He Misspoke: Biden's Obnoxiously Smug Assertion About Hezbollah Was Actually An Aggressively Stupid Policy About Syria (Plus: They Just Don't Know Stuff)
When I did yesterday's post on this genius’s Hezbollah gaffe, I just assumed that he was making it up out of whole cloth. Too generous!
Biden, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, misspoke when he said "we kicked - along with France, we kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon." Hezbollah, a radical Shiite Muslim group, is very much alive in Lebanon, part of the government there, and in fact more powerful than it's ever been. Biden may have meant to say Syria, which under intense international pressure withdrew its forces from Lebanon in 2005 after a two-decade-long presence.
Andy McCarthy has five or six reasons why this version is still an egregious abuse of history. My concern is that it's also a train wreck of a policy suggestion - albeit one that an Obama/Biden administration would indeed enthusiastically embrace. Putting European troops in South Lebanon - which of course has already happened under UNIFIL auspices - has been an unmitigated disaster for Israel. When they're not getting overrun by Lebanese children, they're threatening to take potshots at Israeli planes or conveniently losing equipment that ends up being used by Hezbollah to start wars. The rest of the time they're just passive human shields. Hezbollah tolerates them on account of that, on account of how they're utterly ineffectual, and on account of how France and Spain bribed Syria for protection. Which is to say: if Biden actually misspoke then he and Obama are enthusiastically advocating a de facto pro-Syrian and pro-Hezbollah policy. Sophisticated!
Yesterday morning I posted a roundup of various Obama/Biden historical fantasies: Roosevelt gave a speech on TV in 1929, Roosevelt talked to Hitler and Tojo, Hoover didn't try to soak the rich on the eve the Great Depression, Auschwitz was liberated by American troops, etc. I don't think any of those were deliberate lies - in sharp contrast to, say, Biden's nonexistent mom-and-pop diner story from last night's debate.
The problem here is more basic: they just don't know stuff. These are the kinds of things that you just don't say if you have even a basic sense of history - they just can't be true. And in the absence of actually knowing stuff, these geniuses fall back on what would be true if their vapid ideological catchphrases weren't vapid ideological catchphrases. Working with our allies is important? Let's send NATO into Lebanon even though they have no mandate. Unity is the key to change? Let's call for a United Jerusalem even though we have no idea what that means. Countries negotiate with enemies? The Roosevelt and Hitler thing. Patriotism means paying taxes? The Hoover gaffe.
Worse than not knowing stuff, they're utterly convinced that they're blessed with encyclopedic intellect and discerning nuance. I don't necessarily mind that Biden fancies himself an authority on Constitutional law. But it's an aggravating tic coming from someone who has seemingly never read the plain text of the Constitution. I don't necessarily mind that he condescendingly lectures others on minute juridical intricacies. But it's positively insufferable when - during said impromptu lectures - it becomes clear that he's breathtakingly ignorant about legal controversies that he was personally involved in:
[On abortion] Why are you praising the lines drawn in Roe, when the Court redrew the lines in Planned Parenthood v. Casey? "It says in the first three months that decision should be left to the woman"... ahem... that hasn't been the doctrine since 1992!... [On privacy] This is blatantly wrong and unchallenged. Some conservatives reject the right to privacy, but Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito clearly affirmed it in their confirmation hearings in Biden's own committee. Is Biden deliberately lying or is he ignorant? [On VOWA] Biden has expressed pride in having written a provision in a statute that, in United States v. Morrison, the Supreme Court held was an exercise of power beyond what is granted to Congress in the Constitution... "Federalizing a private crime"? Huh?... The unconstitutional provision in the Violence Against Women Act federalized tort law not criminal law. It did not simply authorize federal prosecutors to file cases.
Scarier - and more obnoxious - than Biden pretending to be a genius: Biden believing it.
References:
* Biden: "We Kicked Hezbollah Out Of Lebanon" [MR]
* Palin did well but got some facts wrong (Biden, not so much) [McClatchy]
* Keeping Up With Biden II — Does Anyone Remember When We "Kicked Hezbollah Out of Lebanon"? [The Corner]
* Take Away Hezbollah's Collaborators, Human Shields, And Useful Idiots. Disband UNIFIL Now. [MR]
* UN Lebanon Force Now Getting Beaten Up By Little Kids [MR]
* Again With the Idiotic French Self-Congratulation On How Their Soldiers Haven't Disobeyed Basic Instructions [MR]
* UNIFIL Involvement in 2000 Kidnapping Not News. Involvement of UNIFIL Soldier Who Thought of Lebanon as "Second Homeland", However, Is. [MR]
* Barak: UN resolution on Lebanon war is a failure [Ha'aretz]
* Sarkozy: Let's Engage Syria! Barry Rubin: Let's Not! [MR]
* Sources: Italy offers Syria help in return for safety of soldiers [Ha'aretz]
* New Coulter Column: "If Obama Wanted A Historically Delusional Vice President, Why Not Lyndon LaRouche?" [MR]
* Joe gives Delaware shout-outs: UPDATED | 10:49 PM [Delaware Online]
* Obama Isn't Anti-Israel Because... Umm... Err... Because He Just Isn't OK? [MR]
* Biden gaffe: VP is always President of the Senate [Hot Air]
* Katie Couric invites viewers to admire the impressive constitutional expertise of Joe Biden. [Althouse]
Previously:
* NJDC: Biden Is Pro-Israel Because... Ummm... Err... Because He Just Is OK?
* Obama Surrogates Now Openly And Demonstrably Lying About Biden's Anti-Israel Policies
* Biden Now Actively Channeling Rabid Anti-Israel Partisans, Adopting Their Barely-Veiled Anti-Israel Euphemisms
