By Bob Gaydos

Gene Hackman roles.

Keeping up with the news is challenging, but it’s a lot more secure than a job with the federal government these days. That said, some thoughts on some recent events, with a deep bow to the late, great Jimmy Cannon.

— Maybe it’s just me, but: Chuck Schumer was right when he called the decision to vote in favor of a terrible Republican budget bill to keep the government open or to vote against it and give Trump even more power over government spending than he has already exercised “no choice at all.” Still, the Senate Minority leader had to choose and decided to vote against a shutdown and for the bill. He convinced enough Democrats to join him for the bill to proceed. In an op ed piece in The New York Times, Schumer said, “A shutdown would give Mr. Trump and Mr. Musk permission to destroy vital government services at a significantly faster rate than they can right now. Under a shutdown, the Trump administration would have wide-ranging authority to deem whole agencies, programs and personnel nonessential, furloughing staff members with no promise they would ever be rehired.” Voting against the bill would’ve shut down the government for who knows how long and Republicans would have forever blamed the Democrats, even though, as the party in control, it was Republicans’ responsibility to make something happen. Tough call. House Democrats could safely vote against the bill unanimously, knowing it still had to pass the Senate. Schumer knew he’d get heat, but chose what he saw as the lesser of two evils. Hard to argue with that.

— Maybe it’s just me, but: If Jeff Bezos is going to run a documentary autobiography of Kay Graham on Prime Video, the least he can do is watch it so he knows what the publisher of the Washington Post is supposed to act like. Graham led the paper through the Watergate and Pentagon Papers scandals in Washington, helping forge the newspaper’s reputation as a staunch defender of the truth and a fearless foe of political corruption. Bezos folded to Trump like a cheap tent you could probably get delivered overnight from Amazon Prime. Gutless.

  — Maybe it’s just me, but: It was sad to hear of the death of Gene Hackman at 94, especially considering the details of his demise. In honor of his memory, we held a mini-marathon of the two-time Oscar winner’s films. None of the really big ones. We watched “Enemy of the State,” also starring Will Smith and Jon Voight; “Get Shorty,” also starring John Travolta and Danny DeVito; and “Crimson Tide,” also starring Denzel Washington. All enjoyable. Gene hung out in good company. I got voted down on “The French Connection.”

   — Maybe it’s just me, but: I still call it the Gulf of Mexico.

   — Maybe it’s just me, but: The Yankees decision to no longer play Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” after a home game when the team loses was the right thing to do. A suggestion for what to play instead on those losing occasions might be Sinatra‘s “That’s Life.” They could also apply that philosophy to all the injuries the team has suffered in spring training.

  — Maybe it’s just me, but: Hawking Teslas on the lawn of the White House like some cheesy used car salesman is not only demeaning to the office of the president, but it’s probably illegal, no?

By Bob Gaydos

Survey answer: Protect the Constitution
RJ Photography

    Got my now-weekly letter from the Democratic National Committee urging me to make my 2025 Membership Contribution and fill out a survey to help the DNC “stop Donald Trump’s dangerous agenda.”

     Couple of problems here:

1. I am not now and never have been a member of the Democratic Party, or any political party for that matter. I am a registered voter and have been since I was eligible to vote more than 60 years ago. I’m not sure today, but it used to be the common practice among journalists not to register in any political party to avoid obvious complaints of bias. My opinions and leanings as an editorial writer may have been clear, but there was no way to claim favoritism to a particular party. Same with my work as a reporter or editor. So I’m not sure where the DNC got the idea that I’m a Democrat and decided to make me a pen pal, but I’m officially a registered Independent voter in Sullivan County, N.Y., and I like it that way.
2. The first question on the survey is: “Which of President Trump’s priorities do you find most troubling? (Please choose up to three.) The list includes eight of Trump’s more publicized and nasty talking points, from mass deportations to cutting taxes for the rich, gutting abortion access, limiting voting access, reversing environmental regulations, targeting the rights of LGBTQ+, dismantling federal agencies and stocking the Supreme Court with unqualified MAGA puppets.

    Umm, I’m troubled by all of them, folks, as I’ve written. But what troubles me the most about Trump is that he clearly has no grasp of separation of power and in fact shows no interest in sharing it with Congress or the courts.

