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Opinion

Biden’s rant against MAGA Republicans was disturbing

Ben Weingarten Federalist Senior Contributor; Claremont Institute Fellow
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President Joe Biden delivered a fiery speech at Independence Hall in Philadelphia earlier this month, calling MAGA Republicans “extremists” who are threatening American democracyNew polling shows that more than half of Americans believe the speech will cause further polarization between the parties. Straight Arrow News contributor Ben Weingarten takes a closer look at why Biden’s rhetoric — which accused MAGA Republicans of not respecting the rule of law — went too far.

In what was cleverly called by one observer his Threatysburg Address — Joe Biden, “uniter in chief” — delivered one of the most divisive, disturbing, and deplorable speeches in recent memory, sullying the Independence Hall setting in so doing.

Yet perhaps even more ominous was the little commented upon fact that the reality of his administration has already surpassed its rhetoric, and few have noticed it.

Now to be sure, it’s worth acknowledging just how disturbing the president’s words were.

He said that “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”

He said such Republicans “do not respect the Constitution,” “believe in the rule of law,” “recognize the will of the people,” “fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights, to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country.” 

Remarkably, the man overseeing the party of the BLM 2020 summer riots resulting in estimated billions worth of damage as cities were shelled out, yet to recover, livelihoods destroyed, and cops were assaulted en masse — the start of a massive increase in violent crime accompanying progressive policing policies – said all this, and now tells us “there’s no place for political violence in America.”

He of course got into issues of election integrity — never mind his party’s challenges of the 2000, 2004, and 2016 elections.

I could walk chapter and verse through Joe Biden’s hypocrisy here – the campaign commercials juxtaposing Biden’s words about Republicans with what his party has advocated – would write themselves.

He also said that the dominance of MAGA in the GOP is “a threat to this country.”

The president said, “We’re all called by duty and conscience to confront extremists who will put their own pursuit of power above all else.”

I could also talk about how frankly scary it is that he spewed this rhetoric, vilifying up to half the country, and calling for confronting them, flanked by Marines, as if they were his enforcers, standing in front of this red glaring light, embittered, angry, and gesticulating in ways that observers noticed really did look Hitlerian.

The blatantly dishonest, rank, hostile showing, demonizing the loyal opposition, coming from a compromised and again cognitively declining old Swamp Creature could be more easily dismissed were the people feeding the words to him not in command of the government. And were they not acting accordingly.

In what was cleverly called by one observer his Threatysburg Address – Joe Biden, “uniter in chief” – delivered one of the most divisive, disturbing, and deplorable speeches in recent memory, sullying the Independence Hall setting in so doing.

Yet perhaps even more ominous was the little commented upon fact that the reality of his administration has already surpassed its rhetoric, and few have noticed it.

Now to be sure, it’s worth acknowledging just how disturbing the president’s words were.

He said that “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”

He said such Republicans “do not respect the Constitution,” “believe in the rule of law,” “recognize the will of the people,” “fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights, to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country.” 

Remarkably, the man overseeing the party of the BLM 2020 summer riots resulting in estimated billions worth of damage as cities were shelled out, yet to recover, livelihoods destroyed, and cops were assaulted en masse – the start of a massive increase in violent crime accompanying progressive policing policies – said all this, and now tells us “there’s no place for political violence in America.”

He of course got into issues of election integrity – never mind his party’s challenges of the 2000, 2004, and 2016 elections.

I could walk chapter and verse through Joe Biden’s hypocrisy here – the campaign commercials juxtaposing Biden’s words about Republicans with what his party has advocated – would write themselves.

He also said that the dominance of MAGA in the GOP is “a threat to this country.”

The president said, “We’re all called by duty and conscience to confront extremists who will put their own pursuit of power above all else.”

I could also talk about how frankly scary it is that he spewed this rhetoric, vilifying up to half the country, and calling for confronting them, flanked by Marines, as if they were his enforcers, standing in front of this red glaring light, embittered, angry, and gesticulating in ways that observers noticed really did look Hitlerian.

The blatantly dishonest, rank, hostile showing, demonizing the loyal opposition, coming from a compromised and again cognitively declining old Swamp Creature could be more easily dismissed were the people feeding the words to him not in command of the government. And were they not acting accordingly.

Joe Biden didn’t say – if the threat is as dire as he said it was – what Americans of good faith should be doing to purge the country of this great evil.

But his administration – the administration led by a person who called Republicans “semi-fascists” and then continued with this rhetoric in a Wisconsin speech after trying to walk it back amid massive blowback from an aghast public, and even Democrat media mouthpieces – is and has been pursuing political opponents accordingly.

We’ve chronicled it here at length before.

The Biden administration through its speeches, statements, threat assessments, and the like, has already cast skeptics of U.S. election integrity, opponents of the government and public health establishment’s draconian and often scientifically indefensible COVID policies, critics of school boards and officials who promote CRT and supported COVID lockdowns, those who would dare ask questions about the Biden family’s dubious dealings with Russia, China and beyond, or challenges the security state over a perceived double standard in corruptly and lawlessly pursuing political opponents and protecting its own, he’s called of them as bigots on the level of Bull Connor, dangerous misinformers and murderers, traitors, and Putin stooges.

And worse, the administration, in truly semi-fascist form, has colluded with Big Tech and its media mouthpieces to impose a regime of censorship under guise of “dangerous mis-, dis- and mal- information” – violating our first freedom, of speech, by proxy – as a backdoor way or really as a front door attack, to muzzle dissent.

And as we’ve discussed before, this effort is rooted in a view that these up to tens of millions of Americans are not just deplorables, but domestic terrorists or their aiders, abettors, and enablers – to be pursued accordingly.

It has said that the most lethal threat to the homeland comes from racially/ethnically motivated terrorists, as well as anti-government/anti-authority domestic extremists. And it has conflated populist, nationalist, and conservative views with these ones that apparently inspire the greatest threats to the country – even though the regime has failed to make that case persuasively if at all.

Hence, as we’ve discussed before, again the censorship, the appending of terror threat tags to critical parents and targeting of all manner of classes of Americans on threat bulletins, the alleged domestic threat inflation from whistleblowers have spoken of and we’ve covered here before, the pursuit of everyone and their mother in Trump’s orbit and beyond through both prosecutions and then legal processes that themselves serve as the punishment to intimidate, break, and bankrupt anyone who would dare challenge the regime, the harassment of the anti-American and Stalinist Jan. 6 Committee, the treatment of Jan. 6ers as equivalent to Al-Qaeda, efforts by progressive zealots to disbar Trump election lawyers and disqualify Republicans completely from running on grounds of “insurrection,” and through a slew of other law fare efforts–all buttressed by elite private sector institutions who promote “Wokeism” and smear, malign, and target anyone who dares to disagree.

So the significance of Joe Biden’s Threatysburg Address is not just that he “othered” up to half of America, or that the Democrat Party’s leaders key message in the run-up to the 2022 midterms is that Republicans are not only evil but dangerous – since the Democrats can’t defend their own agenda.

It’s that the rhetoric finally amping up to match the reality of the administration’s actions. And it leads us to ask, was this speech a dog whistle to its base aimed at provoking it – and if so to what end? And what’s the administration planning next given this dire threat it describes to millions of Americans? 

The injection of this poisonous rhetoric into the American bloodstream augurs far worse to come.

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