Wednesday open thread: The band's back together!
Yesterday's big political news was Pres. Barack Obama endorsing his former wingman, Joe Biden. How long we've been waiting for this to happen!
Also, in spite of his surface pose of neutrality, according the the New York Times, Pres. Obama moved in recent weeks to wrap things up:
Over the past year, Joseph R. Biden Jr. and former President Barack Obama practiced a political distancing of sorts, with Mr. Obama maintaining a posture of public neutrality in the Democratic primaries, offering counsel to any candidate who called (most did), and Mr. Biden saying he wanted to win on his own.We can fulminate at a later date that Sen. Sanders wasn't receptive to such blandishments in 2016. Misogyny, of course, played a major role. But, let's be honest: Who foresaw the perfect storm of events which led to Donald Trump's installation? Combine Russian psy-ops with misogyny, racism, and leftist whining, and we're now up to 25,000 dead and counting from the Great Plague.
But with calibrated stealth, Mr. Obama has been considerably more engaged in the campaign’s denouement than has been previously revealed, even before he endorsed Mr. Biden on Tuesday.
For months, Mr. Obama had kept in close contact with senior party officials, in hopes of preventing a repeat of the protracted and nasty 2016 primary race.
Then, in the weeks after it became clear that Mr. Biden was the party’s near-certain nominee, Mr. Obama — telling a friend he needed to “accelerate the endgame” — had at least four long conversations with his former vice president’s remaining rival, Senator Bernie Sanders. Mr. Obama’s efforts to ease the senator out of the race played a significant role in Mr. Sanders’s decision to end his bid and endorse Mr. Biden, according to people close to the Vermont independent.
But, that's all as well may be. History is behind us, and we have a world to save.
I'm sure we've all watched PBO's endorsement of Joe. But, it wouldn't hurt to watch it one more time.