Bidenisms

Joe Biden, 2021

Bidenisms are comments from U.S. President Joe Biden unique to his speaking style.

In 2014 Jonathan Topaz of Politico noted that Biden's "off-the-cuff style has made him perhaps the most eminently quotable person in Washington". In his piece Topaz listed 15 top Bidenisms from The New Yorker profile of Biden. Evan Osnos of The New Yorker commented that Biden disliked teleprompters, which resulted in gaffes called "Joe Bombs" by Barack Obama's team during their competitive campaign for presidency. An example: "Folks, I can tell you I've known eight Presidents, three of them intimately". In his childhood, Biden stuttered, and reading aloud was still more difficult for him compared to an improvised talk.

Examples

General

• "I can die a happy man not being a president" - when asked about joining the presidential race.
• “I love you, darling.” - Biden’s occasional phone sign-offs to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
• “I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that’s a storybook, man.” - Discussing Barack Obama during an interview with the New York Observer, Feb. 4, 2007
• "Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids," - when discussing education opportunities for low-income students
• "Stand up Chuck, let 'em see ya. God love ya, what am I talking about." - Biden urged Paraplegic Democratic politican Chuck Graham to stand up, despite his disability preventing him from doing so. When he recognized his mistake, Biden instead urged the crowd to stand up for Graham's behalf, September 2009.
• "We hold these truths to be self-evident. All men and women are created, by the, you know, you know the thing." Candidate Biden during a campaign event March 2nd 2020 when referencing the Declaration of Independence. The actual line is: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Foreign Affairs

• "It looks like we're alone, so why don't you call me Mr. President and I'll call you Mr. Prime Minister." - Biden joked while Vice President at the beginning of a meeting with a British minister.
• “Yeah, maybe.” - when asked whether the U.S. could have done anything differently in Syria. Osnos said Biden waited 15 seconds to answer the question.

Matt Viser of The Washington Post notes that Biden frequently inserts quotes of his relatives, most often of his father, a car salesman. "My dad had an expression, 'Joey, don't compare me to the Almighty, compare me to the alternative.'" Viser said it is hard to say whether all these quotes do come from Biden's clan: "…his father seemed to have enough sayings to fit almost every circumstance — even geopolitical lessons".

See also

• Bushism
• Trumpisms

References

This article "Bidenisms" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Bidenisms. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

📰 Article(s) of the same category(ies)

• Iowa Chicken
• Language on Vacation: An Olio of Orthographical Oddities
• Trump Republican
• Big labor
• Walkaway (political movement)
• Obama-ism
• Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy

---