Tangle - Biden's Warsaw speech.

Episode Date: March 28, 2022

On Saturday, the president traveled to Poland to deliver what was billed as the most important speech of his presidency yet. Standing about 200 miles from  Ukraine’s border, Biden said the war in Ukraine represented a "battle for democracy" and framed it as part of a larger, longer struggle of people rising up to defend their freedoms throughout world history. Plus, a reader question about Ukrainian refugees fleeing to Russia.You can read today's podcast here.You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here.Our podcast is written by Isaac Saul and produced by Trevor Eichhorn. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75.Our newsletter is edited by Bailey Saul, Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and produced in conjunction with Tangle’s social media manager Magdalena Bokowa, who also created our logo.--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tanglenews/message Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.

From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle Podcast, the place where you get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking without all that hysterical nonsense you find everywhere else. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we are going to be talking about President Joe Biden's speech in Warsaw, Poland, which caused quite a bit of an uproar. Before we jump in, though, I do want to let you know, acknowledge the sound quality might be a little off today. Tangles on the road. I'm actually down in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, this afternoon and recording this from a makeshift closet studio in my Airbnb. So

I apologize if it's not up to your usual snuff for all you audiophiles out there, but we'll be back in our office tomorrow with our usual sounds of the podcast. All right, as always, before we start, we're going to jump in with some quick hits. First up, Ukraine signaled it was open to negotiating a neutral stance in peace talks with Russia and pursuing a compromise in the eastern Donbass region of Ukraine. Number two, Russia may be shifting its strategy in Ukraine, refocusing its efforts on controlling eastern parts of the country rather than taking the capital of Kyiv.

Number three, Republican U.S. Representative Jeff Fortenberry of Nebraska says he will resign after he was convicted of lying to the FBI. Number four, Senator Joe Manchin, the Democrat from West Virginia, said he backs Katonji Brown Jackson for the Supreme Court, all but assuring her confirmation. Number five, former President Donald Trump and his adult children have agreed to sit for depositions in a lawsuit filed by investors who say the family conned them into making bad investments in businesses the Trumps were promoting. Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia, for free people refused to live in a world of hopelessness and darkness. We will have a different future,

a brighter future, rooted in democracy and principles, hope and light, of decency and dignity, of freedom and possibilities. For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power. God bless you all, and may God defend our freedom, and may God protect our troops. On Saturday, the president traveled to Poland to deliver what was billed as the most important speech of his presidency yet. Standing about 100 miles from Ukraine's border, Biden said that the war in Ukraine represented a battle for democracy and framed it as part of a larger, longer struggle of people rising to defend their freedoms throughout world history.

He emphasized that NATO had tried to avoid war, reminded the world that Putin had pledged he wasn't going to invade, noted that Russia's economy was now collapsing thanks to the unity of the West, and repeated the United States' pledge to take in over 100,000 Ukrainian refugees. Biden also warned Vladimir Putin not to even think about moving on one single inch of NATO territory. He insisted that the world must steel itself for what is ahead, cautioning that the war in Ukraine may not be over in weeks or even months, but years. Time and again, history shows that it's from the darkest moments that the greatest progress follows, Biden said. And history shows that this is the task of our time, the task of this generation.

There's a link to the full transcript of his speech in today's newsletter, as well as some of our recent coverage on the war in Ukraine. Perhaps most notably, though, was what happened at the end. As Biden wrapped up his remarks, he delivered a brief ad-lib comment to the audience. For God's sake, this man, Putin, cannot remain in power, he said. Immediately, the comments became the headline from the speech, with reporters asking if Biden was calling for regime change in Russia or threatening Putin directly. In the minutes after the speech, the White House was already playing cleanup, as one administration official told reporters that Biden's point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region. He was not discussing Putin's power in Russia or regime change. The next day, Antony Blinken, Biden's

