Good morning, it's Friday, Jan. 20, 2023. On this date two years ago, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. took the oath of office as the 46th president of the United States. It's the inauguration date for most modern American presidents, although exceptions do occur.
Lyndon Baines Johnson took the oath of office on Nov. 22, 1963, immediately after John F. Kennedy's assassination. (LBJ had a proper Jan. 20 ceremony 14 months later after winning a landslide election in his own right.) Owing to Richard Nixon's resignation, Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as the 38th U.S. president on Aug. 9, 1974. The first inaugurations of Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, and Barack Obama took place on Jan. 20, but all three presidents' second terms began on Jan. 21, owing to the calendar: We don't inaugurate presidents on Sundays. Perhaps this is an anachronism in our more diverse and secular society, but it's tradition nonetheless.
If I sound somewhat pedantic this morning, there are a couple of reasons. First, although I strive for accuracy, it's been a humbling week. On Tuesday, I put the birth of Thomas Jefferson's grandson James Madison Randolph in 1860. (It was 1806). That was merely a typo, but I opened yesterday's note by saying it was Monday instead of Thursday -- an odd brain lapse.
And those are just the mistakes my readers see. If it wasn't for intrepid copy editor Cathi Warren, who succeeded the great Tom Kavanagh, I'd be apologizing for far worse errors.
All of which is my way of saying that no one is perfect, though in journalism we tend to be overly judgmental about politicians' gaffes. Who among us would withstand the scrutiny of having our every statement, speech, tweet, or offhand remark parsed and fact-checked to a fare-thee-well by people who dislike us?
That said, Fridays are the day of the week when I reprise a quotation meant to be uplifting or elucidating. In today's polarized politics enlightening utterances can be hard to come by, however. A more usual reaction when politicians or their flacks start talking is confusion or irritation -- and sometimes outrage. One finds oneself wondering why these people can't just speak clearly and honestly. So, in today's newsletter, I'll recite a couple of quotes from earlier in the week and then suggest, in all modesty, a better way it could have been said. Yes, today, I'll actually be quoting myself.
As a friend who covers the president noted to me yesterday, the opening question in Wednesday's White House press briefing by Associated Press correspondent Josh Boak wasn't a trick question. Presidential spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre opened the session by boasting about Biden's "historic progress" in managing the economy and tackling inflation, while blasting Republicans for trying to "worsen" the situation by trying to gut Medicare and Social Security, raise gasoline taxes, kill millions of jobs, ruin 401k plans, and generally attack the middle class, all in the name of helping "the super-rich and big corporations."
She could have skipped the partisan hokum and simply opened the briefing, but she didn't. So Boak asked an obvious question: "Given everything you just laid out with regard to House Republicans, what has the White House seen or heard from House Republicans that gives you confidence that we can avoid a default?"
Here is the first part of Jean-Pierre's response:
"Look, we've been very, very clear, and I'll say this again -- let me first say -- let me first say this part: that after the midterm elections, the president was very clear, after we saw a historic -- kind of a historic -- historic, when it comes to a Democratic president in -- in 60 years being able to -- you know, to have a successful midterm, when you look at what we saw in the Senate and we look at the red wave that never happened. The president said, you know, the American people spoke very loudly and very clearly: They want to see us work in a bipartisan way."
Why not this instead?
"Hope springs eternal, Josh. Despite what House Republicans seem to believe, our reading of November's election returns is that the American people don't want chaos, they want cooperation. And we'll do our part."
Then came installed Republican congressman George Santos, who turns out to be a serial fabulist. It also turns out that he may have tried his hand at cross-dressing in public in his native Brazil. In response to this latest allegation, Santos took to Twitter (where else?) and wrote this: "The most recent obsession from the media claiming that I am a drag Queen or ‘performed' as a drag Queen is categorically false. The media continues to make outrageous claims about my life while I am working to deliver results."
Wouldn't this have been better?
"I'd like to deny it, but who would believe anything I say? Besides, it's true, and my therapist says I need to start telling the truth, even if it's painful. I'd make one point, though: Democrats and the liberal media are calling me a ‘hypocrite,' presumably because not all conservative Republicans support LGBTQ rights. But I ran for office as a gay man, with my party's blessing. The real hypocrisy here is on the left. Liberals claim to love gay people. They defend drag shows in public schools and public libraries. So why attack me? What I said in my campaign, and what Gov. Ron DeSantis said in Florida when signing the bill inaccurately labeling the 'Don't Say Gay' law, is that we shouldn't sexualize children -- and that elementary schools are not the place for drag queens or progressive proselytizing about gender politics."
Finally, in one of her last acts as House speaker, Nancy Pelosi spoke on behalf of the Uyghur Policy Act -- and, more broadly, about longstanding concern for human rights on both sides of the congressional aisle.
She reminisced about working on the issue for years in a bipartisan way, singling out two Republicans by name: now-retired Frank Wolf of Virginia and New Jersey Rep. Chris Smith. The legislation currently before the House, she said, represents "the continued work" in Congress to "counter the genocide of the Uyghur people." Pelosi added that "the most sinister and cruel form of torture employed by authoritarian regimes is to tell the oppressed, ‘Nobody even remembers you.'"
On Capitol Hill, Pelosi reminded her colleagues, victims of oppression are not forgotten. She added that Congress "remains bipartisan, bicameral, unbreakable in our commitment to shining a bright light on the persecution of the Uyghurs."
I'll offer no pithy edit of that sentiment, which I couldn't have expressed better myself, and it's our quote of the week.
