“When will the check arrive?”
That’s what “voters want to know,” former Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile told Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace yesterday.
Not whether President Joe Biden is dodging the media’s questions, as Wallace had inquired of his panel of Washington experts, after explaining that Biden now holds the modern record for longest time as president without facing reporters in a news conference.
“Well, it’s no surprise,” offered Jonathan Swan, national political correspondent for Axios. “It’s an extension of what he basically did throughout the campaign, which was very minimal — he basically didn’t subject himself to extended, tough questioning.”
GOP strategist Karl Rove went further, arguing, “he’s just not up to it … at the age of 78 he’s lost a few steps and he’s not going to look good in a news conference.”
But Brazile was having none of it. Citizens are laser-focused, she contends, on being shown the money … and really aren’t too concerned as to whether their commander-in-chief, the sleepy fellow in possession of the nuclear codes, might be suffering something approaching early dementia.
People do like money. But to what degree is she really correct? With palms greased will the public look the other way? How many votes have Democrats bought?*
Don’t think Brazile is alone, either; as I pointed out recently (“Big Bucks Buy Votes”), too much of Washington actually thinks purchasing apathy, support, votes is how Washington should work.
They marvel as modern political statecraft transcends the hubbub of bread and circuses with electronic direct deposits of spendable cash into bank accounts. But with the same hoped-for result.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* And ask the same question of Republicans who voted for sending similar checks to everyone when they controlled the Senate and the White House last year.
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