Biden's Foreign Policy Delusions
The president is deluding himself if he thinks that his record is going to impress the voters.
Julia Ioffe reports on a recent Biden campaign meeting that featured this rant from the president:
In a video of the Zoom that I was able to view, you can hear Biden chastising [Rep. Jason] Crow, who asked about the importance of national security to voters. “First of all, I think you’re dead wrong on national security,” the president says, the emotion at times garbling his words. “You saw what happened recently in terms of the meeting we had with NATO. I put NATO together. Name me a foreign leader who thinks I’m not the most effective leader in the world on foreign policy. Tell me! Tell me who the hell that is! Tell me who put NATO back together! Tell me who enlarged NATO, tell me who did the Pacific basin! Tell me who did something that you’ve never done with your Bronze Star like my son—and I’m proud of your leadership, but guess what, what’s happening, we’ve got Korea and Japan working together, I put Aukus together, anyway! … Things are in chaos, and I’m bringing some order to it [bold mine-DL]. And again, find me a world leader who’s an ally of ours who doesn’t think I’m the most respected person they’ve ever—”
“It’s not breaking through, Mr. President,” said Crow, “to our voters.”
“You oughta talk about it!” Biden shot back, listing his accomplishments yet again. “On national security, nobody has been a better president than I’ve been. Name me one. Name me one! So I don’t want to hear that crap!”
The president keeps coming back to his list of what he considers his big foreign policy successes, and he has become increasingly combative and self-important each time he mentions them. He rattles off items from his record as if he thinks that he is the only one that could have done these things, and he seems baffled and angry that he isn’t getting the appreciation that he thinks he deserves. Biden’s belief that his foreign policy record is a great political asset shows the extent to which he is out of touch with the public’s concerns, and it also shows how oblivious he is to the very real political damage that his support for the war in Gaza has done to his campaign. The president is deluding himself if he thinks that his record is going to impress the voters.