Biden Said What Needed to be Said

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Last Saturday US President Joe Biden spoke to the world for twenty-some minutes from the grounds of the Royal Castle in Warsaw, Poland.  The speech was a recap of progress that had been made during a couple of days of meetings among leaders of NATO countries regarding Russia's on-going war on Ukraine.  The speech, which had been billed as a major event, focused on the continuing and growing sanctions that the United States and its allies were imposing on Russia.  By all appearances Biden's speech had been carefully scripted and was being delivered by the US President, a skilled public speaker who also had a strong background in foreign policy and dealing with foreign leaders.

Everything was going along swimmingly right up until the end of his remarks.  At that point Joe Biden apparently went "off-script" and uttered these nine un-scripted words in regard to Vladimir Putin, Russia's leader and the man who engineered the war against Ukraine.  The President of the United States said, in regard to his Russian counterpart, "For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power."

And the public relations war was on!

Russia was quickly outraged, and it was safe to assume that Vladimir Putin, the Russian politician who had been directly interfering in US politics since the Obama administration, was not happy with what appeared to be a direct call for his removal from office.

US diplomats from Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on down quickly began denying that Biden had urged a "regime change" in Russia, but had instead been voicing his frustration at Putin's instigation of the unnecessary and unrelenting war on the peaceful nation of Ukraine.  Yes, Biden had gone off-script, but he was speaking from the heart and simply let himself get carried away by his passion for peace.

That was the defense:  Joe got carried away.

But not everyone was buying that.  One journalist who had been at the event noted that President Biden's cadence during the speech slowed just prior to those infamous nine words - to a more deliberate pace, because he wanted to emphasize them.  The words may have been tactfully omitted from the prepared text, but they had been intentionally inserted by the President.

Biden knew what he was saying, as someone with a background in foreign policy he knew the impact that those particular words would have, and he made a conscious decision to speak those words.  He put his thoughts out there, and now they were part of the official public dialogue, regardless the efforts of diplomatic underlings to lighten the mood.

Joe Biden said exactly what he intended to say - and now he needs to stand up and own his words.  With the attack upon Ukraine, Putin crossed the diplomatic "Rubicon" and things can never go back to the way they once were.  Vladimir Putin dealt Russia out of the world community of civilized nations, and he will no longer be welcome in in the international councils of world leaders.  Putin can push on and try to redeem himself with a big win in Ukraine, but if that happens he will be recognized as an autocratic despot who operates beyond the bounds of decency - and a bloodthirsty killer.    Or Vlad can step down (or be removed) from power and revert to the role of a "has been" world leader.    Whatever the fates hold for Putin, it seems relatively certain that he will never again be member of the team of world leaders.

Putin is out, and so is his Russia.

He needs to be off of the world stage.

Joe Biden made that very point - and he did it very well.  He said what needed to be said.