May 13, 2023

"There are those who demonize and pit people against one another. And there are those who will do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral..."

"... to hold onto power. That’s never going to be an easy battle. But I know this — the oldest, most sinister forces may believe they’ll determine America’s future. But they are wrong. We will determine America’s future. You will determine America’s future."

Said Joe Biden, quoted in "Biden Warns of 'Sinister Forces' Trying to Reverse Racial Progress/The president’s commencement address at Howard University, a historically Black institution, came as Democratic strategists have expressed concerns about muted enthusiasm for Mr. Biden among Black voters" (NYT).

That quote is creepily generic. Who's he talking about? The article presents this as the context:
[W]hen neo-Nazis and white supremacists clashed with counterprotesters in Charlottesville, Va., in August 2017.... “What did you hear?” he asked. “That famous quote: ‘There are very fine people on both sides.’ That’s when I knew, and I’m not joking, that’s when I knew I had to stay engaged and get back into public life.”

To say "There are very fine people on both sides" is specifically not to to demonize and pit people against one another. So Biden is saying he got into the race to sharpen the divisions.

ADDED: Because ChatGPT helped me identify a bird I'd photographed today...

IMG_1372D

...  (it's a tree swallow), I decided to seek its analysis of the subject matter of this post:

63 comments:

Jersey Fled said...

"That’s when I knew, and I’m not joking, that’s when I knew I had to stay engaged and get back into public life.”

You can always tell when Biden is lying because he says he's not lying.

Yancey Ward said...

Fuck Joe Biden.

Wince said...

Biden is everything he declaims against.

Rabel said...

"There are those who demonize and pit people against one another. And there are those who do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral, to hold onto power."

When he's right, he's right.

What an awful man.

Dave Begley said...

Yeah, some immoral people will do anything to stay in power. Like take $10m in bribes and sell out your own country.

Did this fucking idiot even read his own speech in advance?

Peglegged Picador said...

It was 2008 when I quit voting for Republicans because I realized that they were unwilling to ostracize the hateful people they relied on as a significant chunk of the electorate they needed to win.

I don't believe that you (Professor) think people declining to draw those lines for personal or political gain is an admirable thing to do, or that you're actually confused about how the President calling out divisive culture war tactics reconciles with him clearly establishing that we should not assume moral equivalence for hateful people.

Meade said...

Birds suck. They’re ruining everything.

Kate said...

ChatGPT sounds more original than the Biden speech cribbed from one of the prequel Star Wars movies.

n.n said...

Case in point: Charlottesville, where not "white supremacists" and not "neo-Nazis" assembled to represent history, people, and statues of variable color. Where a vehicle was mobbed with the presumption that the driver was a rabid diversitist. A tactic used for progressive intimidation and phobic consensus across the nation against people of diverse ethnicities, sexes, colors, and members of law enforcement.

Dr Weevil said...

Meade:
Of course birds suck. They can't chew because they have no teeth.

wendybar said...

And the Fed Group "Patriot Front", just happened to march out of their UHauls, march through DC, and then back into their Fed trucks, all masked, so the FBI agents identity will remain anonymous. How convenient.

n.n said...

Biden of Obama's World War Spring series. It's not a coincidence that most wars, conflicts, insurrections, occupations, [neighborhood] incursions, and [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] immigration reform happens during Democrat administrations.

Thar said, diversity of individuals, minority of one. #HateLovesAbortion

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Wow - the Blacks in South Side Chicago are not too happy with Biden's illegal entrants.

Biden is WHITE LEFT. He's in charge of the dark forces and the corruption... with his holding on to power. Bonus - Biden is an asshole.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...


biden Rffstenstal says what?

Sebastian said...

"There are those who demonize and pit people against one another . . . the oldest, most sinister forces"

No demonization there. Are they any prog smears that are not projection?

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Chicago residents not happy about Biden's illegal entrants forced upon them. They must be racist.

Jerry said...

Figuring it out?

Dems are the Cruel Party. Everything they do is for one thing: to stay in power. Fetterman's barely functioning, but they've got him propped up like the movie "Weekend at Bernie's." Diane Feinstein looks like she should be in an assisted living facility with 24/7 care - but they've dragged her back so she can vote as directed.

Keep the borders open - forget about the problems, forget about the crime, they've got to appear 'compassionate', so the concept of the 'Illegal Alien' was discarded for 'Undocumented Immigrant', and now the 'Undocumented' part's been discarded.

