September 6, 2022

President Biden came to Milwaukee to campaign, and the Democrats' Senate candidate, Mandela Barnes, avoided the event.

The Washington Post took note: "As Biden celebrates Labor Day, Democratic candidates tread gingerly/The president attended Labor Day events in Milwaukee and Pittsburgh, as Democratic contenders like Senate candidate Mandela Barnes keep a careful distance."

What, exactly, was Barnes worried about? "Gingerly" means "With great care as to the result of a movement or act; (very) carefully, cautiously, tentatively, warily. Also: reluctantly, with distaste (as in handling some disagreeable object, etc.)" (OED).

We're told that "for days [Mandela] wouldn’t say whether he planned to appear with Biden.... [then] he didn’t show up at the president’s speech and instead participated in other Labor Day events." That's just plain shunning, isn't it?

It seems that the Post attempted to extract a positive-sounding response from the Barnes camp:
Barnes spokeswoman Maddy McDaniel said Barnes appreciated Biden coming to Milwaukee. Barnes participated in a labor parade in Milwaukee and met with striking workers in Racine. 

Here's the text of Biden's remarks in Milwaukee. Only one mention of Barnes:

And I want to thank Tammy — she couldn’t be here today — who’s a champion of working people and always there. (Applause.) You know, and the same goes to Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes, who couldn’t be here, but — (applause) — he’s going be your next United States senator. (Applause.) Oh, he is.

The same goes.... 

46 comments:

typingtalker said...

So ... who do we think the democrats will nominate for president next year ... ?

Mr Wibble said...

What, exactly, was Barnes worried about?

He can't be seen with Biden because the latter is unpopular with independents, but he can't outright snub Biden because the latter is still supported by the Dem base, and Barnes needs both groups to turn out for him in November.

mezzrow said...

Such a happy family. Of course they're going to win.

That's what the Washington Post is telling me. I just read it this morning.

Bob Boyd said...

Doesn't the White House have a basement? I thought it did.

rehajm said...

During his speech in Wisconsin on Monday, the president denounced the former president's followers as 'Trumpies' and claimed politicians on the 'extreme right' of the GOP are 'coming for your social security' and destroying worker pensions.

At one point Biden was interrupted by a heckler - though he told Secret Service to 'let him go.'

'Everybody's entitled to be an idiot,' the president said to scattered laughter.


…probably not The President of the United States, but that’s just my opinion. If I were running for anything I’d keep my distance from him, too…

Christopher B said...

Eighty. One. Million.

LOL

rehajm said...

Watching Democrats campaign in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania seems kind of silly at this point. Silly like Putin sweating out election day silly…

michaele said...

It upsets me when, in his speeches, Biden can blithely pronounce the lie " Police lost their lives as a result of that day." in relation to jan 6. He never gets a fact check warning. The most immediate after the event death was Brian Sicknick who suffered 2 strokes on Jan 7 which ended his life. The other 4 of the 5 committed suicide in the weeks and even months following the riot. And, yes, I'll call it a riot. The suicides seem so strange to me when I think of the stressful situations so many police officers often experience. How many committed suicide after dealing with all the various BLM riots? Has that research ever been done?

Tina Trent said...

Barnes wasn't worried about anything. He was playing the typical political game of "white Biden (and his advance team) better submit to me or I won't get out the vote for him."

Since Barnes is a member of the extremely radical Working Families Party, his refusal to commit, and ultimately not showing, is also flavored with Putting it to The (centrist) Man. Biden didn't express enough revolutionary hatred in his speech the other night.

The GOP and Trump fall all over themselves to give in to this crap too. See: Vernon Jones. Spend one election cycle in Georgia and just try to not see it.

Howard said...

It's smart. Maybe Doctor Oz should have had the guts to be his own man instead of a minion as well.

Curious George said...

He came to Milwaukee? Oh, I see he was heckled.

BTW, Mandela is black. And if you don't support Joe Biden you ain't black. So is Mandela white now?

Mr. Forward said...

Coming attractions. Hunter Biden appears with Senator Ron Johnson.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

I remember our host saying some years ago it is hard to believe both parties would come up with thoroughly unlikeable candidates, with high negatives in the polls. That certainly happened in both 2016 and 2020. Is it happening again? I don't happen to find Trump all that unlikeable, but I have to take seriously the possibility that if he were elected, there would be a backlash that would be bad for the country. This is serious even if you happen to think many Trump haters are deplorable.

