Is Biden Just Bad at his Job?

After the latest surge of migrants in the border town of Del Rio, Texas, our ...

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After the latest surge of migrants in the border town of Del Rio, Texas, our hosts discuss how the Biden administration has handled the immigration issue since taking office. Plus, President Biden continues to have foreign policy problems. What happened with the botched drone strike in Afghanistan? Why is France mad at us? All of that leaves Jonah with one big question: Is Biden just bad at his job?

Show Notes:

–Jonah on Biden’s foreign policy

–The Morning Dispatch breaks down the drone strike that killed civilians in Afghanistan

–TMD catches you up on the deal between the U.S., U.K., and Australia

–Tom Joscelyn on AUKUS in Vital Interests

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Comments (86)
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  1. Avatar photo
    Wandering Texan

    The Biden administration is incompetence personified. A rash and botched exit from Afghanistan. The abandonment of our counterterrorism mission. The abandonment of our civil society and intelligence efforts in a country of geo-strategic importance. The abandonment of a U.S. citizen held hostage by the Haqqani network. The abandonment of Americans and Afghan partners behind enemy lines. The lack of preparation for all aspects of the withdrawal from Afghanistan. The mistaken killing of Afghan children and U.S.-affiliated civilians using hellfire missiles in an effort to mask White House cowardice. The border crisis. The diplomatic disrespect shown to NATO allies, especially France, our oldest ally, a UN P5 member, and nuclear power. Runaway spending amid historic levels of national debt and a potential default. Disregard for constitutional constraints on executive and federal powers. Disregard for national sovereignty and border security. Continually surprising domestic political and foreign diplomatic partners alike. Abetting our enemies by ceding tens of billions of dollars of weapons and materiel to them. Etcetera…. All this, within only the first several months of the Biden presidency. After the Trump administration’s escalating chaos and turmoil, Biden’s early months seem to have lost their shock value. But even the Trump administration at this point was far more stable and sane.

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  2. TragicMishap

    I can't believe you did an entire segment on immigration policy and did not discuss the likely effect of Biden ending the Remain-in-Mexico policy of the Trump admin. This happened almost immediately upon Biden entering office and has been reported on previously by The Dispatch, including here: https://morning.thedispatch.com/p/the-morning-dispatch-bidens-border.

    "Trump left two major policies in place: The Migrant Protection Protocols, under which migrants suing for asylum in America were required to remain in Mexico pending their court date, and Title 42, a pandemic-era policy that required the deportation of all border-crossers from Mexico and several Central American countries, purportedly for the sake of public health. Biden ended the former entirely and the latter in part, implementing an exception for unaccompanied children."

    The obvious conclusion here is that Biden's change in policy is almost solely responsible for the surge in migrants. Yet, if I were to listen to The Dispatch podcast discussion of this issue, I would think the Biden admin hadn't changed any Trump admin policies and the surge in migrants is either unrelated to the Biden administration or is solely due to Biden's problem communicating to migrants that they shouldn't come here (which was also reported in the above Morning Dispatch article.)

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  3. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    I can’t believe Steve Hayes knows more about Drake than me. And I’m a late Millennial.

    Thank you for covering the debacle with the French. I was pretty surprised by that as it seemed like an obvious and basic way to shoot yourself in the foot (and backstab a friend). Wondered if there was more to the story. Sounds like no. Definitely fits with the larger picture of Biden admin being 1. Incompetent and 2. The F That admin.

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  4. Avatar photo
    Tracie

    Speaking of niches, I broke my news fast to see what the Dispatch is doing. Funnily, I've been taking a deep dive into music niches. It's all the Tower of Babel.

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  5. Ryan King

    Sarah, somewhat random, but in the podcast you mentioned that watching the Mitt documentary now vs back in 2014 was quite interesting. You said there were some big differences. I would like to hear your thoughts. I thoroughly enjoyed the documentary and it made me like Senator Romney more. Where did you land?

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  6. Butch Kamena

    Regarding Boris Johnson and Franglais - it wasn't a diplomatic error.

    Very good piece in the Telegraph that says a. Johnson speaks very fluent French and the style of Franglais was intended to draw greatest offense; b. it was very much a shot across the bow to the French to say, "You're not that significant."

    And given the pain in the arse Macron has been over Brexit and related issues, it isn't a surprise Johnson would take a shot. This wasn't bumbling, this was diplomatic gloating.

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  7. Avatar photo
    Carlos.Eliseo.Cardenas

    Did anyone else want to hear Jonah say to Sarah at the very end, "No you won't, it's a podcast" :)

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  8. Nick

    I'm not pointing fingers. I just want to put this out there... I think Steve was warned about Sarah's culture topic this week

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  9. Avatar photo
    Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

    Biden is a thin-skinned creep posing as a hail-fellow well-met, and always has been.

    You want to see his basic personality? Watch this CSPAN video from 1988, in which he responds to a perfectly legitimate question from an audience member — "What law school did you go to, and where did you place in your class?" Biden simply ERUPTS on the guy, and proceeds to lie aggressively through his teeth while "punching down" at someone who wasn't even a heckler: "I think I probably have a much higher IQ than you do!"

    link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1j0FS0Z6ho

    Biden proceeded to claim falsely and on camera that he'd graduated in the top half of his law school class; that he had three degrees from college; that he had been recognized as the "outstanding student" in his college political science department; and that he'd had a full academic scholarship to law school.

    In fact, Biden's law school class rank was 76th out of 85. His degree was in 1968, from the Syracuse University College of Law, which might very generously be described as a middle-tier (not top-50) law school in the national rankings. Biden, however, was almost expelled for plagiarism after he was caught having lifted five pages from a law review article directly, without attribution, into one of his own class papers. He was given an F for that course, but was allowed to re-take it and got a passing grade the second time around. He had a half-scholarship to law school, based on financial need, not academic prowess. He did not have three college degrees, he had one (albeit with a double major) as an undergraduate at the University of Delaware. He was nominated for, but did not win, an award in the economics department. In his first three semesters he got all Cs and Ds, except for two As in Phys Ed and a B in a literature course.

    But our Commander in Chief also managed to get an F in ROTC. Only against Cadet-Captain Donnie "Bone-Spur" Trump could this NOT have been a campaign issue, despite the Slick Willie draft dodging precedent.

    This same personality — and same egotistical, pathological disregard for the truth — has been on display in every Senate hearing I've ever watched him in, and I've watched A BUNCH, since he's spent so much time on the Judiciary Committee.

    By no stretch of the imagination can Joe Biden be called a "smart man" or a "good man" or an "honest man" — and as far as being humble, he's in a three-way tie with our last two presidents for the least humble human being on earth.

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  10. Avatar photo
    Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

    For more than half a century, the French government has enthusiastically supported and permitted its domestic arms and nuclear industry in competing abroad with America for arms sales to countries which lack the capabilities to make their own. They have taken particular glee in selling destabilizing arms that America — for reasons of strategic denial, despite the loss of potential sales — has already refused to sell.

    So yeah, a heads-up to the effect that the U.S. has decided that it's in the U.S.' best interests to share missile and nuclear sub technology with the Australians would have been appropriate, and it would have been best not to smirk even a little bit when giving it.

    But real-world, big-picture?

    Sorry-not sorry.

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