Gotta save the planet - so we're dumping EVERYTHING that keeps the lights on reliably. Nuclear power? Gotta dump it - because it's nasty, we'll go with solar and wind. Oh, there's not enough storage to keep the lights on? Well, we'll use gas and coal plants to make up the difference. Oh, wait - the EPA wants to shut down damned near all gas and coal plants now. And everyone ought to switch to EVs as soon as possible, or the planet will DIE.

You won't have the power to charge them (look at California) - but the point's to reduce mobility, not increase it. Take away diesel trucks, go to EVs - everything costs more, and there will be less of it. Can't take a long drive - electricity has to be prioritized to logistics to keep people fed.

And don't think you'll be able to use natural or propane gas to cook your weekly gruel ration. Gas stoves are deadly, so the Government is saving you from yourself. Here's a 100 watt government approved hotplate, that you can use when you've got electricity.

In the mean time, China and India are building more and more coal and gas plants. We literally (not figuratively, but LITERALLY) could eliminate every bit of our CO2-generated power and transportation and it wouldn't make one bit of difference to the world CO2 levels.

How about crime? Doesn't it seem strange to you that the 'progressive' cities that spend the most on welfare and programs like it have the worst outcomes? Or that they DELIBERATELY choose reading education that doesn't work well - if at all? ( https://spectator.org/new-york-citys-curriculum-overhaul-admission-of-progressives-fault-on-phonics/ )

When every Dem-led initiative either goes badly wrong, costs incredibly more than forecast, or both - what's the takeaway on that?

Is this a sign of how much our Democratic Party 'CARES' about us, that they'd do these things?

Starting to get a bit of a hint there? Maybe thinking that the folks who are portraying themselves as the heroes protecting us all from those eevil Republican plots are the villains in the story?

Wish to God I could think these extrapolations wouldn't come about. I never would have expected to see our politicians throwing away what makes us a First World nation on the flimsiest of pretenses.

Tachycineta said...

What a great picture of a Tree Swallow! Probably an After Second Year female based on the amount of green iridescence in the feathers.

It's one of the focal species I study (obviously!), but I have -never- encountered a Tree Swallow nesting in anything -but- a nest box. That's the first picture in some time I have seen of a Tree Swallow at a cavity opening at a tree.

Was thinking about that a couple of days ago - you would need a ladder to check the nest, and a specialized tool to look down into the nest. Lot of effort.

Big Mike said...

During the 2020 primaries James (“The Talking Skull”) Carville was explicit about choosing a nominee to get power for the Democrats. Power to do what? Not to benefit any Americans other the billionaires who fund their party!

Michael K said...

Biden is a liar, proven on video from 1987, a corrupt politician and a traitor who has sold out his country to multiple enemies. Nothing he, or his puppet masters say is truthful. Aaron Burr would have been a better president.

gilbar said...

"There are those who demonize and pit people against one another. And there are those who will do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral..."
"... to hold onto power.

who is he talking about? He is talking about Himself

Gunner said...

Why doesn't some conservative media person ask Biden or his brainless press secretary, point blank, "Does Biden think anyone who supports keeping Confederate statues where they are is a Neo-Nazi or white supremacist?"

Big Mike said...

@Althouse, please keep in mind that — as you yourself discovered! — ChatGPT knows how to lie.

Rt41Rebel said...

And just like that, the FBI dresses up as white supremacists dressed up like FBI agents and demonstrates in DC.

https://twitter.com/rawsalerts/status/1657466390545088512

JK Brown said...

" the oldest, most sinister forces may believe they’ll determine America’s future"

Like the oldest political party in the US? The party that was the party of slavery? The party of the KKK, the party of Jim Crow apartheid? The party the segregated the federal workforce as soon as it gained power in the 20th century after the Civil War? The party of Redlining? The party of "Bull" Conner, Democrat National Committee member and police chief during the Birmingham black civil right protests?

That oldest, most sinister force?

n.n said...

Feminists pitting women against men.

Politically congruent pitting trans/homosexuals against others in the transgender spectrum.

Pro-Choice zealots pitting women against babies... fetal- babies.

Democrats dividing people by diversity and pitting people, men and women, domestically and internationally, against each other.

n.n said...

That oldest, most sinister force?

Before there were allusions to McCarthyism, there was Palmerism during Wilson's administration.

Before Watergate progressed into a presidential hunt by the fourth leg, there were Great Societies etc and the progressive corruption of political, economic, and social welfare that accompanies them.

rcocean said...