In his big speech Trump got in something about how states should have re-considered their slates of electors in 2020. It is wrong if not crazy for him to keep saying he wants to re-litigate that election. That doesn't mean it's authoritarian or a threat to democracy. It doesn't mean he hates women or any of the chosen victim groups. He should simply have acknowledged, a long time ago, that there is no body before which the question of the 2020 election as a whole can be litigated. There may be odds and ends of prosecutions, but they don't change anything. One joke is that if Trump was actually elected in 2020, then he's not eligible to serve a term beginning in 2025.

Having said all that, it seems increasingly likely to me that Trump will be better than the alternatives in 2024. Many of you will be pleased that I don't have a vote in the U.S.

Temujin said...

If Wisconsinites remove Ron Johnson and replace him with Mandela Barnes, then nothing has been learned in the past 6 years. If you cannot see the carnage in two years of radical Democratic policy, with Democrats left unrestricted in their actions, if you like the results of the last two years, then I'm sure Mandela Barnes is your guy.

Ron Johnson is one of the few Senators up there with the guts to ask the questions the New York Times employees have been instructed not to ask, questions many of his fellow GOPers won't ask. And he pursues those questions, often alone up there.

I truly hope Wisconsin leaves us with one of the few good ones and does not simply vote for the color of a man's skin- thinking that makes him just and good. It doesn't.

You know how people feel by the actions they take. Democrats never did like Joe Biden. They like him even less as President. The funny thing is- Biden is acting on their requests. He is doing all, and more, that they wanted done. Mandela Barnes loves those requests, but like many Dems, he knows he cannot get elected if he stands by his real self, stands by those policies he loves and will continue to enact if elected. Joe Biden represents Mandela's real self and Mandela won't appear in public with his real self.

And Dear God please tell me that this man is not going to get elected because his name is Mandela.

John henry said...

Pretty much everybody avoided the event.

Crowd size was measured in dozens. Not even many dozens.

Our president emeritus measures his crowd sizes in tens of thousands.

John stop fascism vote republican Henry

Dagwood said...

Howard said...

It's smart. Maybe Doctor Oz should have had the guts to be his own man instead of a minion as well.


Maybe Howard should have the guts to pull his head out of Biden's posterior and get a whiff of reality.

Marcus Carman said...

I'm intrigued by the fake heckler at the speech. Was it a Biden plant or just some rogue performance artist. It sure as heck wasn't a "MAGA Republican".

holdfast said...

The Capitol cop who shot a petite, unarmed woman still hasn’t had the decency to suck-start his own Glock.

Although he probably abandoned it in a bathroom, again.

Should we consider that maybe the rioters got in so easily because the Capitol cops are just bad at their jobs?

Meade said...

Mr. Forward said...
Coming attractions. Hunter Biden appears with Senator Ron Johnson.

LOL

Gusty Winds said...

I was in Oconomowoc having lunch with my parents when the local Soap Opera station broke in to show Biden's speech live. Wrecked lunch. He repeated his lie that MAGA-Republicans are destroying democracy. That capitol police were injured and attacked on J6 (instead of telling the truth that they held the doors open).

The small Milwaukee "union" crowd ate it up. No wonder the city is going to shit so quickly. God bless unions, but they will sell their souls and anyone else's to protect that pension.

The "heckler" was an obvious plant so Biden could get off a prepared one liner. Check it out. No way. Some guy with 30 year old face. Prematurely clean cut gray hair. Navy Blue blazer. American Flag on his lapel. Just there all alone. Sticks out like a turd in a punchbowl in the crowd's demographics. He doesn't even look like a Waukesha or Washington County guy. You can't hear what he heckled, but Biden's comeback is being touted all over twitter this morning, as if it was off the cuff and organic. Bullshit. It's about as believable as those khaki pants, white masked feds feds mysteriously showing up doing marches at random.

Even the boogeymen are fake with this asshole. The propaganda never ends.

The big news out of the event this morning is Biden's new think tank nick name for MAGA-Republicans "Trumpies". Wonder how many people it took to come up with that? It's not even good.

Dave Begley said...

Now Biden is saying that MAGA Republicans are coming for Social Security. In its own way, it’s remarkable that Biden would make such a ridiculous lie. The Dems have contempt for the American people.

Bob Boyd said...

Hey Barnes, hows about you come stand next to Alzheimer Hitler in Milwaukee on Labor Day and let's see what happens?

I don't see how any politician could pass up an offer like that.

WK said...

From what little I read, at least Barnes seems to have some aversion to taxes. So there’s that.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Mandela Barnes, avoided the event? Not all democrats love vegetables!

Ann Althouse said...

