On Super Tuesday Joe Biden qualified as former President Bill Clinton’s successor to the title The Comeback Kid. The month before that, Biden’s presidential campaign was on life support. Now, he’s favored to win the nomination.
In the beginning there was a ridiculous field of 27 Democrats and one Socialist who thought they could win the White House in 2020.
After Super Tuesday it was down to two and Hawaii’s Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, a mere blip among primary voters, who some say is hanging around hoping the exposure will land her a commentator job with Fox News.
Bernie Sanders, the lifelong socialist who dreamed up the term democratic socialist so he could leech on to the Democratic Party, saw his glorious proletariat revolution stall on Super Tuesday. He did gain delegates due to young Hispanic voters in California, where he is known as Tio Bernie or Uncle Bernie.
The late Argentinian Communist and later Cuban revolutionary leader Che Guevara is how Sanders seems to view himself—forever fighting Capitalism and the Establishment in behalf of socialist radicals who like to call themselves “the workers.”
A majority of voters in Super Tuesday states wanted nothing to do with Sanders’ proclaimed battle to abolish capitalism and purge the leadership of the Democratic Party.
As Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan wrote, “they don’t want a revolution, they want a nicer country.”
Sanders has made himself feel better by loudly proclaiming “The Establishment” has backed Biden in order to block his quest for the nomination.
This Sanders mantra is a wheel-barrow of self-serving crapola.
The “Establishment” didn’t get behind Biden until his dramatic turnaround in South Carolina. The “Establishment” didn’t suddenly pour money in to the Biden campaign.
The truth is, for most of the campaign the Biden operation has been running on financial fumes. As recently as a few weeks ago, the Biden team was considering having him fly commercial coach because they couldn’t afford a charter plane.
If one person deserves credit for changing the trajectory of the Biden campaign, it’s legendary civil rights figure, Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina.
Clyburn had been mum on who he would support, but he decided he would support Biden and he said so in a moving public endorsement just before the South Carolina primary:
“I want the public to know I’m votin’ for Joe Biden, South Carolinans should be voting for Joe Biden…”
“We don’t need to make this country great again, this country is great. That’s not what our challenge is. Our challenge is making the greatness of this country accessible and affordable for all.”
“And nobody with whom I’ve ever worked in public life is any more committed to that motto, that pledge that I have to my constituents than Joe Biden.”
“I know Joe. We know Joe. But most importantly, Joe knows us.”
“As I stand before you today, I am fearful for the future of this country. I’m fearful for my daughters and their future. And I’m fearful for their children and their children’s future. This country is at an inflection point. It is time to restore this country’s dignity. This country’s respect. That is what is at stake this year. And I can think of no one better suited, better prepared. I can think of no one with the integrity, no one more committed to the fundamental principles to make this country what it is than my good friend, my late wife’s great friend—Joe Biden.”
That powerful, emotional endorsement was the beginning of the turnaround for Joe Biden. Blacks in massive numbers across the South cast their votes for Joe Biden.
When Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar stopped their campaigns and endorsed Biden, history turned a page.
Former New York mayor and self-made billionaire Michael Bloomberg caused a stir with millions of dollars in saturation advertising aimed at the President. He looked like the man to take on the White House bully—until he stepped on the debate stage with the other Democratic candidates and was ripped apart on live national TV.
Like Lionel Logue, the speech therapist in the film The King’s Speech, Bloomberg desperately needed the help of a Logue-like world-class debate coach.
The multi-billionaire isn’t used to people talking to him like that. He should have spent millions and weeks of his time learning how to take and give punches on a live debate stage. He ended his campaign after Super Tuesday.
Bloomberg appealed to many Americans because he focused on defeating the President in November, instead of fighting with the other candidates over meaningless big-spending policy promises. Bloomberg’s costly Superbowl ad resonated with many Americans:
(Text of Michael Bloomberg’s Superbowl TV Ad)
Announcer: American demanded change.
Voice of Wolf Blitzer: Donald Trump wins the presidency.
Announcer: And change is what we got…
(Visual montage of hate, violence, immigration arrests)
Trump: “And ladies and gentlemen, the best is yet to come.”
In the weeks ahead there are two more Democratic debates and important primaries in big states like Ohio, Michigan, Florida, Illinois and a batch of others.
If Biden goes the distance there’s still the matter of getting him ready for the gutter-fight of the national debates with the Liar-in-Chief.
Biden has to learn how to be less of a nice guy tangling with a flim-flam man who fights dirty.
Hollywood actor, producer and political activist Rob Reiner summed it up recently on MSNBC:
“When you’ve got a schoolyard bully you’ve gotta punch him in the nose. And you’ve got to continue to punch him in the nose.
“I mean, we can’t be liars the way he is. He’s a continual liar. If we adopt that, we become him. We have to find another way to do it. And we have to start thinking about this as…it’s like what James Carville said back in ’92. Then it was the economy, stupid. Now it’s Trump, stupid.”
Sputtering and indignant fuming won’t be enough. The Democratic nominee has to be ready for the self-proclaimed counter-puncher. He has to have another punch ready. And another. And another. But before that, the Democrats need to take the fight to Fred Trump’s shameful son NOW.
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