Secretary of State, clarified the comments again at a news conference, saying, we do not have a strategy of regime change in Russia or anywhere else for that matter. In a moment, you're going to hear some reactions from the left and the right to Biden's speech, and then my take. reactions from the left and the right to Biden's speech, and then my take. All right, first up, we'll start with what the left is saying. So the left mostly framed the speech as a historic triumph and praised Biden for uniting the West. Some said Biden's comment was the obvious position to take. Others worry that Russia and the United States are stumbling toward a hot war, which would threaten the entire planet. In CNN, Frida Gaitis called it a historic and impassioned speech. It was the culmination of a trip in which he built up the West's response

to Vladimir Putin's assault. He linked Putin's attack on a Democratic neighbor to events we have seen elsewhere, as the forces of autocracy have revived all across the globe, she wrote. Biden's mission in Europe this week had one overarching purpose, prevent Russian President Vladimir Putin from winning his war in Ukraine, and do it without triggering Putin's worst instincts, which could turn the war in Ukraine into a prelude to something even more catastrophic. But Biden's Warsaw speech showed he believes Putin's defeat can reverse the autocratic tide washing across the world in recent years. It's a tightrope walk requiring exquisite balance. We will not know if Biden has succeeded immediately, but what is clear is that Biden is moving forward, something that cannot be said about Putin's forces stuck in Ukraine, Giedis added.

And as Biden explains his plan and enlists European support for it, his tone has been light on arrogance and unwavering in conviction. For months, Biden's approach to handling this crisis is to bolster Ukraine's defenses, rally America's allies and the international community, and call out Putin's violations. He has done all this while trying to keep the United States and NATO out of a direct combat with Russia. In USA Today, Jill Lawrence said Biden was simply stating the obvious. When you call someone a butcher because his army has turned the sovereign democratic nation of Ukraine into a hellscape of slaughtered civilians and leveled cities for no reason except hunger for power and control, do you want that butcher to remain in power? No, she wrote. I found his words

bracing and was surprised to see the White House immediately start walking back the apparently spontaneous addition to the closing of Biden's speech in Warsaw. Why walk it back, I wondered. Let people debate what Biden meant and interpret it how they want. An argument quickly erupted on Twitter and beyond between people enormously relieved that Biden had said what they were thinking and people who might agree with him but believe it was at best risky and at worst dangerous for him to say such a thing. You want Putin to be thinking about making a deal. Enraging him isn't the way to encourage that, the thinking goes, especially when he seems to be shifting his objectives and his ground

and could be on the verge of something. My heart is with the argument on the other side. Let's stop saying what we won't do or can't do or don't mean. Let's say what we really mean and make Putin wonder what we will do. Glenn Greenwald warned about the state of the war and the possibility of the world's two great nuclear powers coming to blows. All of those pre-existing dangers are, in turn, severely exasperated by an American president who so often is too age-addled to speak clearly or predictably, he wrote. That condition is inherently dangerous, made all the more so by the fact it leaves him vulnerable to manipulation by the Democratic Party's national security

advisors, who will never forget 2016 and seem more intent than ever on finally attaining vengeance against Putin, no matter the risk. Speaking to U.S. troops in Poland on Friday, a visibly exhausted and rambling President Biden, after extensive travel, time zone hopping, protracted meetings and speeches, appeared to tell U.S. troops they were on their way to see firsthand the resistance of Ukrainians, meaning they were headed into Ukraine. But accidental or unintentional escalation from misperception or miscommunication is always at least as serious a danger for war as the deliberate intention to directly engage militarily, Greenwald added. So the grave danger is from Biden's sudden yet emphatic declaration on Saturday that Putin, quote,

cannot remain in power, the classic language of declared U.S. policy of regime change. Whether deliberate or unintentional, these escalatory statements, particularly when combined with the United States' escalatory actions, are dangerous beyond what can be described. Whatever else is true, the U.S. and Russia are now in waters uncharted since the Cuban Missile Crisis. Alright, that is it for what the left is saying, which brings us to what the right is saying. So the right criticized Biden for his comments, saying it was an unacceptable gaffe. Some suggested the president can't be trusted to

