Kadish: Is It Puppeteers Or Puppets In Control In Washington?

Authored by Lawrence Kadish via The Gatestone Institute,

It must be the best of times and the worst of times for our nation’s enemies.

On one hand they have a President in the White House whose actions are reducing America into some befuddled and diminished world power.

On the other hand our foes are trying to figure out, as are all Americans, who is actually in charge in Washington?

Is it a shadow government of consultants, lobbyists, and Obama retreads?

Or is it really a president who counts success as getting to the presidential helicopter unassisted?

One can envision the intelligence chiefs of our sworn enemies being sternly lectured by their supreme leaders to get to the bottom of it because they can’t believe their good fortune that American leadership has fallen so far so fast. It must be a devious trap.

If only that were true.

It is understandable our foes sense a unique moment in history. Under Biden, America now has a national debt that rivals a Black Hole. Our unemployment numbers refuse to go down, suggesting deep fissures in our economy. Our southern border remains more a suggestion than a checkpoint. And our allies see a nation that has casually condemned to death untold numbers of Afghans who fervently believed in America until they saw our last C-17 depart Kabul.

What all of this might suggest is that there are individuals in Washington who are wielding enormous power without worrying about what Joe Biden might think or do because whatever they decide, it is Biden who will take the fall. If true, it has the makings of a nightmare situation.

And yet there is another scenario that is equally chilling.

What if Biden is not the tool of those behind the throne? What if he has cut the cord of puppet strings and is “dancing” freely? What if he is pursuing policies and initiatives far removed from those who thought they could direct the actions of a President whose cognitive behavior has been seriously questioned?

So pity our poor enemies. They do not know who to bribe, intimidate, or co-opt.

And then pity America — for whether we tell Joe “it’s time to go” or “straighten up and fly right,” we appear to be trapped by a Washington power elite intent on consigning our future to oblivion.

In the end, it will be up to the American electorate to halt this slide as they consider who to send to Congress in the next election cycle.