It would be amusing were the stakes not so high. Jill Biden, the First Lady, has revealed that during the 2024 debate she thought her husband was having a stroke. British medics, bless them, express doubt about US health protocols.
I feel obliged to ask: is this a moment of tragic farce or farcical tragedy? The United States, that great superpower, now appears to be run by a geriatric patient whose family cannot even tell if he is conscious or having a cerebrovascular accident on live television. One thinks of Caligula, or perhaps of Nero playing the lyre while Rome burned.
But at least Nero had a lyre. Here we have a teleprompter and a First Lady who moonlights as a triage nurse. The British medics’ scepticism is, of course, characteristic of our national understatement.
We do not have a dog in this fight, but we can spot a stroke from across the Atlantic. The protocols in question are presumably those that allowed a man of 81 to be the standard-bearer of the free world while his wife clutched his hand like a mother at a school play. It is intellectual decadence of the highest order.
We have seen the decline of empires before. They do not fall with a bang, but with a spousal press conference. The lesson for my British readers is simple: do not trust American health protocols, and do not trust anyone who cannot tell if their husband is having a stroke.
The national identity of the United States is now entwined with this moment of confusion. It is a historical cycle we are replaying, the decline of a great power. One hopes the next act is better scripted.
