The news has quite literally taken the entire world by storm at this point — on Thursday, the president of the United States is credibly alleged to have called an array of nations, including Haiti, El Salvador, and some African countries “shithole countries.”
Trump’s reported commentary has attracted condemnation from interests as high level as the United Nations, with UN human rights spokesperson Rupert Colville commenting that “there’s no other word one can use but ‘racist'” to describe Trump’s reported commentary.
One of those to express their intense displeasure with the president’s reported remarks is the nation’s most recent vice president, Joe Biden.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we currently had a vice president that it wouldn’t be far fetched to suggest would take on the president over his racism?
Biden posted his thoughts on the matter early Friday on Twitter, speaking for many of us and saying:
‘It’s not how a president should speak. It’s not how a president should behave. Most of all, it’s not what a president should believe. We’re better than this.’
Biden is quite on point with his remarks.
For one, most of us really are “better than this.” The president’s base has always been and remains comparatively small. He won because of an electoral fluke, finishing ahead of Hillary Clinton in the electoral college because of small winning margins in a few densely populated states, while Clinton finished with millions more votes overall.
Since that surprise victory, the president’s approval rating has mostly stayed solidly below 40 percent, with him literally setting a record for the lowest approval rating measured in the first year of a modern president’s tenure.
As for Biden’s other points, there’s not any real way to get around the fact that no, this is “not what a president should believe.”
Although the Fox crowd has wavered between suggesting that the issue is the cursing to suggesting that the president is actually right, the president is supposed to represent the United States before foreign countries, not push those foreign countries off. Not starting unnecessary conflicts is part of the implied job description — although the current president has never really shown himself to be very concerned with the way that things should go.
It’s in that light that he’s pulled such stunts as maintaining his connection to his private business entities and abruptly firing the head of the FBI just because he didn’t like him.
Additionally, there really have already been a number of diplomatic moves taken in response to the president’s comments, including most recently a formal request from the government of Botswana for clarification from the president on the question of what he thinks of their country.
PRESS RELEASE |Botswana condemns remarks made by President Trump @VensonMoitoi @MIACBW @OfficialMasisi pic.twitter.com/16i7CUMR4x
— Botswana Government (@BWGovernment) January 12, 2018
Early Friday, after rounds and rounds of condemnation from around the world, Trump finally got around to addressing the controversy, claiming on Twitter that he had been harsh but hadn’t used that exact language.
Considering the president’s history of both racism and lying, it’s not as though his half denial should be considered credible. The White House didn’t even explicitly deny the comments in their initial statements on the matter, and on Friday, one of the participants in the meeting backed up press accounts.
BREAKING: Democrat Sen. Durbin, who was in meeting with Pres. Trump: “He said these hate-filled things.” https://t.co/yUHQuZIOCm pic.twitter.com/s9fMhtcguR
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) January 12, 2018
Biden is one of the Democrats being eyed as possible 2020 presidential contenders.
Check out Twitter’s response to him below.
Featured Image via Scott Olson/ Getty Images