speak publicly in wartime. Others said the comments risked yet another escalation in the war already happening. In the New York Post, Michael Goodwin said the speech was a catastrophe. Joe Biden's call to arms speech in Poland was long on soaring rhetoric about the virtues of democracy, but woefully short on what more the West will do to help Ukraine defeat the Russian invasion. But by the time he got to the finish, most of that was forgotten, Goodwin wrote. What mattered most and what will be remembered for a long time was a single line the President of the United States said about the President of Russia, quote, for God's sake, this man cannot remain in power, end quote. In the context of the speech and the slaughter of Russia. Quote, for God's sake, this man cannot remain in power, end quote.

In the context of the speech and the slaughter of Ukrainian civilians, it's impossible to understand that line is anything other than a call for regime change, a move that would dramatically raise the stakes with Russia at a time when Biden has been at pains to lower them. How in the hell can a line like that, so explicit that it could potentially lead to World War III, get into a presidential address if the plain meaning wasn't the intent. Even if the speechwriter screwed up, didn't anybody in the White House, State Department, or Pentagon read the final draft Goodwin wrote? This was, at least, the fourth time on the three-day trip that something Biden said had to be walked back, cleaned up, clarified, or refuted. No, there will not be food shortages in America, despite what he

suggested. No, American troops in Poland are not headed to Ukraine, despite what Biden told them. No, the United States will not use chemical weapons, even if Russia does, despite the president seeming to threaten it would. In the Wall Street Journal, James Freeman said the president should avoid public speaking. Some issues are just too important to be left to an unscripted Joe Biden, Freeman wrote. to be left to an unscripted Joe Biden, Freeman wrote. This is not CNN and your humble correspondent is not a doctor, so this column will not be offering a long-distance diagnosis of the president's mental health or an assessment of how his cognition compares to that of other world leaders. But these are dangerous times and we would all be much safer if Mr. Biden would make greater use of prepared statements on subjects such as, for example, weapons of mass destruction.

on subjects such as, for example, weapons of mass destruction. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for

ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at FluCellVax.ca. Two months after a bumbling press conference in which Mr. Biden implied that a minor incursion by Russia into Ukraine might be tolerable to the U.S. and its allies, the president flew to Europe this week and somehow ended up taking questions from reporters at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Freeman said. Yes, it's important for all of us to be able to hear from our elected officials and to assess the content of their remarks, as well as the skill and conviction with which they advocate for their policies. But this particular elected official does not appear to be up to the task. While we consider

the implications, Mr. Biden should try to say as little as possible in public during an international crisis. In The Atlantic, Tom Nichols praised many of Biden's actions, but called this an unforced error. Joe Biden has been a model of restraint during the most serious global crisis in nearly 60 years, and thank goodness for that, Nichols wrote. He has provided assistance to Ukraine while keeping NATO together against the possibility of a Russian attack on the alliance. He has resisted cause to engage in high-risk escalatory moves such as a no-fly zone while inflicting damage on the Russian economy and making clear the depth of America's outrage at Vladimir Putin's war of conquest. Biden's staff lamely offered that the president

was simply saying Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region. He was not discussing Putin's power in Russia or regime change. What Biden was doing, of course, was being Joe Biden. He was speaking for all of us from the heart, he added. One of the most endearing things about the president, at least for those of us who admire him, is that he has almost no inner monologue and regularly engages in the kind of gaffe where a politician says something that is impolitic but true. This was not the time for such a moment, and even those who think Biden has exhibited sterling leadership during this crisis should admit that the president's remarks were an unforced error. Putin has already made himself a pariah in the West, and though Biden has been right to call Putin a thug, a butcher,

and a war criminal, it is another thing entirely to use language that could be misconstrued by both the American public and the Kremlin as, which brings us to my take. So the way I see it, there are kind of three ways to read the Biden comments that dominated this story. One is that he was just clumsily expressing the hope that Putin fails, something more akin to a prayer than a threat. Another is that he accidentally said clumsily expressing the hope that Putin fails, something more akin to a prayer than a threat. Another is that he accidentally said some quiet part out loud, expressing what may be a new U.S. policy being whispered about behind closed doors to the world. This seems the least likely to me, for whatever it's worth.

