While it’s perfectly fitting for an American president to go and mark a quarter century since the Good Friday Agreement that the U.S. helped to broker, there is something odd about Joe Biden’s oddly long and indulgent trip through the Emerald Isle.
The Irish press has eaten it up. If a Republican president had gone to Ireland and, like Biden, confused the New Zealand “all-blacks” in rugby with the “Black and Tans” — the legendarily thuggish post–World War I special forces sent to quell Irish rebellion — it would have been a major diplomatic faux pas. But from a Democrat, the Irish Times appraised it as a “delicious gaffe.” There has been something comical about it. Joe Biden is, like many Irish Americans, proud of his Irish-Catholic roots. He visited the Knock shrine. He seems not to know or care that, in Ireland, a public official admitting to some pride in Irish-Catholic identity would be an incident more infamous and unwelcome than a Loyalist bombing of a day-care center. So why the warmth? Well, even though official Ireland’s position is that everything about Ireland before Mary Robinson became president (1990) was a big, ugly disgrace and trauma, Irish people still have affection for their elders. And Biden reminds them of their grandfathers.
On the Commentary podcast, Matt Continetti said that the trip had the look of a “swan song.” And I couldn’t agree more. I got the overwhelming sense that Biden was going to announce his intention not to run for reelection after this trip. Maybe I’m wrong and team Biden will come back from this saying that the boss is rejuvenated and ready to run again.