I was very unhappy with Trump's performance at the Helsinki summit press conference. The optics were awful. While I'm in favor of trying to strip Russia away from China, which is the bigger threat, Trump's effort was ham-handed.
Although it was hard to take Democratic hysterical complaints given their history of sucking up to the Soviets and Russians--until Trump.
So sure, Biden didn't do that:
America reclaimed some lost pride Wednesday when President Joe Biden met in Geneva with Russian President Vladimir Putin – and did so without bowing and scraping to a smug and devious autocrat.
That's a low bar, to be sure. But it's one that President Donald Trump failed utterly to clear – to the nation's everlasting shame – when he held a meeting with Putin in Helsinki in 2018 and played supplicant to a man impervious to human rights concerns, who leads a nation with only a fraction of America's economic prowess.
Bravo. But there was no reclaiming of lost pride. One, the impact of the Trump optics faded with time and was undone by American actual actions to reinforce and strengthen NATO against Russian threats. Two, the optics of this summit and related European meetings created new optics that should make Americans cringe.
Stop trying to make us think--contrary to what we can see--that all is well with the president:
I think it was a huge strategic error to send Biden out of the basement and give our allies and foes a chance to confirm their suspicions about our president's reduced mental capacity. Better to have had them suspect this than know it for sure, I think, for as long as possible.
But no, we let Putin see Biden up close, and so now Putin is eager to pretend all is well with our president to keep Biden in place for as long as possible:
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday praised the outcome of his summit with U.S. President Joe Biden and called him an astute and shrewd negotiator.
Our enemies may now decide they have a window of opportunity. Should we really take pride in that mistake?
Have a super sparkly day.
