This week’s White House Report Card finds President Joe Biden taking his 23rd of the last 32 days on vacation after a week highlighted by two speeches in Philadelphia that revealed his fall election strategy: attacking MAGA.
In both addresses, Biden accused former President Donald Trump and his millions of followers of threatening democracy, a controversial and divisive tactic from a president who entered the White House promising national unity.
Our graders were divided over his performances, of course. Conservative analyst Jed Babbin said the week was another failure for Biden and his speeches simply meant to divide the electorate. Democratic pollster John Zogby applauded the speeches in his report card and weekly podcast, especially Biden’s Thursday night address given in front of Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, as a “necessary thing” to charge up his voter base.
The duo did agree on one thing: The expected “red wave” of fall GOP victories has been muted.
Jed Babbin
Grade: F
Biden’s week was another in a long string of disasters. The main attractions were his speeches, the Big Lie coming from his White House press secretary, and the Defense Department’s announcement that Biden would reward failure.
The Big Lie this week came from Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, when she declared that people weren’t walking across our border from Mexico. She said it to a Fox reporter as his network was showing hundreds of migrants walking across the border.
NEW: Border agents rip press sec’s false claim that migrants aren’t illegally walking across the border
“There’s only two reasons she said that and that is either she is extremely dumb or she is flat out lying”
via @AdamShawNY, @BillFOXLA and mehttps://t.co/mCmAduSzUE
— Peter J. Hasson (@peterjhasson) August 31, 2022
Next, there was the appointment of MSNBC pundit Jeremy Bash to the Intelligence Advisory Board, the principal panel of “experts” who advise the intelligence committee on many secret matters. Bash previously insisted that the Hunter Biden laptop story was Russian disinformation. Bash is comprehensively unqualified for the board.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced that all U.S. troops who served in Afghanistan during the Biden debacle last August and those who helped process Afghan immigrants would receive a special unit commendation. It was a shabby attempt to paper-over the failure of the bungled Biden withdrawal a year ago that left behind hundreds of American citizens, thousands of Afghan allies, and about $7 billion in weapons and other military equipment.
Biden’s speeches this week were grinding insults to the public. In his gun control address in Philadelphia, Biden made no mention of the crime wave that liberal prosecutors have produced around the country. Instead, he promised another “assault weapons” ban.
His big Thursday night speech, also from Philadelphia, riffed off his earlier statements that ‘”ultra-MAGA” Republicans were “semi-facsists.” Speaking in front of Independence Hall, Biden said, “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundation of our republic.” That’s straight out of the Saul Alinsky playbook for radicals: accusing your opponent of precisely what you’re doing yourself.
Next week, the Republicans are coming out with their “Commitment to America,” a new version of Newt Gingrich’s 1994 “Contract with America” that is supposed to be the GOP message for the fall election. It may be too little, too late.
John Zogby
Grade: B
Look out, I am a little edgy this week.
Question: What if the GOP threw a “Recession Fest” and 315,000 workers did not show up? I try to go by the numbers every week, and the economic slowdown that was supposed to happen as the economy cooled because of higher interest rates just did not happen. In addition to the new jobs, wages also continued to rise, and gas prices stayed at last week’s levels.
The United States is not out of the woods, but the end of the world as we know it did not happen this week.
Democrats are starting the election season in a tie with Republicans, and they continue to look good to keep the Senate. House Democrats, at least for now, picked up a new seat in Alaska. And Biden has decided to let local candidates do their own thing while he takes on Trump and the threat to democracy. After all, he was the one who slew the dragon the first time.
Right now, Biden’s polling numbers are stabilizing with some showing him in the mid-forties and regaining support among both the Democratic base and swing groups. At the moment, the Democrats could defy history by keeping control of both houses. Retaining the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives looks like more of a long shot, but it is not impossible.
Jed Babbin is a Washington Examiner contributor and former deputy undersecretary of defense in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush. Follow him on Twitter @jedbabbin
John Zogby is the founder of the Zogby Survey and senior partner at John Zogby Strategies. His weekly podcast with son and partner Jeremy Zogby can be heard here. Follow him on Twitter @ZogbyStrategies
