Joe Biden had two doors to walk through when commenting recently about the campus anti-war protests and his commitment to support of Israel. By and large,
While it is laudable that he did not believe in the idea of sending in the National Guard to clamp down on protests, he nonetheless demanded crankily that “order must prevail”, echoing the asshole Speaker of the House who told students to “go back to class and stop the nonsense”. Seemingly uninformed, the president spoke of “violent protesting” (there hasn’t been any in evidence) and railed against the occupation of buildings, which only happened once at Columbia (but it has happened multiple times at their Hamilton Hall over the years). If anyone has been violent so far, it has been pro-Israeli counterprotestors at UCLA. Or perhaps we could point to the repeated overreaction of the police in dispersing protestors.
Tensions are running high on campuses everywhere, charging the national atmosphere with anger on each side of the issue. The president correctly stated there is no room for it to give way to hate. But the overarching message from Biden, university heads and other leaders is to do all of this dissent much quieter, if at all. Unfortunately for the president, that’s not likely to happen. It may achieve its apotheosis at the Democratic convention this year, which Chicago is hosting. It would be a tragedy for the party to repeat what happened outside of it in 1968. Either way it goes down, it will be a black eye for the party. Unless Biden evolves on his “ironclad” support of Israel, Democrats can just prepare for President Trump right now. So far, all we get is:
Q Mr. President, have the protests forced you to reconsider any of the policies with regard to the region?
THE PRESIDENT: No.
I think the question deserved more than a one word answer, given that Palestinian civilians are in grave danger. Is there time to walk back his stubborn streak on Israel? Any concessions he makes at this point could be seen as weakness by his rivals. At the same time, he is bleeding support from young folks and Muslims (and union members!) for being too timid to affect Israeli policy. A true Scylla/Charybdis problem. But cold electoral calculations should not drive the president. We should expect him to do the right thing and do whatever he can to stop Israel from starving and bombing innocent Gazans into oblivion. If that costs him the election, then I must make peace with the possibility that the country has no moral center. I probably should have done that eons ago anyway.
Today, Gaza is on the brink. Let’s do something while there is still time. We can deal with that fuckhead Trump later.
The Illogical Seminary 