Among the many differences between the two Presidential candidates in 2024, two stand out: Donald Trump hates government and all it stands for and is a born public relations man; Joe Biden believes in government and what it can do and is a terrible public relations man.
What is especially interesting is that the perception and facts about Biden and Trump are so very different.
What you see and hear from Trump are exactly what you get – the perceptions and facts intertwine. What you see and hear in Biden conceals what the man has done and is doing despite how he looks and sounds doing it.
Given the circumstances and the importance of the upcoming election, this difference in what is factual and what is perception, is dangerous.
FACTS
Let’s focus on the facts.
Once upon a time in his heyday, Trump acted as his own public relations man – Johnny Moore – calling the entertainment columnists in NYC regularly to tell them the name of Trump’s latest girlfriend…anything to keep his name in their columns. They knew it was him and went along with it.
As the host of a network TV show for 15 years – longer than Seinfeld and Archie Bunker and almost as long as Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz – he knew exactly who his audience was, why they liked him and kept tuning in and how they genuinely felt about America and its government…much as he did.
While he knew nothing about government and cared less, what he did know was that he had millions of people paying attention to him and prepared to vote for him simply because they liked the way he said “You’re fired!!!!!!” and they loved his sneering attitude about government, politics and politicians.
It is a vitally incorrect perception that Donald Trump made anyone antigovernment and is leading them to that position. Rather the fact is that everyone feeling like that found Donald Trump and made him President of the United States squeezing him through the Electoral College
The facts about Joe Biden couldn’t be more different.
After decades in Washington, DC as Senator from the tiny State of Delaware, Biden ran for President two times before 2020 and no one paid any attention to him. Delaware is essentially “owned” by the DuPont Corporation. Biden had the political skill to keep DuPont happy and supportive even as he became a champion of the Labor movement. That indicates a very special skill at knowing what to do and say and when.
Biden was the lead Senator in the questioning of Clarence Thomas when Poppy Bush nominated him for the Supreme Court. Biden could bend over backwards for this Black candidate in spite of some horrendously unfavorable testimony and still maintain his long cordial relationship with southern Senators openly known for their racist attitudes. Once again Biden used that special skill and a special personality.
Then, Biden became the man chosen to be Vice President by America’s first Black President.
Biden’s life-long stuttering problem and the death of his first wife and several daughters kept him from being the classic Irish politician – all smiles and endless words at a million miles a minute and shrewd as he could be at the game of politics.
His ability to balance between diverse situations and people and to help a novice President deal with a Senate pledged to work against him at every instance, proves an ability to make good things happen in government. He has to work especially hard with the current government as the Republicans are focused on regaining power first and foremost often voting against their own policy decisions just to keep pressure on Biden and the Democrats.
PERCEPTION
The only perception found in a study of Trump is based on a false belief that he has done something in his first term besides lower taxes for the rich and corporate America and build a porous 400 mile wall on the southern border that cost one million dollars a mile…and doesn’t work. He genuinely builds better buildings.
Listening to him today one hears a man promising to “get even” with all those who opposed him. We do not know what the retribution will be like or how many people will be involved but it doesn’t matter. It is all personal with him – a psychological battle within his mind hearing his Father calling him “a loser” and wanting to win so that the voice inside his head will go away.
But we do know that people around him, (the Steven Moore’s) who work within the shadows are thinking about removing 600,000 Civil Service jobs in Washington and making them all political appointments – a guaranteed way to end the essentially non-political bureaucracy which really runs the government out of DC. Their very existence helps keep our democracy working.
Biden’s frozen face (due to an unfortunate decision to ‘get the wrinkles out’), his slow, halting, small step walk, his wandering hands, his forgetful responses, and a general public demeanor which makes him appear unstable and older than his 81 years, is clearly concerning those who support him.
Early polling among the general public and Democrats show an overwhelming concern that Biden is too old to serve a full term and that there is no strong Vice President in the wings to step in if necessary.
There is no answer anyone wants to give to the question of why he is running for reelection, when he could have easily stepped aside – with genuine and promising accomplishments in a difficult four years.
No one in the Democratic Party has stepped forward to try to answer those questions as he or she makes a move to push a sitting President aside.
Simply put, ousting Presidents from your own party is not what party politicians do no matter what.
It is not true nationally because there is the MAGA Republican Party which is very much with us.
The months ahead see Biden making public appearances and speeches looking and sounding weak with no one paying attention to what he is actually saying but just looking at him and shaking their heads.
How to offset this all but guaranteed reaction is the key.
BIDEN’S BRIEFINGS
Biden will remember that during World War II American President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Britain’s Prime Minister, Winston Churchill spent many fruitful hours speaking to their people in what FDR called his ‘fireside chat’.
In those days radio was the prime instrument for them.
Churchill’s radio visits were more critical as the German’s were bombing Britain and London, at the time.
Today the informational venues are TV and social media. Biden needs to begin taping a whole series of briefings, right from his desk in the Oval Office. The briefings would contain the substance often lost in that bad perception. There would be no crowds, just the facts. He would talk to the public and not be making speeches at them. He could be specific and energizing with no pressures whatsoever.
There is a lot to say, a lot to describe and explain – details lost in the movement and noise of public appearances. His tone and pace would be comfortably controlled.
And he would be the very image of a leader, totally in control of facts and events…comfortable, specific and all in a conversational tone that lets his warmth, his knowledge or his tough Irishman come through.
There would be a range of personality rarely seen in these last two years.
We don’t know whether there is anybody on Biden’s staff who would recognize this technique and introduce it.
Biden has had a staff for years and years. They know him but they may be limited in their thinking just because of their familiarity with him.
It is sad to see Secretary of State, Antony Blinken moving through the Middle East sinkhole pleading rather than calling the shots as America once did. For us he has become the image of Biden’s staff which may be totally unfair.
We hope that Biden can find a way to go around the perception that covers him today so that the country recognizes that the guy is doing good and has the required capabilities despite appearances.
It is interesting to note that his image as a ”crook helping his sad son” is the result of an FBI liar and not anything like the truth some MAGA Republicans covet.
We know we will see the best of Trump in the months ahead of next November because what we see is all there is to see.
We hope we can see the best of Biden too.
This well-written characterization of the two major likely candidates for the presidency largely agrees with my impression of these men. Yet I wouldn’t hold that Trump hates government, rather that he likes it if he’s part of it.
Yet Biden’s flaws are minimized here. I, along with the majority of the electorate wish there would be a better choice of candidates. Look forward to more minor party candidate votes in this election.