   He has somehow, at least for the moment, been usurped as president by Elon Musk, who is running amok through any agency he sees as a threat to his lust for more power and money. And he seems to know even less than Trump about how government (at least ours) is supposed to function.

     And Democrats are being way too polite about it. Yes, the lawyers and civil liberties groups are doing their job, taking Trump to court and winning rulings from judges, at least temporarily stopping Trump. 

      But we need Democrats jumping up an down and getting people in the streets and on TV and social media with the same message, over and over. And I guess I’m actually answering the second question in the DNC survey: Which aspects of the Trump presidency do you find most disturbing?

      Easy. “His disregard for the U.S. Constitution.” All the other stuff stems from his ignorance, cowardice, greed, pettiness, narcissism, dishonesty and obviously failing mental faculties. They all carry a price for Americans. But the ultimate price is lack of freedom and an unchecked Trump beholden to an autistic billionaire with no loyalty to anything but himself is the ultimate threat to American democracy. And someone needs to make a lot of noise about that.

   Wall Street doesn’t care. So-called mainstream media no longer cares, or at least the one-time big names in credibility have put away their knives and First Amendment privileges out of fear and greed. What else could it be?

     The Constitution is under attack and Republicans don’t care. I’ve been writing that message for a long time now, having declared the death of the Republican Party in 2016 when it knelt meekly at the feet of Trump.

      Perhaps that’s why someone in the DNC mistakenly thought I was a registered member of the party. Sorry, no. I just want my Senators, Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, and all the rest of the Democrats to take to the ramparts and use whatever weapons they have at their command to stop this dismantling of America. Go get Musk.

     Rally the people who were lied to by Trump and voted for him, the Republicans who may be hiding quietly, too embarrassed to come out and admit they were wrong, and the millions of Americans who didn’t bother to vote for president because “they’re all the same.“

     No, they’re not.

(Note to DNC: Thanks for the survey. The opinions expressed here are free for you to use, but in keeping with my tradition, I’ll be making my donations to the ACLU, SPLC and other apolitical organizations fighting to defend and preserve the Constitution.)

By Bob Gaydos

     I was voter number 838 Sunday afternoon, Oct. 26, at the Government Center in Monticello, N.Y.. Row A, Kamala Harris and Democrats, all the way. “Yes” on New York State Proposition One extending protection against discrimination in several categories including pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes — Democrats’ preemptive effort to thwart possible Republican efforts to enact a national abortion ban.

            Republicans have forfeited any chance of consideration at the ballot box with their full-throated and conscience-free embrace of all things Trump, punctuated by the all-out salute to hatred and bigotry at his Sunday night Madison Square Garden rally. An utterly despicable display.

       In contrast, it was a pleasure casting the vote Sunday. A sunny afternoon. Lots of parking. No lines. Plenty of helpful volunteer poll workers. Name, address, signature. Smooth as silk. Well done, Sullivan.

       Of course, this is precisely the kind of thing Republicans have been trying to dismantle across the country — orderly, honest, uncomplicated voting. For all. When that happens everywhere, they tend to lose nationally because their policies don’t sit well with many Americans. Especially for the past decade when their only policy has been to oppose anything Democrats propose. It’s hard to run a two-party system of government that way.

       That’s why Trump and the MAGAs want it their way: one ruler with absolute power and a bunch of flunkies to make it happen. Essentially eliminate all marginalized citizens — non-white, non-straight, non-Christian — who might expect support from their government by eliminating their vote and the votes of those who support the concept of equal rights and opportunity (those Trump calls “the enemy within”).

       It wasn’t that long ago that women were on that list of marginalized citizens. Not anymore. They have the vote and tend to vote in larger numbers than men. They have a candidate this year who understands their concerns and those of the citizens who were targets of ugly “jokes” and comments in Madison Square Garden Sunday night.

       Early voting numbers are up in many areas of the country where it hasn’t always been as easy as it was in Monticello Sunday afternoon. I’d like to think it’s a positive sign for Kamala Harris and those who want to protect and preserve democracy in America. 

          Vote like your freedom depends on it.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

    “Nah, I don’t get involved in politics.”

