Here's What Hit Me About Biden's Speech

There were a lot of odd things about Biden's speech yesterday -- it got remarkably little coverage yesterday evening -- but I watched it. The one thing that bothered me all night was that his suit didn't fit. I don't mean it hung loosely (though to some extent it did) or the sleeves were too short; that would have been obvious. But the subtler sign of a cheap suit is that the collar stands away from the neck, as it does in the photo above. Presidential suits normally fit extremely well. Check Dubya, for instance, in the photo at right, for how a presidential suit should actually fit.

Both Obama's and Trump's suits always hugged their necks. This is to be expected. A president can afford suits that fit. Reagan's tailor even watched his public appearances for signs that lapels weren't sitting exactly flat or whatever and made ongoing alterations.

It's plain that Biden's handlers, having prevailed on him to remain in the White House over the weekend, set up the Sunday speech on short notice in an effort to stop his decline in credibility, The ultra-serious dark suit was part of the package. But normally his suits fit better. Was the good dark suit still back in Wilmington? They clearly coached him this time to appear more engaged, sharper, less woozy, but somehow the loose collar kept everything from quite coming together.

His prepared remarks were a little less otherworldly than they were on Friday, though I think his writers are as bad as his tailors -- why should writers actually compose word salad for the teleprompter, which they clearly do? But he continues to slur and stumble in his presentation. This may give the impression of mental decline, but I think it's more habit borne of laziness. He just never felt the need to speak effectively, he was in a safe seat and did what he was told anyhow. The picture for me isn't cognitive decline, it's laziness and flawed character that do contribute to the other impression.

Commentators noted chiefly that his remarks were designed not to make statements that could be contradicted on the evening news, as they clearly were on Friday, but they continued to be largely happy talk leavened by warnings that nothing is perfect, and no matter how well planned things might be, there could be unspecified horrible things, which would be unavoidable but not his fault. We'll have to see how that plays out.

But generally, commentary on the speech itself has been sparse. This may be because it was announced at short notice on an August Sunday, when nobody was paying attention, and it dwelt primarily on appearances. But one passage has gone unremarked. In the transcript, it goes,

One, planes taking off from Kabul are not flying directly to the United States. They’re landing at U.S. military bases and transit centers around the world.

Number two, at these sites where they’re landing, we are conducting thorough scrutiny — security screenings for everyone who is not a U.S. citizen or a lawful permanent resident. Anyone arriving in the United States will have undergone a background check.

Why are they taking such different measures with arrivals from Afghanistan vis-a-vis arrivals at the southern border? As far as I can see, the people at the southern border are waved through and quickly flown to the US interior without security screenings or background checks. But of course, we're talking about tens of thousands in any case, with no real resources available to do screenings and checks based on non-existent or inaccessible records back in Afghanistan. It doesn't matter if these promises are impractical or inconsistent with existing policy, it's all happy talk anyhow.

Yesterday and last week, Biden and his spokespeople have hedged and danced around whether they'll need to stay beyond the August 31 deadline. The consensus seems to be they'll almost certainly need to do that, but now the Taliban has threatened "conequences" if Western forces remain beyond that date. It's plain that the Biden administration in particular is treating the Taliban very gingerly; after all, they have thousands of hostages.

By the way, somebody should be talking to John Kirby about his cheap suits as well. The guy's a retired admiral, now double-dipping as civilian Pentagon flack. He can and should afford better. Not a good look at all.