Poor Uncle Joe.
After the 76-year-old avuncular former vice president jumped into the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination, he was widely expected to whip the whippersnappers and sweep to victory. That’s proving far harder than expected.
In the latest debate on Wednesday, Biden at one point blurted out “go to Joe 3-0-3-3-0.” He didn’t say where you should go to find that Joe 30330 (some Gen Z wag immediately bought joe30330.com and mocked the muddled Biden). Apparently, Uncle Joe meant to say that viewers should text “Joe” to 30330, which invites signees to “chip in” and declares the campaign is expecting a “MASSIVE rush of donations.”
Twitter, of course, had a field day. One of the best was this:
When he went on a rant about climate change, Biden said, “We’re responsible for 15% of all the pollution in the country.” Was he talking about the 10 Democrats on stage? If so, he very well could’ve been right. But tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang a short time later cited the correct statistic, saying the United States is responsible for 15% of global emissions.
Just a few minutes into the debate in Detroit, Biden said that the plan from Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) on “Medicare for all” “in 10 years will cost $3 trillion.” Several respected groups have put the cost at more than $30 trillion.
He wasn’t any better at the end. In his closing remarks, Biden said “eight more years of Trump will change America in a fundamental way.” Well, Trump can’t serve eight more years, at least according to a constitutional amendment. Trump can serve only two terms, which means if he wins re-election in 2020, he’d leave office on January 20, 2025.
Somewhere in the middle, Biden referred to Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) as the “future president.” While debating him on Biden’s former support for the 1994 crime bill, he said: “The fact is that the bills that the president, excuse me, the future president, that the senator is talking about, are bills that were passed years ago and they were passed overwhelmingly.”
Booker pounced, saying, “Well first of all, I’m grateful that he endorsed my presidency already.” His campaign chief later put out a post on Twitter touting Biden’s unintentional endorsement.