If there ever was a time in my life when I enjoyed Whirl 'n' Puke rides at amusement parks, it was too far back in time for me to remember. Living in Central Florida, we spent more than our share of time at Disney parks, and could not wait for the kids to be old enough to ride the Mad Hatter's Tea Cups on their own.
I'm getting the same feeling about my former political party.
You may recall that I broke my lifelong association with the Democratic Party earlier this year, the final straw being when they disenfranchised me by cancelling Florida's presidential primary election.
Turns out, I was just ahead of the game. If I'd stayed a Democrat, they would have disenfranchised me more spectacularly, along with everyone else. Not that there isn't precedent—there's a long history of political slates being decided in smoke-filled rooms. (I do wonder what they're actually smoking these days.)
Here is the far-from-amusing, no-end-in-sight amusement park ride I feel stuck on:
- President Biden's cognitive decline has been obvious to much of the country at least since 2020. Even to me, and I tend to give public speakers a lot of leeway, because my own brain, which functions quite well when operating my fingers on a keyboard, seems to lose all sense of direction when it tries to operate through my mouth.
- I am also not surprised that there are many ordinary citizens who did not notice this decline, because, frankly, most people are just too busy to pay attention to anything more detailed than carefully edited sound bites, if that.
- But those closest to the president? The vice president, cabinet members, secret service agents, the press corps, his doctors, his own family? How could they not have seen it?
- And yet for years, right up until his performance in the presidential debate (which was called "disastrous" but should have been no surprise at all), they assured us, in a united front, that the president was very healthy, sharp as a tack, and more than fully competent. Was it mass delusion, willful blindness, or simply lying?
- "Do not call conspiracy what these people call conspiracy"—but if all these people have been lying, what else would you call it?
- But if they were lying, and not deluded, why didn't they stop Biden from agreeing to the debate in the first place? How could they possibly have been surprised by what occurred?
- Even after the debate, many of them still maintained that it was just "one bad night," until the tide of opinion turned against them. What were they thinking?
- Maybe that's what puzzles me the most: What were they thinking? Did they think he'd get lucky and make it through all right? Under those circumstances? I think my own faculties are doing quite well, but I sure wouldn't trust myself standing under hot lights for 90 minutes beginning at 9 o'clock at night. And those closest to me know better than to expect much sense out of me at that hour.
- Here's where my cynical brain takes over: Was it a purposeful take-down of the president? Were they convinced he couldn't win in November and couldn't find a more graceful way of getting rid of him? But if they wanted to get rid of him, why did they work so hard to make sure he had no opposition in the primaries? I would happily have voted for a better choice if they had given me a chance.
- If President Biden is not competent to run for the office again, is he competent to be in the office now? What about for the last four years? I know I said I understand not being competent to make sense after 9 p.m. but can't we expect more of our commander-in-chief? What if "one bad night" occurs when we're on the brink of war?
- (Not, mind you, that I want to see Biden removed. I always thought Kamala Harris was a great choice for vice president because she served him well as both assassination and impeachment insurance.)
- What unelected and unknown person or committee has been running the country for the last four years? Do they hope to continue in that role?
- Are they using Kamala Harris as a placeholder until they can manoeuvre someone better into the nomination, or do they think she will be as manipulable as Biden?
- If this is a conspiracy, it sure seems as if it could have been done better. I've always said that there is no need to cry "conspiracy" when events can just as easily be explained by plain human stupidity. Or maybe the conspirators, whoever or whatever they may be, are far smarter than I am and are playing a long game whose end I cannot see.
Even the Mad Hatter's Tea Cup ride never left me this dizzy and disoriented.