Does it even matter what Senile Biden says? He lies. He gaffes. He makes stuff up. He calls his Republican opponents Nazis. He insults foreign leaders. He sends billions to Ukraine and lets millions of illegal aliens pour accross our border.

If this was a serious country, he'd be impeached for failure to enforce the immigration laws and secure the USA against foreign invasion.

And now he's dividing the USA and race baiting. He cries copious tears if someone of color is killed. If its E Palastine OH or the Waukesha Christmas parade massacre, he doesn't give a shit. If Antifa riots and burns down cities, Biden smirks and says Antifa is "just an idea". If Trumpsters riot on J6, its "white supremacy " trying to "destory Democracy"

None of it matters, because Biden will get 90 percent of the D vote, no matter what.

n.n said...

the FBI dresses up as white supremacists

A probable Whitmer-event? Biden's dreams of racial progress? The Capitol Hill fire part deux? That said, all's fair in lust and abortion.

rcocean said...

And just remember: According to Mitt Romney, Joe biden is a "good man" trying his best.

n.n said...

ChatGPT knows how to lie

ChatNYT et al know how to spin and possess diverse capital resources to publish and bray handmade tales.

gspencer said...

Q. "Who's he talking about?"

A. His overseer, Obama along with O's CFR friends

walter said...

Mr. Unity speaks.
Vote for him or you're not b/Black.
Look it up!

Michael said...

That is not what Trump said, for the four-millionth time. He said (in effect) that there was disagreement over removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee in Chancellorsville, and that there were good people on both sides of that debate - which I hope any reasonable person would find unobjectionable (good people can be wrong). He also said that KKK, neo-Nazi, etc., activity should be condemned totally.

Then, as is now to be expected, the media extracted the earlier quote and applied it to the latter situation. These people only tell their remaining readers/viewers what they think they want to hear; they have no personal or professional integrity.

n.n said...

Like the oldest political party in the US? The party that was the party of slavery? The party of the KKK, the party of Jim Crow apartheid? ...

Democracy NOW.

Leland said...

"I felt no greater racism than going on the Internet and claiming I am a conservative. It was unbelievable how quickly people jumped to me and said 'well, you're a female, you couldn't possibly be a conservative; you're half black you couldn't possibly be a conservative.'"

Narayanan said...

a cofession of sorts by FJB!?

Mr. Majestyk said...

When I first started reading the quote, I thought it must be Trump talking about Biden.

Ann Althouse said...

“ It's one of the focal species I study (obviously!), but I have -never- encountered a Tree Swallow nesting in anything -but- a nest box. That's the first picture in some time I have seen of a Tree Swallow at a cavity opening at a tree.”

There were 2 holes, one above the other. We called it a 2-story nest.

wildswan said...

Who kept the schools in the black communities in the big Dem cities closed for Covid longer than anywhere else in the world?
and
Who introduced changes in legal practice which doubled the murder rate in the black communities in the big Dem cities?
and
Who did the black community in the big Dem cities vote for in the last election?

My townspeople, - what are you thinking?

Dave Begley said...

Jerry:

Epic!

MadTownGuy said...

"There are those who demonize and pit people against one another. And there are those who will do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral..."
"... to hold onto power.
"

There he goes again, projecting.

MadTownGuy said...

A 2-story nest is better than a 2-story outhouse.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

"patriot Front" - the tell they are Feds (besides the silly uniforms) are the masks.

Joe Smith said...

Racial progress?

The entire federal government is dedicated to spending trillions of dollars to help black people.

They are not 'oppressed.'

They will do anything to keep them on the D plantation.

As for holding on to power at all cost, just look at Fetterman and Feinstein.

Rt41Rebel said...

"the tell they are Feds (besides the silly uniforms) are the masks."

And no tattoos. None. Not a single one.

Rt41Rebel said...

In addition to the visible tattoo restrictions for FBI agents, there are also requirements about hair length, facial hair, and jewelry. I don't know about you, but all of the white supremacists that I know have some combination of hair below their collar, facial hair, piercings, and tattoos on their arms and perhaps foreheads. Also bulging veins popping out of their foreheads.

Nancy Reyes said...

During the Viet Nam war, the FBI spied on a Catholic meeting I attended because it included one of the Harrisburg 7, so I am probably on one of their lists as a potential terrorist.
And now I guess I am again on their enemy list because I am a middle aged Catholic pro life woman.
Nice to know the US government has priorities.

tim in vermont said...

"And there are those who will do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral. to hold onto power."

