Excess Baggage Could Sink Biden Presidency Bid

Joe Biden is currently the frontrunner in an ever growing Democratic presidential primary pack.

However, the time honored maxim of history repeating itself may apply when it comes to the former vice president’s third bid for the Oval Office.

Biden’s campaign speechwriters have been tasked with keeping his stump speeches as lofty and broad as possible. One of the clearest examples of this can be found in Biden’s frequently repeated campaign promise to “restore the soul of this country.”

In his rhetoric, he carefully avoids making mention of any specific policy position. Instead he mouths hack political phrases, conveying ideas regarding a supposed return to "unity" and "bipartisanship."

Lost in his words is any semblance of truth about the administration in which he played a major role, an administration that, among other things, left a legacy of having severely polarized the nation along race, class, and cultural lines.

Biden’s latest campaign has come up with a fictional crisis, one of a "soulless" nation that is in need of fixing. His campaign is doing everything it can to avoid the simple fact that the Biden candidacy carries with it an enormous amount of baggage.

The former senator and vice president happens to be the embodiment of establishment politics. In addition, he is an apologist for a massive federal bureaucracy.

The third-time presidential hopeful has been in the political business for an astounding fifty years. He apparently believes that he is just the guy who will be able fix things, even things that over the last half century he helped to break in the first place.

Not only does Biden represent to the Democratic electorate the old ways of doing things, his age is a relevant issue. If he were to be elected, he would be kicking off his presidency at the seasoned age of 78. While there is a lot to be said for senior power, at some point a reality check becomes a prudent option.

The Democratic Party’s energy currently resides in its left wing, and many of its activist members are feeling tepid about Biden’s entry into the race, due to his long record as a politician.

The titular leader of the Democratic left, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D - N.Y., has already dismissed the notion of a Biden nomination,

"This idea that we can go back to the good old days with Obama, with Obama’s vice president I think, you know, there is an emotional element to that. But I don’t want to go back. I want to go forward."

Ocasio-Cortez and her likeminded allies do not like that Biden opposed busing to end segregated public schools, voted for the Iraq war, supported the job-killing trade agreements, supported a draconian crime bill, and displayed a prosecutorial attitude toward Anita Hill during the 1991 Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings.

Two important issues with which Biden must contend that continue to sow seeds of doubt in the minds of primary voters are as follows: 1. A pattern of inappropriate behavior toward women and girls, much of which has been captured on video recordings; 2. A penchant for making serious gaffes.

Biden has a history of failed presidential campaigns. His first one came to an end due to a plagiarism scandal. His second one ended as the result of his having finished fifth in the Iowa caucuses.

The Democratic front-runner’s biggest problems may be the serious scandals that are swirling around him. These would typically be ignored by the mainstream media.

However, because of the more than 20 Democratic opponents in the field, many of whom are well liked by the media, press coverage of the scandals is likely to ensue.

Two stories that have already been publicly exposed involve transactions with the Ukraine and China. The China scandal has received coverage in two mainstream media organizations that would not typically be revealing stories that might be harmful to a Democrat candidate.

The New York Times and Vanity Fair both reported on Biden, when he was vice president, as having conducted high-level diplomacy with Beijing days before a $1.5 billion deal was made with his son Hunter Biden’s private equity firm, secured from the state-owned Bank of China. This may explain why Biden recently brushed aside the idea that China poses a danger to the U.S.

"China is going to eat our lunch? Come on, man . . . . They can’t even figure out how to deal with the fact that they have this great division between the China Sea and the mountains in the east, I mean in the west,” Biden said.

During his term as vice president, Biden’s son Hunter was being investigated in the Ukraine after landing a high-paying job at a major Ukrainian energy company. Biden reportedly used taxpayer money and the power of his office to have the lead prosecutor on the case fired.

Known for speaking before thinking, Biden boasted about the misuse of power.

"We’re not going to give you the billion dollars," he said. "They said, 'You have no authority. You’re not the president.' I said, 'Call him.'

"I said, 'I’m telling you, you’re not getting a billion dollars.' I said, ‘You are not getting a billion. I will be leaving here,' and I think it was, what, six hours. I looked and I said, 'Leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.' Well, son of a b***h got fired."