    And with a wave of his hand, the decision was made. He wasn’t interested in a free subscription to my column. I didn’t bother to argue that I have been known to write about lots of other subjects besides politics — addiction, nutrition, food, books, health, media, TV, UFOs, sports, social customs, environment, science — because I knew it wouldn’t matter. 

    Yeah, I write about politics a lot, because, unlike my friend, I think it matters a lot. Especially today. And it really annoys me that so many people just wave it off so casually, as if it has no impact on their lives. This friend, who recently became a father, had been talking about companies failing to pay a living wage, the inability of businesses to hire help, the lack of trained help available, the red tape in workers compensation proceedings, shoddy construction jobs and how the system is rigged. You know, that system.

     That system which threatens to inflict Donald Trump on us again, unless we all start paying more attention to the politics of the day. Because whatever complaints you might have with the way things are today, you’re going to have many more if enough uninterested-in-politics voters decide not to vote or, worse, to join the bullies and racists and check the box for Trump because, you know, he tells it like it is.

       If only.

Like it or not, everything is politics in one way or another. We are a nation of laws and politicians write the laws. We either like them or we don’t. We get to vote accordingly. Hire them or fire them. That’s our basic job as citizens.

     But if you “don’t get involved in politics,” you really don’t have any right to complain, especially if you also don’t vote. Informed citizens who vote are the backbone of a democracy. Ill-informed or misinformed citizens are the obvious threat. That’s where we are this year with the Trump cult of ignorant followers, who vote.

     But the silent threat are all those who don’t want to get involved, don’t want to learn about the candidates and their positions on issues and how it might impact the lives of everyone, voters and non-voters. And, please, don’t give me that “they’re all alike” nonsense. The last eight years should have put that argument to rest.

     The Trump Republican Party is a clear and present danger to our democracy. The Democratic Party, behind its presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, is fighting to protect and preserve our democracy. It’s as simple as that. Even a minuscule, grudging amount of attention paid to what has been going on in America should make that clear to anyone who likes the idea of living in a free and democratic nation. We all have a stake in it. That’s not politics, that’s the cold, hard reality.

      This concludes your civics lesson for today. Perhaps some day we’ll elect enough politicians who think it’s a subject that should still be taught in all our schools, along with a true history of slavery, sex education and geography.

      Pay attention, please.

rjgaydos@gmail,com

By Bob Gaydos 

Kamala Harris, accepting the nomination as Democratic Party presidential candidate.

   Well, that was unconventional. At least for Democrats.

     From Lil Jon to Oprah to Bill and Hillary and Barack and Michelle to the Gen Z’s and Old Joe, the Democrats (and a few sane Republicans) had a grand old time in Chicago reminding the rest of the country what it means to be a proud American and the threat Donald Trump and the Republican Party pose to that idea.

      America needed the wake up call.

      Four nights of joy and optimism culminated in the nomination of Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party’s nominee to run for president of the United States. Historic and hopeful.

       It is fair to say that there has been a profound mood swing in America in the short time since Joe Biden said he was once too young to be a senator and is now apparently too old to be president, handing the reins of power to a black/South Asian/American woman with apparently just the right attitude and resume to dispose of an aging, self-absorbed felon whose only interest in America is how to fleece it.

       Hope and joy are contagious. They can spread quickly, especially when there is a concerted effort to share them. Democrats, working together and setting aside differences for the moment, have decided to share the wealth. The moment is that important.

       Harris, adapting quickly to the role of party standard bearer, delivered a powerful acceptance speech, reminding Americans that Trump is an “unserious man” who represents a serious threat to the freedoms they cherish and typically take for granted. But this is not the time for taking things for granted. This is the time for action, she and speaker after speaker at the convention reminded Americans. It’s time to work together, setting differences aside for now, to protect and preserve democracy.

     For Democrats, very unconventional. For all Americans, very much needed.

                            ***

     Meanwhile, in the world of lies and delusion, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. abandoned his third-party candidacy for president, endorsing Trump as a man who shares Kennedy’s views on America’s future. Birds of a feather.

      Kennedy, hoping that his endorsement will result in a role in a Trump presidency, said the Harris campaign never returned his calls. Another plus for them.

    However, Kennedy’s siblings sent him a message. They issued a public statement dismissing everything he stands for and calling his endorsement of Trump “a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear.”

