Though Kamala Harris' loss in Tuesday's presidential election unleashed a firestorm of hyperbolic outrage on the left, there is at least one prominent Democrat who seems to be taking a much calmer approach to the outcome.
Amid uncontrolled wailing and gnashing of teeth from liberals everywhere, President Joe Biden turned the “not my president” theme on its head, declaring his commitment to a peaceful transition of power to President-elect Donald Trump, as the BBC reports.
In an address to the nation delivered last week from the Rose Garden, Biden pledged to facilitate a smooth changeover to the incoming Trump administration and offered some insights on the nature of the electoral process.
“We accept the choice the country made,” Biden declared, adding, “You can't love your country only when you win.”
The president praised the United States and its democracy as “the greatest experiment in self-government in the world” and noted that “the will of the people always prevails.”
Biden's message stood as a bit of a contrast from that of many disgruntled liberals who have described Trump's ascent as the end of democracy as Americans have known it, some of whom have also blamed the president's late exit from his re-election campaign as a key reason for Harris' defeat.
Though a key theme of the Harris campaign was the assertion that Trump is a fascist, harbors Nazi-type sympathies, and threatens the very principles on which the country was founded, even some Harris allies are now calling that premise into question at the same time that Biden has called for unity.
Popular urban radio host Charlamagne tha God, certainly no fan of Trump's, took to the airwaves after the election to ponder just how much of that heated rhetoric was genuine and how much was craven posturing, as the Daily Mail reports.
Despite his own apparent support of Harris, Charlamagne asked his co-hosts -- and by extension, his audience -- “Do y'all find it strange that now he's won, they're not calling him a threat to democracy, they're not calling him a fascist?”
He continued, “It just makes you wonder how much of it did they really believe?”
The radio host's comments drew backlash from at least one X user who mused, “No backbone, no independent thought. What Charlamagne is trying to say is that he feels dumb for falling in line with rhetoric that was obviously not true, yet he takes zero accountability for refusing to think for himself.”
Judging from the onslaught of online meltdowns posted by liberals declaring Trump's election to be a catastrophe of unprecedented proportions, Biden's contention that now is the time for acceptance and unity has not yet won the day among Harris' loyalists.
Nevertheless, Biden is -- at least outwardly -- moving forward in the direction he urged for his countrymen, preparing to host Trump at the White House on Wednesday for a traditional, post-election chat, as the Associated Press reports.
Though Trump's return for a second term in office may not be the political outcome Biden preferred, it is not at all implausible to think that he feels a sense of vindication after being unceremoniously ousted by his party in favor of Harris mere months ago, with this week's outreach to the incoming president perhaps a manifestation of that sentiment.