Projection, thy name is Joe Biden, who is willing to risk nuclear war rather than concede the residents of Donbas and Crimea the right to live as Russians as they and their ancestors have for hundreds of years.

Maybe we would have done better to use the hundreds of billions to settle Indian land claims in our own country, for which there are zero Federal funds, rather than to travel thousands of miles to right "wrongs" committed in the 18th century by Kathrine the Great against people far from our own shores.

Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?. - George Washington

Terry di Tufo said...

Where is Caitlan Collins when you need her?

iowan2 said...

Joe Biden

Diane Feinstein

Robert Byrd

(add in Obama, He is still raising money, so still controlling his own fiefdom.)


When will the Blacks realize Democrats only used them a population dependent on handouts. AND that the democrats have dumped the blacks for 6 million and counting, illegal immigrants. Black counties have been turned into shooting gallaries, for Democrats pleasure.

gilbar said...

MadTownGuy said...
A 2-story nest is better than a 2-story outhouse.

spoken truly like a man who has NEVER experienced a winterland with more than 6 feet of snow.

Iman said...

“There were 2 holes, one above the other. We called it a 2-story nest.”

I've got my story
And I've got mine too
How sad it is, we now live in a two-story nest
How sad it is, we now live in a two-story nest

Rusty said...

"And now he's dividing the USA and race baiting. He cries copious tears if someone of color is killed. If its E Palastine OH or the Waukesha Christmas parade massacre, he doesn't give a shit. If Antifa riots and burns down cities, Biden smirks and says Antifa is "just an idea". If Trumpsters riot on J6, its "white supremacy " trying to "destory Democracy"

None of it matters, because Biden will get 90 percent of the D vote, no matter what."

And do you know why? I'll tell you. It isn't for the good of the country or to benefit "the working class" or to combat racism. No. It's so that they can look YOU in the eye and go Fuck You.

Patrick Henry was right! said...

The most perplexing political conundrum of my now 66 years of life is "why do black voters vote for the people and political party that enslaved them, first on plantations, then in ghettos." I guess I will die before Black Americans vote again for the party that was formed to free them and is still the party of freedom.

lonejustice said...

Birds aren't real ---

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXu4_s5nuwI

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Reality?

WHITE LEFT mob supremacy is the real problem. Our downfall.

Jupiter said...

"I don't know about you, but all of the white supremacists that I know have some combination of hair below their collar, facial hair, piercings, and tattoos on their arms and perhaps foreheads. Also bulging veins popping out of their foreheads."

Sounds like all the white supremacists you know are Antifa.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

""There are those who demonize and pit people against one another. And there are those who will do anything and everything, no matter how desperate or immoral..."
"... to hold onto power."

This is what projection actually looks like. It starts with his first three words. To say "There are those" is a form of othering for no other purpose than creating an object of hate. What a piece of shit.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

"Case in point: Charlottesville, where not "white supremacists" and not "neo-Nazis" assembled "

And as we were told, the guy who plowed through migrants at a bus stop in Allen, Texas was an Hispanic neo-Nazi. The fact that claim was so incredible might explain why the story has since been flushed down the memory commode.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

"And don't think you'll be able to use natural or propane gas to cook your weekly gruel ration."

The Germans confiscated all the querns* in Poland. Made it a capital crime to own one. The Soviets confiscated any winemaking tools in Czechoslovakia. Made it a crime to own any.


*A simple quern, likely one passed down from her great grandmother, was probably a Polish village woman’s most treasured possession during the brutal years of the Second World War. A quern, or żarna in Polish, is a simple hand mill typically consisting of two circular stones for grinding wheat, rye and oats in flour.

To the Germans, this ordinary object was a threat to their complete control of the population through implementing food quotas. It was immediately outlawed during the first year of occupation, and the villagers had to turn over their querns that were then smashed and burned. To not comply and then later found with a quern resulted in immediate death by shooting or hanging. Even at risk of death, some women refused to hand over their precious quern. They instead hid their querns in the undergrowth of the wilderness forests and in specially dug pits.

Source: https://donnagawell.com/2020/10/25/the-quern-a-womans-weapon-during-wwii/

Donna Gawell is the author of a historical novel In the Shadow of Salem which was released by Heritage Beacon on June 18, 2018.

Mike of Snoqualmie said...

Joe's been working at put Black Americans down now for 50+ years. He's been taking bribes ever since he was elected via his brothers and later his sons and daughters. He ran for office to get rich.

Lexington Green said...

They gonna put y’all back in chains.