On August 18, 1944, Senator Harry S. Truman met President Franklin D. Roosevelt for lunch at the White House. Truman had just been nominated to be Roosevelt’s running mate that year, and the two men dined on the White House lawn and chatted about the upcoming campaign.
Truman had not seen the president for over a year and was shocked at Roosevelt’s haggard appearance. He noticed that FDR was so ill that he couldn’t even pour cream into his coffee. Despite seeing direct evidence of Roosevelt’s poor health, Truman told reporters afterwards that Roosevelt “Looked fine...He’s as keen as a briar.”
Truman was lying. Roosevelt was a dying man, which was evident to everyone who saw him. But during the 1944 campaign, a conspiracy of silence reigned about his health. Roosevelt had a physical in the summer that showed he had high blood pressure and was suffering from congestive heart failure, but the results were kept from the public.
With the assistance of a compliant media that was overwhelmingly sympathetic to FDR, the issue of Roosevelt’s ability to serve four more years never materialized as a serious campaign issue.
Seventy-six years later, history is repeating itself. Any neutral observer can see that Joe Biden’s mental acuity is a serious question mark. Biden's public appeareances repeatedly provide evidence of cognitive decline. He is easily confused, he stumbles over his words, and at times he seems not to even know where he is. Now that Biden will almost certainly be the Democratic nominee, questions about his health should be front and center. But instead, the liberal media is circling the wagons and trying to create a narrative that it is immoral or conspiracy-mongering even to raise the issue.
The actual conspiracy is the one by the media to dismiss any inquiries into Biden’s capacity to serve as president. The same thing happened in 1944. Refusal to confront Roosevelt’s diminished capacity would later have serious and dire consequences. In February 1945, a dangerously ill Roosevelt traveled to Yalta to meet with Winston Churchill and Josef Stalin to discuss the future of post-war Europe. At Yalta, FDR effectively surrendered Poland and most of Eastern Europe to the Soviets. During the conference, Roosevelt lacked the stamina to keep up Stalin, and the agreements they reached reflected the poor state of FDR’s health.
Yalta should serve as a warning to what can happen when a president is materially unfit, physically or mentally, to serve in office. Biden’s health should and must be an issue, if not thekey issue during the campaign. We mustn’t let history repeat itself.
Justin P. Coffey is Professor of History at Quincy University and is the author of Spiro Agnew and the Rise of the Republican Right.
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