      The Kennedy endorsement wasn’t expected to do much for Trump vote wise either.

        All in all, a good week for America.

    rjgaydos@gmail.com      

By Bob Gaydos

Vice President Kamala Harris waves as she is introduced during the Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc.’s Grand Boulé,in Indianapolis.

    Much as the politicians and those whose job it is to write about them think there is nothing else worth writing and reading about in the world, they’re wrong. But they can dominate the news coverage through sheer persistence and repetition, as witness the recent non-stop “reporting” on how Joe Biden was slipping mentally as well as physically and was too old to serve another term as president and needed to step aside as a presidential candidate for someone — anyone — younger.

     Donald Trump, nearly as old, clearly slipping and never close to Biden in terms of intellect and knowledge of how stuff actually works (never mind moral compass) pretty much got a pass through all this because the media had already decided what the storyline was.

     Well, Biden flipped the story on them when they were napping on a Sunday afternoon. He apparently caught Republicans napping, too, because all they had been talking about for weeks and had highlighted at their crowning of Trump at their nominating convention was beating “Old Joe.”

     No mo. Joe’s out, Kamala’s in it to win it and much of the media is now busy trying to come up with a storyline on why the vice president just can’t beat Trump.

      Hotshot political writer talking to a colleague working at a desk close by: “Harris? Really? I mean she’s too … well, she’s not … well, you know, she doesn’t … and isn’t she too … well, yes, as you say, Democrats are acting weird and rallying behind her. Like, all of them, even the lefties. Wow! How’d they do that? And they seem excited. And she’s getting lots of positive social media reaction outside of the MAGA sites. And she’s raising a ton of money already. A lot! Of course, she is smarter and much younger than Trump. Then there’s the abortion issue that Trump bragged about … but Republicans are now trying to hide that. And there’s the women’s vote, the black vote, the black women’s vote, the young people’s vote. Heck, the Asian-American vote. … You know, despite what our polls say, Trump might actually have a problem beating her because, well, you know how he talks about women and Harris won’t put up with it. After all, she’s a former prosecutor and he’s a convicted felon and a sexual offender and she’s sent a lot of them to prison. She also went after phony, for-profit colleges, like the one Trump ran. And, really, he did take all those documents. And he does lie constantly and isn’t too bright and rambles a lot. Plus, she keeps talking about preserving democracy the way Biden did and a lot of people like that and Trump has called us “fake news” in the past. A lot. Remember? And now Republicans are whining that Biden tricked them? No fair! That he should be forced to run because he said he was? Are they kidding? How would that work? Or that he should now step down as president? But he never said he couldn’t do the job and no one else did, just that he’s too old for four more years. Which you could also say about Trump, right? You ever see him walking down a ramp? Scary. And Trump’s been talking about sharks and electric boats and abandoning NATO and Ukraine and having the Justice Department go after his “enemies,” which doesn’t sound good. And that J.D. Vance he picked to run as his vice president? He once called Trump “America’s Hitler”! Now he’s acting like Trump’s new Rudy Giuliani. He’s changed his name three times. Forget George Santos. Is there a bigger phony around? Maybe we should recheck Vance’s “hillbilly” story. …

     “I mean, Biden has done a good job and he’s a proud man with a long record of service who has suffered a lot of personal loss in his life and it takes a lot of humility, especially because people think you’re too old, to step aside, to pass the torch to ‘a younger generation,’ as he said. To finish the job. To preserve democracy, as he also said. After all, Harris can run on his record because it’s their record, right? And it’s a good one. Economy? Foreign policy? All good. He even worked out a bill — bipartisan — to address the Mexican border issue, but Republicans killed it because Trump told them to. He didn’t want Biden to have it as a campaign issue. How cheesy, right? And Trump’s got nothing real to offer but revenge. That and tax breaks for rich people. I mean, did Mexico ever build that wall? Did we ever see his ear? And he’s already attacking Harris personally. Calling her crazy. Mispronouncing her name. Petty. … So, whaddya think? At this point, it looks like Republicans are really stuck with Trump, right? I mean, he’s got all his MAGAs, but that’s not enough to get elected without cheating and the guy is really old and showing signs of slipping, isn’t he? I mean, he never really was all there, anyway, right? And Old Joe really set Kamala up great, like overnight, didn’t he? Slick. She’s got a lot of positive energy going. Money rolling in. And she is the VP.  Hmmm … Hey, thanks for listening … 

          “Hey, boss! I think I’ve got a new angle on a storyline for Kamala. …”

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

      Thanks, Joe. … 

President Joe Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential race.

