Happy Monday!

White House Correspondents Dinner: The Fancy Liberal Smooch-Fest

The annual White House Correspondents Association Dinner took place Saturday night. It’s a glitzy charity event thrown by the people who cover for Joe Biden … I mean, cover the White House. The president himself was there, and used the opportunity to mock Trump for being on trial in a case that his administration helped arrange.

Biden jokes about Trump going through a communist show trial. pic.twitter.com/cYdZ0360Ax

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) April 28, 2024

He drew laughs from the same “reporters” who would have a conniption if Vladimir Putin joked about putting one of his political rivals being in prison or worse:

“I see Kamala Harris is here. I like science, too. Madame Vice President, did you know if you throw a fat political enemy and a skinny one out of a hotel window they’d hit the ground at the same time? It’s true. Maybe you’d like to try that with Trump and RFK Jr.?”

You think we’re making that up? Top Democrats want to remove Secret Service protection from Trump if he’s convicted of any crimes involving prison time, and the White House is still refusing to provide Robert Kennedy, Jr. with Secret Service protection despite the threats on his life and his family making personal pleas to Biden.

Protesters and Other Comedians

Putin would have been as entertaining as Saturday Night Live’s Colin Jost. Knowing his audience, Jost shredded Trump while treating Biden with kid gloves, even comparing him favorably to his dear ol’ grandpa.  “Some of your best qualities remind me of his. And, I will say, he was 95, and he was still great at stairs, I think it is because he didn’t try to run up them.”

As someone who wrote topical humor for a living, I can tell you that was written to affirm Biden, to flip his inability to walk and climb stairs into a positive, not poke fun at him. It’s translated as “you’re a wonderful guy with a still-youthful spirit.”

Let’s agree, viciousness has no place at these soirees — unless Trump’s in the White House. (Remember when comedian Michelle Wolf savaged then-Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and other White House staffers in 2018,  to the point that Trump’s folks walked out of the dinner?) But there were no jokes about coordinated efforts by Biden to imprison his chief political rival? Not even a gentle, “Gee I wish I thought about pressuring the principal to suspend my opponent for school president. Perhaps I would have had a chance” or even, “Good move, Mr. President. Keeping Trump locked down in New York so he can’t campaign is doing wonders for Manhattan fast food businesses.”

No, there were only a few weak jokes about age and a sense of bewilderment that the race is tied.

Speaking of age, did you hear that the White House now has “walkers” assigned to accompany Biden to and fro across the White House lawn so he won’t look so feeble? Axios broke the story. And it is totally serious. (The White House also is planning to put 2^nd graders around press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre so she looks smarter. Okay, that I made up.)

Too Chicken to Fire Her, But Desperate Enough to Try to Coax Her to Leave

The New York Post broke the news the other day that the White House was desperate to get rid of KJP last year because she’s such a failure, could harm Biden’s reelection bid, and refuses to properly prepare for briefings.

In fact, they were so desperate they recruited friends to try to talk her into leaving for greener pastures, including offering her the top gig at Emily’s List. However, Jean-Pierre wouldn’t budge. She thinks she’s doing a fabulous job and wants to stay on through the election.  

Why not just fire her like normal people do with failing and embarrassing employees? According to the New York Post, the White House is hamstrung by fears of what it would look like to dump their token gay black woman. (Isn’t refusing to hold her to the same standards as other press secretaries insulting to gay people, black people, and women?)

We’ll say it again: The only ones this administration has ever mustered the guts to fire are the dogs.

Biden Does Howard Stern

During his speech/comedy routine Saturday night, Joe Biden joked about having done an interview with Howard Stern after avoiding interviews with even liberal news organizations.

Unfortunately, Biden even managed to bungle that one by saying he’s happy to debate Trump.

When Stern said, “I don’t know if you’re going to debate your opponent,” Biden replied, “I am, somewhere, I don’t know when. I’m happy to debate him.” He went onto say he’s a good debater, having once cleaned the floor with Stephen A. Douglas.

We’re kidding; he didn’t say that. But he did claim he’d been the runner up in scoring as a “powerful” high school football player. (In actuality, he’d been fifth, though the New York Post reports he did score enough during nonconference games that he may have moved a few notches higher.)

Biden also told the tall tale that he “got arrested standing on the porch with a black family” during the Civil Rights movement.

Biden claims he "got arrested standing on the porch with a Black family" during the civil rights movement.

That never happened. pic.twitter.com/HxHIiCZStZ

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) April 26, 2024

It’s one thing to exaggerate your athletic prowess or say you want to debate when nobody believes you’ll go anywhere near a debate stage. But once again creating an alternate reality? Like the story of his uncle being eaten by cannibals? His son dying in Iraq? Having conversations with foreign leaders who have been dead for quite some time?

Biden’s always had an astonishing disregard for truth. But is it not incredibly dangerous to put our military might and safety in the hands of someone who’s clearly having difficulties distinguishing fiction from reality? What if he gives orders based on events that did not happen? Threats that were never issued? Or refuses to act based on conversations that never took place?

We need not worry about Biden walking across the White House lawn. We need to be concerned about him sleep-walking our nation into a nuclear disaster. 

Protests, Protests Everywhere …

Correspondents, establishment political figures, and celebrities alike were hassled and harassed on their way into the Correspondents Dinner by rabid anti-Israel demonstrators. “Shame on you!” they taunted. The New York Post reports hundreds cheered as a large Palestinian flag was unfurled from the top floor of the hotel hosting the dinner. Protesters even managed to get inside the hotel, carrying signs reading “Biden’s legacy is genocide.”

The anti-Israel, anti-America protests are spreading faster than COVID. I wouldn’t be surprised if these nuts start showing up at Little League baseball games. Certainly the Associated Press is treating the protestors with kid gloves.

The AP, which reportedly got some of its footage and images of the October 7 massacre from freelance photographers it hired who were associated with Hamas but which, for some reason, is still considered a neutral news organization, referred to the nationwide campus demonstrations as “anti-war” protests. (Fact check: Chants of “we are Hamas” and “from the river to the sea” are literally calls for war and genocide.)

In one positive development, the nonbinary Columbia University student leader who openly boasted of his thirst for killing Jews and said, “Zionists don’t deserve to live” has been banned from campus. Columbia wouldn’t say if Khymani James has been expelled. (Expelled? In five years he’ll be faculty.)

This segment on genocidal protests has been sponsored by George Soros, the NY Post reports.)

Along The Stream

His job title says “webmaster,” but we at The Stream know him as “The Guy.” Austin Roscoe is simply amazing. Such a quiet gentleman, but when he speaks, it’s wise to listen. Yesterday he posted “What’s the Hurry? Reflections on the Element of Haste in the Passover Celebration.” Please check it out. 

In her newest offering Sunny Side of the Stream, Aliya Kuykendall writes about “Highly Educated Mothers Discuss the Benefits of Big Families.”

 

Al Perrotta is The Stream’s Washington bureau chief, coauthor with John Zmirak of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration, and coauthor of the counterterrorism memoir Hostile Intent: Protecting Yourself Against Terrorism.