President Joe Biden quoted Abraham Lincoln and the Bible on Capitol Hill Thursday in a call for unity and friendship among Democrats and Republicans.
The only problem is that he’s been labeling many, if not most of the latter “MAGA extremists” and a “threat to democracy” throughout his presidency.
Ironically, his administration is trying to put the leading candidate for the GOP presidential nomination, Donald Trump, in jail for the rest of his life on dubious, politically-motivated charges.
That is to say nothing about how his Justice Department has targeted non-violent Jan. 6, 2021, protesters with over-the-top criminal prosecutions, after allowing leftist rioters off the hook with little or no consequences.
So if Biden truly wants unity, he should start with his own rhetoric and his administration’s actions.
At the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday, Biden said, “History remembers President Lincoln’s first inaugural address counseling us to heed, quote, ‘the better angels of our nature.’”
“We do well to remember what he said just a few moments before he concluded the same address. At a moment of deep division in our nation, President Lincoln said, ‘We are not enemies.’ He said, ‘We are not enemies, but friends,’” the president continued. “‘We must not be enemies,’ [Lincoln] went on to say.”
🇺🇸BIDEN TEARS UP ASKING FOR A TRUCE WITH REPUBLICANS | “WE MUST NOT BE ENEMIES”
“At a moment of deep division in our nation, President Lincoln said, we are not enemies. He said, we are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.
He went on to say, I’ve long believed we… pic.twitter.com/Rd9YHDAjIE
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) February 2, 2024
Do you think Biden has sought unity during his presidency?
“I have long believed we have to look at each other even in our most challenging times not as enemies but as fellow Americans,” he said.
Biden then quoted from the Bible’s book of Galatians, chapter 5, saying, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.
“I believe that’s our collective calling today,” he offered.
“My prayer, my hope is we continue to believe our best days are ahead of us — that as a nation we continue to believe in honesty, decency, dignity and respect. We see each other not as enemies but as fellow human beings, each made in the image of God, each precious in his sight,” Biden said.
What wonderful sentiments, if only this type of spirit had pervaded his presidency, he would likely be much more popular than he is right now.
Biden is the least popular president since Jimmy Carter, according to a Gallup survey published in January.
When the president demonized half the country in his infamous, red-lit Independence Hall speech in September 2022, that surely didn’t help.
He mentioned MAGA Republicans no less than 13 times during his address titled, “The Continued Battle for the Soul of the Nation.”
“Too much of what’s happening in our country today is not normal. Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic,” Biden said.
He distinguished “MAGA Republicans” from “mainstream Republicans” who he’s been able to work with, presumably referring to establishment or moderate GOP senators like Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski, who lack majority support among GOP voters.
“But there is no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans, and that is a threat to this country,” Biden said.
There was a “painful” truth he said he needed to share with the audience.
“And here, in my view, is what is true: MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution. They do not believe in the rule of law. They do not recognize the will of the people,” Biden said.
That is rich coming from a president who refuses to enforce immigration law, throwing the border wide open.
He has also disregarded the Supreme Court’s ruling last summer that he lacked the authority to cancel student loan debt without congressional approval. The White House bragged last month that he’s canceled approximately $137 billion.
In Tempe, Arizona, last September, the president went after MAGA Republicans as hard, if not harder than he did during his Independence Hall speech the previous year.
“And there is something dangerous happening in America now. There is an extremist movement that does not share the basic beliefs in our democracy: the MAGA Movement,” Biden said.
“[T]here is no question that today’s Republican Party is driven and intimidated by MAGA Republican extremists. Their extreme agenda, if carried out, would fundamentally alter the institutions of American democracy as we know it,” he added.
Biden further asserted, “This MAGA threat is the threat to the brick and mortar of our democratic institutions. But it’s also a threat to the character of our nation and gives our — that gives our Constitution life, that binds us together as Americans in common cause.”
“We have to stand up for American values embedded in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, because we know the MAGA extremists have already proven they won’t,” Biden said.
It’s hard to imagine more politically charged rhetoric than that. The president is accusing Republicans of being as un-American as you can be: Opposed to the Constitution and the Declaration.
Those accusations are certainly not in the spirit of Lincoln’s, “We are not enemies, but friends” sentiment Biden says he wants in American politics.
If the president desires more unity, he should stop demonizing and wrongfully prosecuting Republicans.
Then the “better angels” of our natures can shine through.
