Biden Delivers Barn-Burner NATO Speech, Doesn't Even Threaten To Quit Alliance And Marry Putin
We guess it DOES matter who's president.
Last night, during Donald Trump’s rally at Doral, he admitted that before he was president, he didn’t even “know what the hell NATO was too much,” but said he figured it out really fast, “like two minutes.” He then proceeded to give his perpetually confused explanation for NATO funding. “They weren’t paying, we were paying!”
Trump has always seemed to believe there’s a NATO checking account somewhere, that only America pays into. (NATO funding is an agreement among member nations to each spend two percent of GDP on their own defense.)
He also told his followers that he told NATO allies that he wouldn’t defend them against Russia, if they didn’t “pay.” (He told it as a “sir” story, so it’s almost certainly a lie that he was such a tough guy with NATO allies in private. He’s not known for being a really tough guy, in private.)
Meanwhile, there is a real NATO summit of the real NATO alliance happening in Washington DC, hosted by President Joe Biden, who gave a barn-burner of a speech last night to welcome NATO leaders.
Go ahead and watch it. Biden starts just after the 45-minute mark.
Biden called NATO the “single-greatest, most effective defensive alliance in the history of the world.” He noted that NATO is “stronger than it’s ever been in its history,” having just finally brought Finland and Sweden into the alliance, to defend against a rogue Russia.
About Russia, Biden said that Vladimir Putin “wants nothing less than Ukraine’s total subjugation, to end Ukraine’s democracy, to destroy Ukraine’s culture, and to wipe Ukraine off the map.” He added that “we know Putin won’t stop with Ukraine.”
But he continued, “Make no mistake, Ukraine can and will stop Putin,” and said in no uncertain terms Ukraine would continue to do that with NATO’s full support. He announced new air defense systems for Ukraine, courtesy of the USA and NATO.
Biden even bragged on his own success in getting NATO members to pay up, as Trump is so obsessed with them doing, noting that in 2020 — you know, the last year Trump was president — only nine members paid the requisite two percent of their GDP for defense spending. Now it’s 23.
At the end, Biden said he wanted to end his speech “a slightly unusual way.” Was it by going upstairs to watch “Wheel Of Fortune” without saying goodbye? No, it wasn’t an old person thing like that! Instead he gave NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg the Presidential Medal Of Freedom for his leadership over the last decade, and especially since the beginning of Russia’s evil war on Ukraine.
So yeah, he nailed it. They gave him a standing ovation, like you give to the leader of the free world.
The reviews for Biden’s speech were strong. In fact, just about everybody used the word “forceful.” Even the New York Times.
President Biden opened NATO’s 75th anniversary summit on Tuesday seeking to bolster confidence in both the alliance and his own political standing with a forceful speech warning of the threat posed by Russia and other authoritarian states as the world plunges into a new era of superpower conflict.
Mr. Biden, speaking in a strong voice, with few errors, sounded themes from some of the most memorable speeches of his presidency, painting an image of a fearsome and growing NATO with an ironclad commitment to Ukraine in its fight against a Russian invasion.
Strong voice! Few errors! That fucking killed them to write, you just know it.
They mentioned the debate in paragraph four, and a number of times after, but grudgingly conceded:
By all measures, he passed the test,
Wait for it …
though he was speaking from a teleprompter — meaning there was no risk he would wander into incomplete thoughts.
Unlike other presidents, who just fuckin’ wing it when they give formal addresses to world leaders, we guess.
Biden’s schedule for this NATO week is bugfuck by anyone’s standards, and that’s after his past week full of events. (Trump, comparatively, spent the week with his thumbs up his ass before he reappeared for his rally last night. You would too if the American media was dutifully doing your job of taking down your opponent for you.)
He’s got 12 straight hours of presidenting and NATO hosting today, and then tomorrow he’s doing a real live press conference.
We’ll see how that goes! Regardless, we are sure the New York Times will have something really important to say about it.
Evan has a new side project called The Moral High Ground, you should check it out and subscribe there too!
Follow Evan Hurst on Twitter right here.
@evanjosephhurst on Threads!
If you're shopping on Amazon anyway, this portal gives us a small commission.
𝐀𝐧𝐝 𝐌𝐫. 𝐁𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧’𝐬 𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐚𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐝𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐧𝐨 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐨𝐰 𝐰𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐬 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐝𝐚𝐲𝐬...𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐮𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐞 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐝𝐞𝐛𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞.
But the media can *stop* talking about it.
in a strong voice, with few errors,
At this point it's just reactive w/ the NYT, like an beaten child trying to shield themselves from a hug.