David Brooks: Biden is not mendacious, not over the hill - PBS NewsHour

[question everything]

After talking about Trump lying and then Judy Woodruff talked about Biden combining two stories about meeting with veterans:



Judy Woodruff:

You know, there's been — some are saying this should be connected and compared to the president. Others are saying in no way.

David Brooks:

Oh, I think in no way.

I mean, Biden may be aging, and maybe that's an issue. I think it is a legitimate issue for voters to think about. But he is not mendacious, he is not irresponsible. He may embellish a story to improve its dramatic effect. And he may be for getting things.
Our memories are just much more fallible than we think. Every memory expert will tell you that. And when you're on the campaign trail doing thousands of events traveling everywhere, things get jostled in your mind.

So, it could be just the normal jostling of campaign. And for some reason, we have gotten into a pattern where a Biden gaffe is the story. So he will do eight good things in the campaign, tells one mistake, and that's the story, because that's the story we associate with Joe Biden right now. But it is something for voters to monitor. I don't think embellishing that kind of story is like something that is necessarily a sign that he is over the hill.



Judy Woodruff:

And Biden's campaign, Mark, is saying the press is making too much of this.

Mark Shields:

Yes.

The Biden campaign ought to shut up. I mean, they really do. The last thing in the world you want to do as a campaign is tell voters what matters. Right now, it doesn't matter to voters.

We went through a campaign in 1980 where the president of the United States running for election got 49 electoral votes and six — carried six states, Jimmy Carter, against Ronald Reagan, a man who said that trees cause more pollution than automobiles, a man who said there was more oil under Alaska than there was in Saudi Arabia, a man who said that maybe Darwinism, you know, should we ought to teach creationism as well? But there was no malice with Ronald Reagan, and voters saw that. They said, yes, he said things that weren't totally factually true, but it wasn't mendacious, to use David's word, and it wasn't an attempt to aggrandize him.

All of Donald Trump's lies are to put him in a better light. Joe embellishes, Joe embroiders, and I think it can be a proxy for age when he starts doing that. And I think that they have to be worried about that. But I don't think the two are comparable at this point, either morally or politically.



David Brooks:

It is noticeable with voters that people will forgive you for getting the facts wrong if you get your basic narrative right.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/shields-and-brooks-on-trump-at-the-g-7-democratic-debates

[andym]

1. Reagan "misspoke" so often that his spokespeople had that phrase ready at a moment's notice

Yet he was one of the most popular recent Presidents mostly because of his warm personality and optimism; despite his policies. Reagan's gaffes actually helped him by making him appear human. I think Joe Biden has a warmer more caring personality than Reagan, and his "gaffes" are actually going to help him as well.
It would be sweet irony if Joe Biden finally ended (with Trump's corrosive help) the conservative era that Reagan ushered in. If Elizabeth Warren doesn't win the nomination, I think Biden/Warren would make a great ticket.

[Thekaspervote]

2. Seems to be the case "he does 8 good things" but the msm and his opponents focus on the

one thing ....no matter how correct the narrative is overall

Yes, borrowed from the posted article

[Hekate]

3. THANK YOU, DAVID BROOKS. Judy Woodruff, please retire now.

PBS Newshour has not been the same since Gwen Ifill died.

Judy W is a nice lady, but she is just not up to this, and when she starts in with the false equivalencies ("Some say the sun rises in the East, but there are those who say it rises in the South, and...&quot I change the channel pronto.

Both Brooks and Shields got this right.

One of the things people -- you know, real people -- like about Biden is that he is a storyteller. He tells us the story of ourselves. It's accurate insofar as stories go, what it's not is a social science dissertation with sources and footnotes and every word vetted and nailed down -- the likes of which would bore people to tears and make them feel talked-down to, in any case.

It's a story, and people live in stories. Trump tells a story of resentment and victimhood. Biden, like Obama, tells a story of hope, heart, and yes, saving the soul of this nation.

I know which story I'd rather listen to.

[Gothmog]

4. And they worry about Biden's verbal gaffes? The president is a category 5 disaster

Link to tweet

[Gothmog]

5. "Voters just don't care... they think that he's an honorable man..."

Link to tweet