And the third is that, in his mind, he intended it as a call to the world and to Russia, but simply did not think about the ramifications those words would have. Regardless of where you land, it isn't good. My initial reaction to the comments was not that it was a call for regime change, but that it was just a guttural off-script expression that Putin can't be left to his own devices. Even if that's the case, which I think is best case scenario, it was a stupid thing to say on the world stage. In a worst case scenario, Putin could view those words as some kind of regime change threat and act accordingly. Even without that, though, he could simply repurpose the comments as propaganda and show them to his people as proof the United States is hell-bent

on killing or replacing him. President Biden, of course, knows this. The words of a President matter, Biden said throughout his campaign for president in 2020. They can move markets. They can send our brave men and women to war. They can bring peace. That was how he used to criticize former President Trump for the troubling off-the-cuff comments he would make. And he was right. They do matter. Of course, there's another voice in my head too, one aptly expressed by the reporter Terrell Germain Starr, who said I'm more concerned about Putin, who has literally called for regime change in Kyiv and whose army is raping and killing, than Biden's words that Putin shouldn't be in power and who isn't actively invading Russia. Some of y'all get caught up in the most ridiculous things. Regardless, it's a tough spot for Biden's

staff to be in. The suggestions that he should stop speaking publicly are a bit overwrought, and of course if he ever did that, people saying he shouldn't speak publicly would then rightly criticize him for hiding in his basement from the press. Still, Biden can no longer afford these kinds of missteps, especially not in this moment, where the wrong words or unintended threat could literally lead to nuclear war. The timing was doubly troubling because the comments come as Russia might be regrouping and adjusting its strategy, which is the kind of moment in war where the possibility for de-escalation increases. The comment overshadowed an otherwise strong speech, one where this moment was properly framed in the context of world history and the high stakes of what is happening were accurately

weighed. My favorite part of the speech was Biden's direct plea to Russians. I've worked with Russian leaders for decades, he said. I sat across the negotiating table going all the way back to Soviet Premier Alexei Koskin to talk arms controls at the height of the Cold War. I've always spoken directly and honestly to you, the Russian people. Let me say this. If you're able to listen, you, the Russian people, are not our enemy. I refuse to believe that you welcome the killing of innocent children and grandparents, or that you accept hospitals, schools, maternity wards for that,

for God's sakes, being pummeled with Russian missiles and bombs, or cities being surrounded so that civilians cannot flee, supplies cut off and attempting to starve Ukrainians into submission. It's unfortunate that much of the speech, the calls for Western unity, the framing of the fight for freedom, the reminder of Putin's lies and war crimes, the humanizing of Russian citizens, and the expressions of U.S. support for Ukraine, will go largely unnoticed, but the president has nobody to blame but himself. All right, that's it for my take. That brings us to your question's answer. This one comes from an anonymous reader in Amityville, New York, who said, what is this story about tens or hundreds of thousands of Russians emigrating to Russia during the Ukrainian invasion?

So I've also wondered about this group of refugees, which some news organizations have estimated amounts to more than 270,000 people who have gone to Russia during the war. There seems to be, based on what I can tell, a few things at play here. The first is that for many people, the migration is probably normal in the sense that some of these refugees are undoubtedly just fleeing to the nearest safe spot. If you live in eastern Ukraine and have connections in Russia, as many Ukrainians surely still do, then crossing into Russia may be a logical thing for you to do. But the other story is much darker and more upsetting.

