The accepted wisdom among conservatives is that Joe Biden is a demented buffoon who is under the control of a leftist cabal in the White House, the individual members of which are unknown.  However, Don Surber, who is one of the conservative blogosphere's most astute political writers, has a different theory.  He thinks Biden is a savvy political operative as evidenced by a successful political career that has spanned almost fifty years.

When most conservatives look at Biden's malapropisms, Grandpa Simpson–esque stories that seamlessly intermingle lies and delusions, and disastrous policies, we assume that he's a congenitally stupid man who, thanks to the Peter Principle, has risen to the top of the heap.  (For those who weren't around during the 1970s, Laurence J. Peter's principle is a management concept holding that people in a hierarchical organization rise until they've essentially reached peak incompetence.)

Don Surber, though, has a different theory:

Voters and pundits misread Biden. They thought they were getting a harmless and befuddled old man who would keep the seat warm while the two parties sorted things out Après Trump.

Basement Biden has played that role well. He hints at handlers running the show and the gullible fall for it. He is no moderate. He is no fool. He knows how to stage and frame his presidency.

Being seen as a puppet gives him a great advantage because he is never held accountable. Someone else is pulling the strings. In fact, being manipulated by unseen hands makes him the victim. Poor Joe.

In the same post, Don points out that Sen. Joe Manchin, having stomped on the Build Back Better bill, claims that, for several months, it was the White House — not Biden, but the White House — that led him on, causing him to believe that a real negotiation was taking place regarding his concerns about the federal debt.

Thus, when speaking on West Virginia's Hoppy Kercheval's show on Monday, Manchin said, "This is not the president — this is staff.  They drove some things, and they put some things out that were absolutely inexcusable."  In Manchin's telling, Biden had nothing to do with the negotiation.

Image: Joe Biden — criminal mastermind?  YouTube screen grab (edited in befunky).

Don Surber thanks Manchin is misreading the situation:

Biden is the president, and he calls the shots. He — not his staff — gave Kamala the cold shoulder at Bob Dole's funeral. He — not the generals — surrendered Afghanistan. He — not liberals in Congress — demanded socialism and green energy nonsense stay in the BBB bill.

Biden is no centrist, but he plays one on TV.

Don notes that Blinken exemplifies the "amateurs" with whom Biden surrounds himself.  "Do you think for a moment that Blinken calls the shots as secretary of state?"

I'd be inclined to disagree with Don except for one thing: Biden has proven to be an adept criminal mastermind.  For decades, he has funneled millions of dollars to his children and siblings and, especially, to his debauched, deviant son, Hunter.

Biden got away with it because he cleverly left himself out of the direct line of the bribes from foreign governments.  Moreover, he sold himself as "good ol' Joe from Scranton," even as the Big Guy was taking cuts from Hunter's "salary" (i.e., the bribes Hunter worked for).  I would assume he got the same cuts from his other family members.

Despite constantly boasting about his relative poverty compared to other Congress members and his poor roots, Joe Biden has done very well for himself, considering that he's worked for the government for almost 50 years.  He owns two very nice homes, the second of which is a beach house he purchased for $2.7 million.  He also managed to earn $17.3 million in just the four years between leaving the White House in 2017 and returning in 2021 — although, interestingly, he claimed to be worth only $8 million.  I'm thinking Swiss or Caribbean bank accounts that he set up years or decades ago, although that's pure surmise on my part without any facts interfering.

The other reason Don Surber's theory appeals to me is that it reminds me of a classic Saturday Night Live sketch, back in the day when the show could be funny.  The sketch posits that Reagan's public persona, which the media perceived as bumbling and stupid, was in fact cover for his being a brilliant political mastermind covering up the entire Iran Contra affair:

If SNL were still capable of actual comedy and political honesty, can't you just see the same sketch made in 2021, except that, when the press is gone, the bumbling, confused Biden turns into a fiendish criminal mastermind, collecting bribes from the most corrupt regimes around the world?

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