Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger is a true American hero. He was an Air Force fighter pilot and the pilot of US Airways Flight 1549, known a the “miracle on the Hudson.”
The movie Sully, based on his autobiography, is one of my favorite movies. Between Clint Eastwood and Tom Hanks, it so good, the scene where all the NYC water taxis come to help rescue the passengers of the crashed plane brings a tear to my eye, no matter how many times I watch it.
So it would be hard-pressed for someone like Sully to engender ill will from me, but he did.
He wrote an OpEd in the New York Times:
Capt. ‘Sully’ Sullenberger: Like Joe Biden, I Once Stuttered, Too. I Dare You to Mock Me.
It was in response to a video of Laura Trump making fun of Biden.
As a small boy in Denison, Texas, I remember vividly the anguish of being called on in grade school, knowing that I was going to have a hard time getting the words out; that my words could not keep up with my mind, and they would often come out jumbled. My neck and face would quickly begin to flush a bright red, the searing heat rising all the way to the top of my head; every eye in the room on me; the intense and painful humiliation, and bullying that would follow, all because of my inability to get the words out.
Those feelings came rushing back, when I heard Lara Trump mocking former Vice President Joe Biden at a Trump campaign event, with the very words that caused my childhood agony. “Joe, can you get it out?” Ms. Trump was seen saying onstage, as a few giggles are heard from an otherwise silent audience. “Let’s get the words out, Joe.”
Go watch the video in the link above.
She wasn’t mocking his stutter. I don’t think most Americans know that Biden had one.
He does have a problem speaking in debates. I don’t think it is because of a childhood stutter, but because he is an old man probably with early dementia.
He doesn’t stutter, he jabbers on nonsensically.
This can’t be real life…
— Tim Murtaugh (@TimMurtaugh) December 1, 2019
He has on multiple occasions done campaign events where he got the state he was in wrong.
And it’s wrong to mock a man with dementia. If Bide dropped out of the race and said he had it, nobody would mock him for it. That he keeps plugging ahead like he’s in full command of his faculties is mockable.
My grandfather had dementia, it was tragic, but he knew when it was time for him to retire and not run the business anymore. He was only a few years older than Biden is now, and wasn’t running to control the US nuclear arsenal.
If Biden wins in 2020, by 2022 the US Secret Service is going to have to make sure President Biden is wearing pants before stepping out of the residence.
I can imagine this happening at a press conference.
President Biden: “I’ve signed a new trade deal with China. I like how those Chinamen make noodles. *sloppy fart noise* Uh…”
USSS: *wrinkles nose* “We have a code brown. Magoo discharged a live round. Clear the press corps.”
I’m not saying that this is evidence the great Captain Sully has full-blown TDS. Only that it seemed like quite a reach not worthy of a NYT OpEd.
This is elder abuse. Too many people are making good money flogging Biden for President; while the inner circle know they have a malleable tool they can use. I think Joe Biden is about where my Mother was two or three years ago. She is now in a Memory Care unit starting last month. Merry Christmas? At least we know she is safe and well cared for when we often visit.
I would love to see a reporter or someone ask him, “Joe what is today’s date? What day of the week is it Joe?” Maybe at the next debate?
That was one of the biggest signs of my Mother’s decline. Now she doesn’t even know or even comprehend the time of the day. It is hard to have to constantly explain, “No Mother, it isn’t nighttime, it is noontime / afternoon, just look at the sunny landscape through your window.” (Or vice versa.)