   That’s all I could muster at first. The news alert — “Biden dropping out of presidential race” — had popped onto my I-Phone screen about five minutes earlier and I reacted with surprise and I wasn’t sure what else.

       So I drank some tea, popped a couple of vitamins and went outside to watch our three resident hummingbirds try to keep an aggressive woodpecker away from their feeders. Their subsistence. Their future. Through persistence, remarkable athleticism and teamwork, they succeeded. The woodpecker left for easier pickins.

      And I had a moment of clarity.

      It seems I have a pattern. When confronted with a dramatic historic moment, rather than yielding to the ingrained journalistic instinct and rushing to write about it, I take a break to reconnect with, I suppose, real life.

      On Sept. 11, 2001, after watching on TV as a second plane flew into the World Trade Center, I got into my car, turned on the radio and drove to a park close to the newspaper where I worked. As editorial page editor, I knew I would have to write about the attack. The park was familiar to me because I used to walk my dog there before going to work in the morning. I had since moved and there was no dog, but I relaxed as I enjoyed the quiet and watched other people walking their dogs, drank my coffee and listened to reports of a plane striking the Pentagon.

     Then I went to work and wrote an editorial stating that the U.S. was at war.

      Nineteen years later, on Jan. 6, 2020, after watching on TV for two hours as a mob egged on by a president who refused to accept the fact he had lost an election laid waste to the U.S. Capitol, I finally turned off the TV, looked at the new dog and said, “Let’s go for a walk.” We took a quiet stroll around the pond in the back and, though it was cold, it reminded me of the beauty in my life.

     Then I went back in and wrote a column about the fear and anger and shame I felt at this attempted coup and about how the calming words of President-elect Joe Biden helped me to feel there was still hope. He faced a “monumental task,” I wrote, to overcome the disastrous Trump presidency and return America to its place of dignity and stability as the world’s symbol of democracy.

     Which in large part, in a remarkably successful presidency, he did. But the rot in the Republican Party, a gold-plated chamber pot of fear, racism, ignorance, greed, corruption, cowardice, hypocrisy, bigotry, opportunism, threats, lies and lust for power fueled by religious extremism, has not yet been eradicated.

       And President Joe Biden has been told by many of his formerly closest allies in the Democratic Party and much of the mainstream media that he is too old to finish the job.

       I don’t know. He’s 81 and showing signs of mental and physical fatigue. But he knows how to do the job and understands right from wrong. Trump, meanwhile, is 78, a physical, moral and mental wreck and doesn’t really care about the job, just the title and the perks. But Republicans apparently love him and too many Americans still don’t understand the threat he and his enablers pose to that American democracy.

        So as I watched the hummingbirds Sunday afternoon, I thought about what an act of selflessness it was for Biden, who clearly believes he can still do the job, to agree to step aside for someone younger, because, well because it’s the right thing to do. The patriotic thing to do. The politically smart thing to do. At least that’s what he had been constantly told for a month since his poor performance in the debate with Trump (whose litany of lies and accusations was largely ignored).

          Now, Joe Biden, with a lifetime of service to country, has thought of country first and done his job again. He has stood aside for someone younger — most likely Vice President Kamala Harris — who can bring the fight to Trump (now the only old man in the race) and the Republicans and, more importantly, convince a lot of Democrats and other Americans to unite behind her to drive away the threat to America’s future. To their future. Just like the hummingbirds did.

      Thanks, Joe … for everything.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

Vice President Kamala Harris.

Why do we  elect vice presidents?

     That’s not a rhetorical question. In fact, it’s the answer to a question many Democrats have been asking themselves for more than a week.

      In a virtual meltdown since Joe Biden’s shutdown performance in his first debate with Donald Trump, and under a constant New York Times-led media barrage about Biden‘s age and his capability to handle the job of president, many wealthy Democratic Party supporters and plenty of everyday Democrats have been asking, “What is Plan B?”

