Wimping out or saving face? Biden walks back “Killer Putin” rhetoric [Video]

The American media, particularly conservative outlets like Fox News and even Next News Network (videos from each shown below), are in the throes of a problem: How to outline Imposter Joe’s weakness without crediting President Vladimir Putin where credit is due?

The two men are scheduled to meet today, June 16th, and in fact that meeting may be underway or even completed at the time of this writing. But we want to focus on media handling of this situation and contrast it with reality. It would seem that, no matter how the meeting actually goes, the American media will have to come to grips with vastly superior leadership on the part of President Putin, and there may be some real surprises that come out of this meeting.

Here is why I think this is possible:

1. President Biden stepped in it very badly when he called President Putin a “killer” on national / internationally rebroadcast television. President Putin took the high road on this matter, wishing the American… well… placeholder in the White House “good health”, offering to meet him in person to discuss anything desired.

WINNER: Vladimir Putin. He simultaneously showed great statesmanship AND humiliated Mr. Biden by calling out his weakness straight out. Further, Mr. Biden cannot keep up the “killer” rhetoric and meet the man at the same time. That is made evident today.

2. Biden is personally weak and, because of this, he is psychologically unable to deliver the false rhetorical positioning that the Russia Neo-lib (and Neo-Con) hawks both agree on: that Russia is by definition, bad, and that President Putin is also, by definition, a KGB dictator.

WINNER: Vladimir Putin, again. President Putin has a glowing chance to display his statesmanship merely by giving a clear and understandable speech. This is where Joe Biden will be the hardest pressed to succeed at the same endeavor. In fact, the two men are not speaking jointly, a move devised by Biden’s handlers, no doubt, to try to insulate him and to give maneuvering room to twist and distort President Putin’s talk, or even simply to ignore it.

3. The big loser in all this is only partly certain to be Joe Biden himself. It also may be the American news corps. President Putin is in a very good position to make some surprising shifts in policy, especially if he is able to push Mr. Biden over as easily as it appears (Biden will likely be pinned between Mr. Putin’s common sense and Biden’s own handlers’ wokeness, which I suspect is too extreme for the hapless liberal to actually incorporate into his own thought. He will not be able to deliver a very strong woke message, nor will he be able to deliver a very hawkish tone, because he simply is unable to get it together enough to even fake this.

The American media may find that they are obligated to report surprise reversals in policy arrangements between the two countries. Those reversals may well be very beneficial to both.

Full disclosure: I am hoping for this, and that hope may cloud my judgement. It is, of course, possible for a very strong Biden team to craft something simple enough for their hapless frontman to deliver that actually makes things worse. However, this seems unlikely.

President Putin will emerge from this meeting the winner no matter how this event goes. Whether it be policy concessions gained from the US or even simply the ability to speak a clear sentence where the American leader cannot, this is definitely a situation that Vladimir Putin would have to work really hard to throw, and I have never seen the Russian president play to lose. Ever.