RUTHFULLY YOURS

Soon after the transcripts of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s interview with President Joe Biden were released, the mainstream press — as though handed talking points by the White House — said they weren’t nearly as bad as Hur had made them out to seem in his report.

“Paints a nuanced portrait,” says the Washington Post. “Transcript shows nuance,” says The Hill. “The interview transcript is more complicated,” says the Associated Press. “Shows memory lapses, but also detailed exchanges,” says NBC News.

CBS News even dismissed evidence of dementia — “Biden appears to be reaching for words he cannot find. Twice, the phrase ‘fax machine’ eludes him, and he confuses Iraq and Afghanistan for Iran” — by saying that such “missteps appear to be common lapses for Mr. Biden who for years has struggled with names and dates in public speaking engagements.”

So, you see, no problem here.

But read the transcript yourself. It’s not “complicated,” or “nuanced.” As we suspected, it provides the perfect context for Hur’s contention that Biden is an old man with memory problems.

For example, we counted 37 instances where Biden says “I don’t remember” during his interviews with Hur. That’s a lot of nuance.

The transcript also shows that Biden flat-out lied to the public about Hur bringing up Beau’s death, or that Hur asked him when he died. What actually transpired should be deeply troubling to anyone who cares about the nation.

Here’s the key exchange:

MR. HUR: So during this time when you were living at Chain Bridge Road and there were documents relating to the Penn Biden Center, or the Biden Institute, or the Cancer Moonshot, or your book, where did you keep papers that related to those things that you were actively working on?

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Well, um … I, I, I, I, I don’t know. This is, what, 2017, 2018, that area?

MR. HUR: Yes, sir.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Remember, in this timeframe, my son is – either been deployed or is dying, and, and so it was – and by the way, there were still a lot of people at the time when I got out of the Senate that were encouraging me to run in this period, except the president. I’m not – and not a mean thing to say. He just thought that she had a better shot of winning the presidency than I did … And, and so what was happening, though – what month did Beau die? Oh, God, May 30th –”

MS. COTTON: 2015.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER: 2015.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Was it 2015 he had died?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER: It was May of 2015.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: It was 2015.

Is this what the press means by “more complicated” and “nuanced”?

Biden thought his son was deployed in Iraq “in this timeframe” — even though Beau had returned from Iraq in 2009 — or “is dying” — even though Beau died in 2015. Biden says that it was in this timeframe “when I got out of the Senate” — which he’d done in 2009 — and that people “were encouraging me to run in this period, except the president” — except that would have been in 2015 or 2016, given that Trump was already president in the 2017, 2018 “timeframe.”

Then he has to be told what year his son died.

In that same exchange, Biden can’t seem to remember that presidential elections occur in even-numbered years.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: And what’s happened in the meantime is that as – and Trump gets elected in November of 2017?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER: 2016.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE SPEAKER: ’16.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: ’16, 2016. All right. So – why do I have 2017 here?

MR. SISKEL: That’s when you left office, January of 2017.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Yeah, okay. But that’s when Trump gets sworn in then, January –

MR. SISKEL: Right.

Then there’s this exchange in which Biden is off by four years when he stopped being vice president.

MR. HUR: But do you remember how these materials got into this box and then how that box got into the garage?

PRESIDENT BIDEN: No, I don’t remember how it got – I don’t remember how a beat-up box got in the garage.

MR. HUR: Okay. And do you remember how things like the Beau Iowa binder got into –

PRESIDENT BIDEN: No, I –

MR. HUR: – this spot?

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Somebody must’ve, packing this up, just picked up all the stuff and put it in a box, because I didn’t.

MR. HUR: Okay. Do you have any idea where this material would’ve been before it got moved into the garage?

PRESIDENT BIDEN: Well, if it was 2013 – when did I stop being vice president?

MS. COTTON: 2017

There’s nothing nuanced or complicated about this. It’s a damning portrait of a man who barely has control of his mental faculties.

Nor is there anything nuanced or complicated about what the press is doing by trying to paper over what is plain to see.