benefits expansion for vets exposed to toxic burn pits, protected marriage rights for LGBTQI and inter-racial couples, appointed the first African-American female to the Supreme Court, and there are now more people in this country on health care than ever before.
Maybe he’s not the ideal guy to run for re-election at age 80. But I suspect those other Democrats even remotely contemplating running against him in any kind of a primary are probably rethinking their futures. Joe Biden is a badass, and his trip to Ukraine in the midst of a war was just the latest example.
This article was originally published in Texas to the World and has been republished with permission.
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James C. Moore is the New York Times bestselling author of “Bush’s Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential,” three other books on Bush and former Texas Governor Rick Perry, as well as two novels, and a biography entitled, “Give Back the Light,” on a famed eye surgeon and inventor. His newest book will be released mid- 2023. Mr. Moore has been honored with an Emmy from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for his documentary work and is a former TV news correspondent who has traveled extensively on every presidential campaign since 1976.
He has been a retained on-air political analyst for MSNBC and has appeared on Morning Edition on National Public Radio, NBC Nightly News, Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, CBS Evening News, CNN, Real Time with Bill Maher, and Hardball with Chris Matthews, among numerous other programs. Mr. Moore’s written political and media analyses have been published at CNN, Boston Globe, L.A. Times, Guardian of London, Sunday Independent of London, Salon, Financial Times of London, Huffington Post, and numerous other outlets. He also appeared as an expert on presidential politics in the highest-grossing documentary film of all time, Fahrenheit 911, (not related to the film’s producer Michael Moore).
His other honors include the Dartmouth College National Media Award for Economic Understanding, the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television News Directors’ Association, the Individual Broadcast Achievement Award from the Texas Headliners Foundation, and a Gold Medal for Script Writing from the Houston International Film Festival. He was frequently named best reporter in Texas by the AP, UPI, and the Houston Press Club. The film produced from his book “Bush’s Brain” premiered at The Cannes Film Festival prior to a successful 30-city theater run in the U.S.
Mr. Moore has reported on the major stories and historical events of our time, which have ranged from Iran-Contra to the Waco standoff, the Oklahoma City bombing, the border immigration crisis, and other headlining events. His journalism has put him in Cuba, Central America, Mexico, Australia, Canada, the UK, and most of Europe, interviewing figures as diverse as Fidel Castro and Willie Nelson. He has been writing about Texas politics, culture, and history since 1975, and continues with political opinion pieces for CNN and regularly at his Substack newsletter: “Texas to the World.”
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