It getting to be habit-forming. Two days ago, Joe Biden made history when he became the first president in the modern era to read instructions from his staff to him off a teleprompter during a TV interview. He was in the process of mounting an attack on incumbent Donald Trump when he included the cue ““Venezuela top line messages.” (RELATED: Joe Biden does battle with a teleprompter. Spoiler alert: The teleprompter wins)
It happened again yesterday during a news conference in Wilmington, Del. He was again attacking Trump, this time falsely claiming that the current administration advocates defunding social security. His speechwriters had evidently placed quotation marks around phrases that the former vice president was meant to emphasize. Instead he read the punctuation marks off the teleprompter.
A transcript follows the video.
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
… Trump continues to all but ignore. In the meantime, Trump and his friends have strong views about what the rest of America should do. Quote, “Cut unemployment benefits to force people to go back to their jobs” end of quote. “Defund social security and eliminate ObamaCare in the middle of a pandemic,” end of quote. “Reopen public schools without resources or guidance.” “Reopen main street business without protection for workers so corporations can continue to soar.” This is their plan. Second and similarly, the economic pain remains unrelenting for millions of working people.
Note that after the first two bullet points, he stopped uttering the words quote and end of quote.
While some critics of Biden are explaining this gaffe as another instance of his declining mental health, an equally plausible explanation is that he is simply not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
