Late-night hosts collectively did a 180 this week, admitting at long last that President Joe Biden isn’t up to the job. Colbert, Fallon, Meyers, and Stewart had previously pretended the Commander in Chief was fit for office, despite endless news clips suggesting otherwise.
But what about ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel?
Biden’s calamitous June 27 presidential debate showed the world what his administration and the corporate press had been hiding.
The 81-year-old leader is not well.
Kimmel was part of the disinformation campaign to cover up that truth. He protected Biden from his bully pulpit, hammering Donald Trump while steering clear of gags that might reveal Biden’s mental state.
It got worse on June 15.
That’s when Kimmel took part in a swanky Biden fundraiser featuring the president, former President Barack Obama, and Oscar winners Julia Roberts and George Clooney. The night ended with Biden freezing in place before Obama steered the elderly man off stage.
That stunning moment went viral. Americans saw an old man with an undisclosed illness being rescued by the ex-president. Democrats and the media insisted it was all a “cheap fake,” an edited video designed to mislead.
Kimmel was there.
And, like the propagandist he’s become, he later told his audience that moment didn’t happen like they saw it.
“You know there’s a clip of Joe Biden going around today. They say he froze and had to be escorted off stage on Saturday night … I was standing right next to him when it happened. He didn’t freeze, he was listening to the people calling him in the front row.”
“But the right-wing media, while working very hard to claim Biden’s out of it, somehow seems to completely miss moments like this.”
He then played a clip of President Donald Trump confusing a doctor’s name. It’s Dr. Ronny Jackson, not Dr. Ronny Johnson, as Trump said.
Kimmel’s spin was embarrassing at face value. Clooney just made it impossible to believe.
The “Ocean’s 11” star’s New York Times’ op-ed called for President Biden to let someone else take on Trump come Election Day.
Why?
Biden suffers from an age-related illness that makes it impossible to carry out his duties. Clooney saw it up close that night.
“It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fundraiser was not the Joe ‘big F-ing deal’ Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.”
There it is. The truth. Why Clooney didn’t share it immediately speaks poorly of him, no doubt.
Now, it’s Kimmel’s turn. Except he’s probably on a boat somewhere sipping a tall, cool drink.
He certainly won’t suspend his summer vacation to perform a late-night mea culpa. Even his red-faced peers didn’t apologize for misleading viewers over the past few years.
We still deserve answers.
Does Kimmel stand by his previous spin? Did he see signs of the President’s obvious decline like Clooney did? We’re hearing Biden’s mental fog has been the ultimate open secret, known by friends, donors, and journalists.
How did Kimmel, a comedian powered by a keen sense of observation, miss it?
Or is he incapable of telling us the truth at this point?
His X feed makes no mention of Biden’s mental state nor Clooney types calling for the president to step down.
Colbert likely won’t lose many fans for gaslighting viewers about Biden’s condition. The same is true for Team Kimmel. They’ll cheer the end of his summer vacation and pine for more “Orange Man Bad” gags.
He still owes viewers an explanation, even if the corporate press will never demand it.