Joe Biden, Just Like Jimmy Carter, is Being Challenged by a Kennedy – Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., is an enigma to many.
He was born to one of the wealthiest, most powerful families in modern America. The son of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, who, in many ways, was the co-president to John F. Kennedy. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., spent his life living up to the demands that his late father put upon him and his siblings: to right the injustices of America. The Kennedys were always controversial but RFK, Jr., did not behave like many who inherit their wealth do. He did not spend his time enjoying his generational wealth or seeking greater political power, but fighting for causes that he believes benefit the common good.
An environmental lawyer by trade and a lifelong Liberal, RFK, Jr., appealed to a very specific subset of people (mostly on the Left). Recently, however, a great shattering of America’s polarized political environment has begun.
It started with the election of Donald J. Trump in 2016, who entered office with heterodox views. Although a Republican, Donald Trump was a protectionist at heart, embraced socially liberal causes, and attempted to reduce America’s military footprint in the Middle East.
None of these things made him popular with his own party.
Americans want a candidate, from either party, who will represent the majority. Few modern American presidents have done that. They represent their special interest. One thing that has made RFK, Jr., appealing to members of both sides of the political spectrum was his stance on vaccines.
Specifically, his opposition to the vaccine mandates that both former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden have favored (Trump sped along the creation of the vaccines and carved out special legal protections of the pharmaceutical companies making these experimental vaccines, and Biden later forced millions to take them).
While COVID-19 as a pandemic has faded from our national concern, its impact is still being felt all around us today. Many Americans have suffered not just physically from the illness or whatever side effects many think the vaccines may cause, but they are also suffering from possibly losing their jobs due to their opposition to the vaccine mandate.
This isn’t just a Republican issue. Vaccine skepticism has long been an issue that both members of the Far Left and Far Right have shared a common cause. RFK, Jr., since 2005, has led the nation in vaccine skepticism.
Billing his skepticism to vaccines—specifically COVID-19 vaccines—as a defense of personal liberty, the crux of the American way of life, RFK, Jr., has made it possible to appeal to a wider spectrum of Americans that even five years ago he would not have reached. Even Americans who received the vaccines (such as this author), were never comfortable with the idea that people opposed to them should be forced to take a vaccine for a novel disease. Interestingly, RFK, Jr., chose to make the conservative Hillsdale College in Michigan the site of his pre-campaign announcement speech in which he outlined his reasons for running.
The defense of personal liberty, the call for the preservation of our community against a rapacious, faceless corporate and political elite that has grown far too powerful and detached from the ordinary Americans that they are supposed to serve, was RFK, Jr.’s reasons for running.
All this is interesting because RFK, Jr., on top of having the famous last name and deep ties to the Left, is running as a Democrat. Until now, it was assumed that if President Biden opted to run for reelection (which it appears as though he will announce soon), the forty-sixth president would not face any serious challenge from the Left of his own party.
Other than Marianne Williamson, whose candidacy is not taken seriously at all, Biden is now being challenged by a major Democratic Party player (albeit one who was always controversial and seen as being on the fringe). Yet, the way that the political map has been rejiggered since 2016, one must not write RFK, Jr.’s chances off entirely.
At the very least, a truly contested DNC Primary in 2024 will do significant damage to the weak Joe Biden so that even if Biden likely did get the DNC nomination, he will be bruised going into the contentious General Election against the GOP nominee.
Many have said that Joe Biden is another Jimmy Carter. In fact, he makes Carter look good. But it is obvious that we have rapidly returned to the worst aspects of the 1970s under Joe Biden’s “leadership”. And just like Jimmy Carter, Joe Biden is being challenged from his Left by a Kennedy.
I fully support RFK, Jr.’s campaign not only because it will divide the Democrats going into 2024, but because RFK, Jr., has a legitimate platform: preserving individual liberty and protecting the general community from the forces that Joe Biden (and some Republican candidates, like Nikki Haley) represent.
A 19FortyFive Senior Editor, Brandon J. Weichert is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, as well as at American Greatness and the Asia Times. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower (Republic Book Publishers), Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life (May 16), and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy (July 23). Weichert can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
