OPINION:
Joe Biden visited union autoworkers in Michigan this week at their plant, and in the middle of his hand-shaking and innocuous tour, one man stopped to confront him about the potential new gun laws that he has endorsed that would further limit the Second Amendment rights of Americans. Mr. Biden’s reaction to this questioning turned into a viral video.
This is a lot to unravel in one 90-second clip, so stay with me.
The 77-year-old presidential candidate stopped in his tracks and began berating the man, simply for questioning his policy choices. He began by swearing at him, yelling aggressively that he’s “full of s***!” At this point, his younger, female staffer tried to wrap the conversation to get Mr. Biden to move on, when she did, he barked at her and told her to keep quiet with a “shush!” Mr. Biden continued to argue what guns the man could possibly need under the Second Amendment, adding that he will take the “AR-14s” from people while pointing in the man’s face. When the man told him not to point in his face, Mr. Biden snapped, “Don’t tell me what to do, pal. I’ll take you out and slap you!”
Later in the day, to correct for this on Twitter, “Good for Joe” became a trend on the left, as they cheered for his actions — but could you just imagine what would happen if President Trump did even one of the things that Mr. Biden did in those 90 seconds. Thanks to the behavior of the talking heads and pundits in the media, we don’t have to imagine; we know.
We know exactly what happens when Mr. Trump openly criticizes an opposing viewpoint. If he calls the media or a commentator “B-S-” or labels a news story “fake news,” the outrage from the left is that it’s somehow an attack on the First Amendment. His stating of his opinion is labeled an attack on free speech.
“How dare the president” respond or clap-back to constant criticism from opponents in the media. Somehow, when he does it, it’s construed as the end of our ability to receive “the truth” from national media outlets, as opposed to him just explaining his opinion.
We know exactly what would happen if Mr. Trump publicly disrespected and embarrassed a female staffer the way Mr. Biden did when he shushed the young lady who was by his side. The left, which for years has called him misogynist, sexist and many other -ists, would use this clip to show that he has no respect for women. Women coalitions would use this as their rallying call and the left would dust off their pink hats and vagina costumes for another march on Washington. They would use this 90-second clip as definitive proof that Mr. Trump hates women.
Do we even need to discuss what would happen if Donald Trump gaffed as much as Joe Biden — especially on critical talking points like the AR-15? Since the Trump presidency began, the left, including former acting Director of the FBI Andrew McCabe, have screamed that he is mentally unfit to be president. They add that the 25th Amendment needs to be enacted in order to remove this “crazy man” from the Oval Office. Sure, the president has his moments and there are occasional gaffes, but he doesn’t forget what the most politicized gun, the AR-15 is — and he also doesn’t forget what state he’s in, who his wife is, that he’s running for president, that the last president was Barack Obama — and he doesn’t claim to have taken advice on current issues from longtime deceased world leaders. In case you’re wondering, Mr. Biden has done all of those things — in basically the last two weeks.
Finally, we all know what would happen if Mr. Trump got in someone’s face and physically threatened them. We’d have combinations of all the above reactions: Pearl clutching, disrespect for humans, cries that he’s threatening to end the First Amendment and calls for the 25th.
If Mr. Trump literally did any one of the multiple things Mr. Biden was guilty of in that basic 90-second clip, it would be treated as the end of the world by the left and their media friends. It would be headline news for days, if not weeks, and it might even be used to attempt to impeach him again.
But because it’s Joe Biden, Democratic candidate for president, it’ll be celebrated, blown off and excused away.
• Tim Young is a political comedian and author of “I Hate Democrats/I Hate Republicans” (Post Hill Press).
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