"The "heckler" was an obvious plant so Biden could get off a prepared one liner. Check it out. "

That link didn't work, but it should go here.

Bob Boyd said...

If you click through to the yahoo news article, there's a 2nd picture of the heckler. He really does look totally fake, a young man with his hair made gray.

mikee said...

Dementia Joe doesn't care what happened there, because he was & is unaware of the gingerly shunning.

Gusty Winds said...

Thanks for fixing the link Althouse.

Buckwheathikes said...

81 million votes, huh. Most in history. Most popular elected president in the history of the office. People came out at 3 in the morning to vote for this guy.

LOLOLOLOLO.

Not a single Democrat wants the stink of this thief permeating their campaign events.

Buckwheathikes said...

81 million votes, huh. Most in history. Most popular elected president in the history of the office. People came out at 3 in the morning to vote for this guy.

LOLOLOLOLO.

Not a single Democrat wants the stink of this thief permeating their campaign events.

Mr. T. said...

Maybe Barnes couldn't find a place to park-that didn't require him to pay. He hates to pay parking tickets.

Or taxes.

Or his fair share.

That, you see is only for middle-class plebs, not urban grifters like him, nor his public union goons.

Yancey Ward said...

Barnes is a shoe-in candidate, guys. No way he loses in November with no changes in mail-in-balloting in Wisconsin. It is over.

walter said...

He was busy trying to gather a protest outside home of his opponent, Scott Walker.

Lurker21 said...

I don't hate Nelson Mandela. I rather admire him. But I wouldn't name my kid after him.

I will miss Ron Johnson from Wisconsin if he loses, but I guess I could always drop in at the sawmill there.

Yancey Ward said...

The Democrats prepped the ground for the 2020 and 2022 elections in 2018. They poured resources into winning governor mansions and Secretary of States offices in the key states Trump won to win the 2016 election. With control of those offices, mail-in-ballots were coming, even if COVID had never appeared. And note, even when the Republicans controlled the legislatures (see Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania).

The Republican Pary is right on the cusp of not being able to ever win the Senate or the Presidency again. This election was the last chance, and they have done absolutely nothing to stop the Democrats from cheating with mail-in-ballots.

Saint Croix said...

The heckler looks like Ben Shapiro's uncle.

or maybe a cousin

that is funny hair

don't call me a plant denier

Joe Smith said...

I've seen the videos of Biden's events...

A mime show could draw bigger crowds...

ElPresidenteCastro said...

28 year old complexion with 54 year old grey hair. Dad's blue suit and a flag lapel pin. Hmmm.

All he needed was a tiki torch and he'd be set.

If only we had independent media to check on these sorts of things.

Michael K said...

Howard said...

It's smart. Maybe Doctor Oz should have had the guts to be his own man instead of a minion as well.


Maybe Fettermann should list his accomplishments aside from living with his parents until he was 50. Oz could also get Fetterman on stage with him and see who can talk more then 5 minutes. I know Fetterman has refused to debate but maybe an opportunity will appear. Sort of like Beto appearing at an Abbot speech.

Achilles said...

" Police lost their lives as a result of that day."

This is a blood libel and completely false.

The only people that lost their lives that day were women police beat and shot to death.

Democrats are just shitty amoral people.

Joe Smith said...

Does Fetterman use makeup to hide the bolts behind his ears?

Is Peter Boyle really dead?

Rabel said...

Biden's slurring was very bad. I think those two bouts of Covid took a lot out of him.

walter said...

Joe Smith said...
I've seen the videos of Biden's events...
A mime show could draw bigger crowds...
--
Great addition to Joementia's rants. The mime can stand near him like a sign language translator and act out what he says. They could occassionally interact, joke around. If Joementia short circuits a bit, the mime can dominate and distract.
Can Hunter mime? He has so many talents.

Jim at said...

Gee. You'd think with 81 million votes in his back pocket, candidates would be climbing over each other to bask in his glory.

Gk1 said...

"81 million votes, huh. Most in history. Most popular elected president in the history of the office. People came out at 3 in the morning to vote for this guy."

So true. Isn't it funny the subservient media doesn't dare write an article about how "No Modern President has sunk so spectacularly in such a short time" navel gazing articles because it raises too many uncomfortable questions. Like, how someone who hid out in a basement in 2020 out did the vote totals of Obama and Clinton. Weird, huh?

Michael R. Arndorfer said...

"And I want to thank Tammy — she couldn’t be here today — who’s a champion of working people and always there." That is the problem with Tammy. She's always there, and never here.