US President Joe Biden on Thursday delivered a Christmas address from the White House, wishing an increasingly divided US a “fresh start,” including a purge of “the poison that has infected our politics and set us against one another.”
Biden has in the past few months taken a more aggressive stance against opposition Republicans, but with Christmas just three days away, his holiday message centered on themes of reconciliation and unity.
“My hope this Christmas season is that we take a few moments of quiet reflection, find that stillness ... at the heart of Christmas and really look at each other,” Biden said from a festive White House decked out with trees, garlands and white lights.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“Not as Democrats or Republicans. Not as members of Team Red or Team Blue, but as who we really are, fellow Americans, fellow human beings worthy of being treated with dignity and respect,” he said.
The 80-year-old early in his term spoke often about the need for reconciliation amid the discord left in the wake of the administration of his predecessor, Donald Trump.
Returning to that topic, the ardent Catholic delivered a message of empathy and calm.
Photo: Reuters
“No one can ever know what someone else is going through, what’s really going on in their lives,” Biden said, inviting Americans to “spread a little kindness” this Christmas.
Fifty years ago, Biden lost his first wife and baby daughter in a vehicle accident shortly before Christmas.
He reminded Americans that in addition to joy, “Christmas can be a time of great pain and terrible loneliness.”
The president has recently gained some valuable political momentum, including diplomatic and legislative successes, as well as midterm elections that turned out better for Democrats than forecast.
He is expected to early next month make a much-anticipated decision on whether he would run again for president in 2024 after discussing his future over the holidays with his family.
Biden’s Christmas message came hours after a congressional panel probing the attack on the US Capitol on Jan. 6 last year released its final report, outlining its case that Trump should face criminal charges of inciting the deadly riot in the wake of his election defeat in November 2020.
The US House of Representatives Select Committee earlier on Thursday and on Wednesday also made public the transcripts of a number of its interviews and witness testimonies.
The report, which runs to more than 800 pages, is based on nearly 1,200 interviews over 18 months and hundreds of thousands of documents, as well as the rulings of more than 60 federal and state courts.
“Rather than honor his constitutional obligation to ‘take care that the laws be faithfully executed,’ President Trump instead plotted to overturn the election outcome,” the House panel said in a 160-page summary of the report that it released earlier.
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
RSS