For starters, reporters on the ground have documented several instances where Russia has opened up corridors only for entry into Russia. In other words, Ukrainians fleeing the war have been funneled directly into Russia. We've seen Russia announce safe civilian corridors and then bomb them, and so the reports on the ground that Russia would be creating corridors only into Russia seems pretty plausible to me. Reuters has also reported that 15,000 Ukrainians were deported to Russia and others have claimed thousands were taken by force. President Zelensky has said some 2,000 children were redirected to Russia when soldiers came to evacuate the city of Mariupol, which the Russian military has been systematically destroying for the last few weeks. In fact, one of the Ukraine's spokespeople has

said that 402,000 people, including 84,000 children, have been deported against their will to Russia or Russian territory. According to The Guardian, some Ukrainians have been deported as far as the Russian island of Sakhalin in the Pacific Ocean. One Ukrainian refugee spoke to the BBC about a group of 40,000 refugees now in Russian territory. All of us were taken forcibly, they said. It's hard to verify all these reports in a time like this. Obviously, no refugee is a refugee by choice, but I think it's clear that many Ukrainian refugees who ended up in Russia did not end up there on purpose. And while it doesn't account for the reports of hundreds of thousands of people, we do now have documented cases of at least dozens of civilians being abducted. All this is to say, I don't think Russia deserves some kind of credit

for their humanitarian aid in the war they started, and I'm not exactly sure how we can know which of these refugees chose Russia and which have been forced there by some darker forces. It's a very interesting story that I think we all need to keep an eye on. All right, that's it for our reader question today, which brings us to the story that matters. President Biden is planning to release a new budget on Monday, and it's already generating some headlines. Apparently, Biden will propose a new tax of at least 20% on households worth more than $100 million, a plan the White House says will reduce the federal deficit by $1 trillion over a decade. The tax would apply to the

top 0.01% of households with half the expected revenue coming from homes worth over $1 billion. The minimum tax would effectively prevent the wealthiest sliver of America from paying lower tax rates than families who think of themselves as middle class, while helping to generate revenues to fuel Biden's domestic ambitions and keep the deficit in check relative to the U.S. economy, the Associated Press reports. There's a link to this story in today's newsletter that you can go check out for yourself. All right, next up is our numbers section. The number of Americans who have low confidence in President Biden's ability to deal with Russia's invasion of Ukraine is now 7 in 10. Biden's approval rating in a new NBC News poll is 40%, the lowest of his presidency. The percentage of Americans who say they disapprove of Biden's presidency is 55%.

When asked if Biden should focus most on inflation and the economy or ending the war in Ukraine, the percentage of Americans who say inflation and the economy is 68%. The number of senators whose position on Kataji Brown Jackson is still unknown is 46, according to a Washington Post tracker. All right, and last but not least, our have a nice day section. Scientists in England are using seeds from the 1,000-year-old oak trees to help plant an experimental super forest. The Blenheim Estate has received a government grant of about 1 million euros to plant 270,000 trees, and they're using the seeds of a medieval-aged

forest to try and make it happen. In 2020, the massive oaks, some of which are over 1,000 years old, produced a bumper crop of acorns. Foresters harvested those acorns, brought them to a nursery, and then planted them in pots and let them grow. The saplings take several years to grow big enough to be planted out in the forest, but experts think it is worth the wait to harness the pedigree of the Blenheim oaks, BBC reported. The native oak trees can support hundreds of species of insects, birds, and fungi, and will be leaned on as the United Kingdom ups its effort to reforest the country. BBC has the story about these trees and you know how they might be alive a thousand years from now which is kind of nuts. All right everybody that is it for today's podcast. Like I said at the top of the show I

apologize for a little bit of the crazy sound in here. We're on the road, but we'll be back to our normal studio tomorrow, and we will be right back here at the same time tomorrow afternoon. So we'll see you then. Peace. Our newsletter is written by Isaac Saul, edited by Bailey Saul, Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and produced in conjunction with Tangle's social media manager, Magdalena Bokova, who also helped create our logo. The podcast is edited by Trevor Eichhorn, and music for the podcast was produced by Diet75.

For more from Tangle, subscribe to our newsletter or check out our content archives at www.readtangle.com. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis We'll be right back. His family's buried history and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu.

It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at FluCellVax.ca.