Hey, life’s a beach, man.
President Biden lounged Sunday on Rehoboth Beach while the town of Lahaina on the island of Maui was still smoking, with photos of the once-idyllic paradise showing a charred wasteland.
The grim images, the unfathomable loss of life, the haunting, sickening knowledge the news would only worsen as the days passed: It would have brought any stoic to tears.
But not beach bum Biden.
Ol’ Joe was busy relaxing in his lounge chair for hours getting some vitamin D and living out one of those cheesy “Beach life” mottos you see painted on driftwood.
When asked about the mounting death toll from the country’s deadliest wildfire in a century, he gave a cold, “No comment,” reported Bloomberg White House correspondent Justin Sink, who tweeted a picture of Biden relaxing on the sandy shore, looking like Chris Christie in his infamous 2017 Beachgate scandal.
At that point, a staggering 96 souls had been lost, with many more still unaccounted for.
On Biden’s return to Washington Monday, he avoided reporters altogether.
What kind of human doesn’t have a simple sympathetic sentiment to share? What kind of leader can’t spare a moment to offer a message of hope, sorrow and support?
Joe Biden, that’s who. The same man often portrayed by our lapdog media as the patron saint of compassion: the Mother Teresa of the Beltway.
NBC News dubbed him our “consoler-in-chief,” Time said he is “unmatched as America’s grief counselor,” and the highbrow New York Review of Books called him “the designated mourner.”
A fawning 2021 opinion piece in the Washington Post on his COVID response said our “commander in grief” has a “superpower”: empathy.
Well, it seems he’s encountered some sort of kryptonite: his true self.
Considering his lifetime achievement of plagiarism and ridiculous lies including everything from claiming the other driver in his wife and daughter’s fatal accident was drunk and he supported gay marriage as far back as his high-school years, I don’t believe he was ever the good ol’ empathetic Uncle Joe sold to the country.
Back in 2020, Biden ran on being a healer, a uniter, a salve to our cracked nation. What a farce.
At 80, he’s clearly too old and too tired to keep up the charade of being decent.
Instead of addressing the traumatized people of Maui, the president put out a statement on social media: “As residents of Hawai’i mourn the loss of life and devastation taking place across their beautiful home, we mourn with them. Like I’ve said, not only our prayers are with those impacted — but every asset we have will be available to them.”
This type of dismissive, callous behavior is hardly isolated for Biden.
Families of the 13 US service members who were killed in an ISIS suicide bombing during the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan gathered at a California forum organized by Rep. Darrell Issa this month.
Cheryl Rex, whose son Marine Lance Cpl. Dylan Merola died Aug. 26, 2021, in the Kabul bombing, gave an excruciating account of her meeting with Biden, who flexed his unique ability to upstage.
To steal sympathy.
“His words to me were, ‘My wife, Jill, and I know how you feel. We lost our son as well and brought him home in a flag-draped coffin,’” Rex said. “My heart started beating faster and I started shaking, knowing that their son died from cancer and they were able to be by his side.”
That isn’t empathy or leadership. It’s unbridled narcissism.
Marine Sgt. Tyler Vargas-Andrews, who lost his right arm and leg in the blast, recalled Biden trying to shake his nonexistent hand and immediately invoking his son Beau.
When the February train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, led to a toxic spill and evacuation of the small town, Biden didn’t deem it important enough to show his face.
Instead he hopped on over to Ukraine to visit President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“That was the biggest slap in the face,” Mayor Trent Conaway told Fox News at the time, adding, “That tells you right now he doesn’t care about us.”
Empathy is Politics 101. No one can forget George W. Bush standing atop the smoldering, twisted pile of the Twin Towers rubble in the aftermath of 9/11.
Holding a bullhorn, he addressed frightened and shell-shocked New Yorkers: “I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.”
“Conversely, Bush’s Hurricane Katrina response damaged his legacy.”
Remember the faux horror at Melania Trump wearing a jacket emblazoned with the message “I really don’t care, do U?” as she visited the border? Even though she said the message was aimed at the media, the optics were off and everyone from Vogue to CNN had a conniption.
Well, perhaps Melania left the jacket in the White House and Biden has packed it for his next trip — to Lake Tahoe. Yep, instead of going to Maui, he’s heading off to Nevada for more fun and sun later this week.
Screw the survivors of Lahaina, who are frantically searching for loved ones and need to be told “I can hear you” more than ever: Mr. Empathy has a vacation planned.
𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝘁𝘀, 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝘆𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 & 𝗖𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘁𝗲𝘀𝘆: nypost.com
𝗙𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗴𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗗𝗠𝗖𝗔,
𝗣𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗻𝗱 𝘂𝘀 𝗮𝗻 𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗶𝗹 𝗮𝘁 dmca@enspirers.com
