“No comment.”

That’s how President Joe Biden , fresh off his latest sunbathing session capping off weeks of cycling and chilling at the beach , responded when asked about the deadly wildfires that have decimated the island of Maui and taken the lives of 96 people and counting.

Wait, isn’t Biden supposed to be a shining beacon of grandfatherly empathy? After all, didn’t a tsunami of legacy media propaganda cement this notion in place during his 2020 campaign?

“How Empathy Defines Joe Biden,” Forbes offered. “Biden's Empathy Is What Matches Him to This Moment,” Peter Wehner wrote for the Atlantic in a column now titled “Biden May Be Just the Person America Needs.” And what about Time with “Joe Biden’s Empathy Offensive”?

Offensive being the operative word….

It is true that the modern obsession with performative politics in times of tragedy has resulted in the somewhat bizarre expectation that politicians immediately descend on the site of any disaster as proof not only of their control of the situation, but also of their deep and unwavering compassion.

Not only that, but any politician who fails at any stage to behave otherwise, regardless of their previous actions or work behind the scenes, is widely demonized … if they’re a Republican.

Perhaps the best-known example of this phenomenon is the intentional political demolition of President George W. Bush in the days following Hurricane Katrina's destruction of New Orleans. This was arguably motivated by the desire to distract from local institutional and structural failures by pushing the falsehood that the federal government is to blame for all that is bad … if the state or local government is controlled by Democrats.

But the same can be said of the worst-timed vacation in history and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who was photographed flying to Mexico while Texas grappled with the severe impact of a winter storm, including mass power outages.

Yes, this reaction is entirely emotional — it’s hard to argue that Cruz was going to roll up his sleeves and personally get the electricity working again — but it’s also important to acknowledge that roles of supposed leadership and representation come with some level of expectation regarding displays of camaraderie.

We don’t necessarily mind that our politicians couldn’t care less about us. We just need them to be a little convincing when the weather gets really bad.

But given the political tarring and feathering of Cruz and the political crucifixion of Bush, how is Biden able to get away with the response of “no comment,” let alone the fact that his entire brand is empathy, empathy, and more empathy?

The answer is simple: the Democratic Party cares as much about empathy as it does any other emotion. To Democrats, emotions are nothing but tools to use as smoke screens in the pursuit of power.

If you’re the leader of the Democratic Party and the United States, you’re allowed to smile and sunbathe while Americans perish in the worst natural disaster that Hawaii has ever faced.

But if you’re a Republican, you better not fly to Cancun if it’s cold outside.

Ian Haworth is a columnist, speaker, and podcast host. You can follow him on Twitter at @ighaworth . You can also find him on Substack .