T he philosopher George Santayana is most remembered for his maxim that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
His observation should remind us not to put the efforts of the White House to cover up President Biden’s cognitive decline and medical condition down a memory hole.
Most recently, Biden was invisible for six days after he hastily cut short his Las Vegas speaking last Wednesday and flew to Delaware claiming he had Covid. Local law-enforcement officers monitoring police radios heard reports that Biden had a “medical emergency.”
Just as they failed to do for much of his presidency, the media haven’t been very eager to probe the White House’s narrative or question whether it’s the full story.
Since the United States became a major power after World War I, we’ve seen at least four attempts by White House family members, advisers, and doctors to lie and obfuscate in order to keep voters in the dark about the potential incapacity of the commander in chief. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, a leader’s inner circle always believes he is so precious that he must be protected by a bodyguard of lies.
After a stroke in 1919, Woodrow Wilson had his wife, Edith, controlling access to him. “Mrs. Wilson, legendarily, is not only his gatekeeper, but to a large extent, his decision maker over the last year and a half in the presidency,” concludes Jerald Podair, a professor of history at Lawrence University.
On any given day in office, John F. Kennedy was using up to twelve painkillers and medications that brought on a myriad of side effects. His Addison’s disease was carefully hidden from the public, and some doctors believed he wouldn’t have survived a second term if he hadn’t been assassinated.
But the most egregious cover-up involved Franklin D. Roosevelt’s hiding from the public in the election year of 1944 the fact that he was dying. The year began in January with naval doctor Ross McIntire, the president’s personal physician for twelve years, telling reporters that FDR’s health was the best it had been since he started examining him. Several days later, Dr. McIntire was promoted to rear admiral.
In March, McIntire diagnosed FDR with acute congestive heart failure and in July told him he probably wouldn’t finish a fourth term. A day later, Roosevelt announced he would run for reelection. In September, McIntire assured reporters that FDR had “absolutely no organic difficulties at all.”
With such assurances and a few carefully controlled speeches, Roosevelt won. In January 1945 a dying, drugged-up FDR left for a fateful summit with Stalin and Churchill in Yalta. In a letter, Roosevelt described his negotiating strategy to his friend William Bullitt: “I think that if I give (Stalin) everything I possibly can and ask nothing from him in return . . . he will not try to annex anything and will work with me for a world of democracy and peace.”
We know how that turned out: Stalin broke all his commitments, and 120 million Eastern Europeans were condemned to live under communism for over 40 years.
In President Biden’s case, U.S. adversaries could certainly sense weakness that they might take advantage of as he steadfastly refused to do one-on-one interviews, tripped on Air Force One stairs, stumbled through teleprompter speeches, and had aides dubbed “The Fall Guys” surround him every time he walked in public (“Operation Bubble Wrap”). The few media outlets such as the Wall Street Journal that reported on the president’s diminished capabilities were attacked as politically motivated, with one White House spokesman using his official X account roughly 80 times to disparage one Journal story.
The cover-up took other forms. In February, special counsel Robert Hur concluded that Biden shouldn’t be charged with criminal misuse of classified documents in part because a sympathetic jury would see him as someone with “diminished faculties and faulty memory.” Biden invoked executive privilege to block release of the audio recordings of Hur’s interview with him, insisting that a transcript must suffice.
But months later the White House was forced to concede in a court filing that the Hur transcript was doctored. Repeated words and filler words such as “um” were often omitted.
Also in February, the president completed his annual physical exam, and Kevin O’Connor, his personal physician, issued a one-page summary declaring him physically fit for duty.
But, tellingly, O’Connor declined to answer any questions from reporters. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre admitted that no cognitive exam had been given: “He passes a cognitive test every day,” she claimed.
This month, Pierre refused to answer some basic questions about why a medical expert on motor disorders had repeatedly visited the White House in the past year.
All of this prompted James Comer (R., Ky.), the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, to subpoena three senior White House aides for closed-door interviews this month. Comer said he wanted to probe a possible medical cover-up and their “knowledge of whether the President is personally discharging the duties of his office.” Despite Biden’s withdrawal as a candidate, Comer should vigorously continue with his investigation.
If we are to avoid another future crisis like the one we just endured with President Biden, voters will have to pay closer attention to the frailties of candidates.
Given the media’s abysmal handling of the Biden cover-up so far, the fear is that future voters may never get the information they need to form judgments.