     As in, “If we don’t think Joe can win, who should the party’s candidate be? Quick!”

     Funny thing is, all the names quickly mentioned as possible presidential candidates quickly said they’re still backing Biden. Now, that may be because it would be unseemly to challenge the leader of the party or simply because none of them wants to face Trump now when they might have an easier race four years from now.

    The other funny thing is, even though presidents run with vice presidential candidates, who, theoretically at least, can step in immediately and take over the duties of president if necessary, whether because of incapacitation or resignation, hardly anyone mentioned Vice President Kamala Harris as a potential substitute for Biden.

       But isn’t that her job?

       This is in no way an argument for Biden to decline to run again “for the good of the party and the country” or for him to dramatically resign the office of president. I have no way of knowing, any more than do any of those big media pundits, whether Biden is capable of fulfilling the duties of president while also conducting an aggressive reelection campaign against Trump and his Republican cult followers. If Biden’s running, he’s got my vote.

       All I am saying is that if he feels he is not up to it, his vice president would seem to be the person most qualified and capable of doing so. Harris has been with Biden through all the successes of nearly four years in office, been part of the planning and prodding and preaching necessary to get things done. She has dealt with leaders on the world stage. If people like what the Biden White House has done, well, then Harris has been part and parcel of all that.

    Plus, she is Donald Trump‘s greatest nemesis: An educated, articulate, outspoken, politically astute black woman. She has been district attorney of San Francisco, Attorney General of the state of California and served as a United States senator from California. She knows how government works. She can take on the issue of abortion head-on. She can talk frankly about voter suppression tactics. In fact, she can talk about any issue Trump or Republicans throw out there with more clarity and knowledge than can Trump.

       In fact, so can Biden. But if by Plan B Democrats want someone to more aggressively get up in Trump’s face, call out his constant lies, which much of the media now seems to accept as, well, acceptable, then Kamala Harris is their woman.

     Plus, you’d have the whole first woman president angle going again, the one stolen from Hillary. And if Biden did take the dramatic step of resigning (which he has given no indication of doing, nor am I suggesting), she would have access to the Biden campaign’s considerable funds.

        All of this, of course, would be dependent on Democrats doing something they always have trouble doing — getting behind one candidate and sticking to the script.

       Republicans have mastered the art of uniting behind even the most despicable of candidates imaginable, with Trump the felon exhibit A. They are a political party without a soul. Democrats, however, usually spend an inordinate amount of time challenging each other over who is the most noble of candidates. It often produces confusion, not votes.

       Joe Biden has been a good president. He has served this country well his entire adult life and grown old in the process. Few are granted the opportunity. In an election which is in sum a contest between democracy and despotism, he is the symbol of what our forefathers had in mind when they said farewell to the king.

       When the script hit the fan, their Plan B was to have a vice president.      

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

    Reporting the most significant news of the day is always a combination of judgment and opinion, seasoned by experience. But, within the variables, one thing is certain: War trumps  everything.

      The terrorist attack by Hamas on Israel was so brutally vicious, claiming the lives of more than a thousand innocent civilians, including women and children, the elderly, people dragged out of their homes, young people at a festival, even babies and also resulting in the taking of hostages that it (1.) overshadowed the unprecedented shutting down of the House of Representatives because Republicans, the majority party, had removed their chosen Speaker and could not agree on a new one, putting in peril (2) funding for the government itself, (3) aid to Ukraine in its war with Russia and (4) aid to longtime ally Israel in its declared war against Hamas, which (5.) did not seem to trouble the small group of rightwing radical Republicans holding the government hostage, or their anointed leader, Donald Trump, who (6.) gave his blessing for new Speaker to Jim Jordan, the ineffectual Ohio congressman who aided and abetted Trump in the failed January 6 insurrection and whose only goal seems to be to shut down the government and, in the process, all the investigations and court proceedings against Trump, who (7.) took the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel as an occasion to compliment Hezbollah, another Islamic terrorist group with a target on Israel and (8.) to blame Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu for the success of the surprise attack, most likely as payback for the fact that Netanyahu (9.) was the first foreign leader to congratulate Joe Biden on his election as America’s president in 2020, something which Trump, Jordan and the rest of the MAGA crowd are still  (10.) trying to undo even as (11.) Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a member of one of America’s most celebrated political families, flip-flopped between conspiracy theories and strategies in his own ego-driven campaign for the 2024 presidential election, having (12.) announced that he is dropping his plan to run as a Democrat to run instead as an independent candidate, probably because he was gaining little traction among Democratic voters since his extreme views more closely resemble those of Trump supporters, (13.) a development which caused confusion among political prognosticators as to whether Kennedy as an independent candidate with a famous Democratic name  would take more voters from Trump or Biden, (14.) something which would be more of a worry for Democrats if RFK Jr. even vaguely resembled his late father politically and personally (he’s no Bobby Kennedy) and had also not recently been accused of anti-Semitism, but, again, was complicated by (15.) Kennedy’s unambiguous reaction to the Hamas attack on Israel: “This ignominious, unprovoked, and barbaric attack on Israel must be met with world condemnation and unequivocal support for the Jewish state’s right to self-defense. We must provide Israel with whatever it needs to defend itself — now.”

    War trumps everything.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

Marianne Williamson and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. … challenging Joe Biden

  Be careful what you wish for, they say. They were on to something.

     A while back, I wrote a column expressing my desire (hope, wish) that the 2024 presidential election not be a rematch between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. America needs to move on, I said.

      Trump is a totally incompetent, lying fascist who has seriously damaged American democracy, I said, and Biden is a competent, concerned, experienced public servant, who saved America from four more years of Trump. I still stand by all that.

      But I also noted that Biden would be 82 should he decide to run for president again in 2024, which he has now said he plans to do. That would make him 86 in the last year of his term. America’s oldest president.

        Seeing no relief from the Republican Party save for younger, nouveau fascist versions of Trump (no spring chicken either, he will be 77 next month), I said Democrats needed some new, younger, more vibrant candidates for president. Thanks, Joe, but America needs it, I said.

       I meant maybe an experienced governor or senator or a re-energized version of Vice President Kamala Harris.

       I did not mean Marianne Williamson or Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. So far, that’s what we’ve got.

       Yes, both are younger than Biden, but both do qualify for Social Security benefits. Williamson, although she is 70, possesses considerable energy and appeals to a segment of younger voters. They know her on TikTok. An author, she also is not shy about challenging more mainstream Democrats, like Biden, about what she sees as their lack of urgent commitment to progressive goals.

    She has a point. She also has zero chance of winning the Democratic nomination, never mind the presidency.

     Kennedy, 69, is a different matter. His strongest weapon is his family name and history. But RFK Jr. does not stir the masses the way RFK Sr. did and he’s definitely no JFK. Time has also dimmed some of the vote-getting power of the Kennedy name.

     Son of the assassinated New York senator and U.S. attorney general and nephew of the assassinated president, this Kennedy is basing his campaign for the Democratic nomination primarily on the reputation he has gained as the most aggressive, best-known, anti-vaxxer in the country.

    That sounds like a terrific issue for a Republican. In fact, it probably will be. Fortunately for the country, but unfortunately for Kennedy, most Americans do not share his vigorous, scientifically discredited opposition to vaccines.

    Still, some recent polls put Kennedy drawing almost 20 percent among Democrats and Williamson up to 9 percent. While a bit surprising, since neither can be considered a mainstream candidate, that support is not a serious threat to Biden. And some Democratic voters may not know much about Kennedy beyond his lineage. Time will tell.

    Significantly, those same polls also show a solid majority of Democrats saying they would prefer that Biden not run again (too old), but that runs up against the overwhelming sentiment among Democrats (and many independents) that, if Trump is again the Republican presidential candidate (too scary), they would run barefoot over hot coals to vote for Biden again if he’s the Democratic candidate.

     That’s apparently what he’s banking on.  Vote for steady, experienced, moderate, sensible Joe over erratic, clueless, power-hungry, dangerous Trump — or any other Republican promoting fascism. The Biden campaign message is that he will save democracy now for the younger, more energetic Democrats who follow him to improve on a little later. Be patient.

     In certain context, it makes a lot of sense. Like it did in 2020. It’s Yogi Berra’s “deja vu all over again.”

     Such is the unfortunate state of politics in this democratic republic three years shy of its 250th birthday.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

Bob Gaydos is writer-in-residence at zestoforange.com.