Biden Swindles Voters and Tara Reade with Three-Card Monte Scam

Roger LeBlanc (author of The Punter’s Tale)

As someone who has traveled both the dark and enlightened circles of the gambling world, I tend to recognize a scam when I see one. And Joe Biden’s first public response to Tara Reade’s sexual assault allegation has that four-letter “S” word written all over it. A particular scam comes to mind.

In the mid-1980s I attended a Rolling Stones concert in St. Louis. The tour was rumored to be the band’s final one. During a break I walked into the men’s restroom, where a noisy crowd had gathered in one corner.

At the front of the semicircle a man was laying three cards face down on the floor.

“Find the lady! $20 says you can’t find the lady!”

He was dealing the classic version of Three-Card Monte known as “Find the Lady”: two black kings and one red queen dealt face down and then shuffled around. The dealer then challenged onlookers to bet $20 that they could pick the red queen.

As with all good hustles, there’s a catch. Three-Card Monte dealers swap out the red queen for a third black king as they shuffle the cards around. By the time the player ponies up $20 and makes a selection, he can’t win. All three cards are face-down black kings.

Joe Biden Deals “Find the Lady” on MSNBC

Joe Biden, who’s rumored to be making his final tour, faces some bumps in the road. The most recent obstacle to his presidential bid is Reade’s allegation that Biden assaulted her in 1993. Biden answered questions related to that charge in a recent MSNBC interview.

To shift attention from the sexual assault charge to a separate sexual harassment complaint Reade says she filed back then, Biden focused on whether Reade’s complaint document actually exists. Reade insists the document is stored at the University of Delaware. Biden says any such complaint would be stored at the National Archives and has requested the release of all relevant documents stored there.

But Biden has refused to order the University of Delaware to release his papers. He claims that only his political writings and speeches reside there.

Biden’s actions imply that the truth of Reade’s assault claim depends on the existence of the harassment paperwork. If you can’t find paperwork for issue B, then Issue A must also be nonexistent. Like all good Three-Card Monte hustlers he’s using sleight of hand to ensure the black king gets chosen.

“Find the lady!” says Joe, while hiding the red card as best he can.

The problem for Biden is that he’s dealing a game of Three-Card Monte in which two cards are red-queen losers for him instead of just one. Here are the three cards Biden holds in his hands:

• Card 1, Release just the University of Delaware records as Reade requested. If Reade’s allegation proves true, this card is a red queen and a losing one for Joe. Consider that if Reade’s allegation is false, Biden knows that and he didn’t need to mention the National Archives records at all. He could’ve simply turned over the Delaware card, revealed it was a black king (that is, there’s no harassment record there), and we’d all move on. His resistance to flipping this card makes one suspect it will turn up red.
• Card 2, Release both sets of records. Anyone pursuing openness, honesty and full disclosure would at least consider this approach. But it presents another red-queen scenario for Biden because it reveals the Delaware records that he insists on hiding.
• Card 3, Release all National Archives records. This black king is the only winning card for Biden because, whether he’s innocent or guilty, he’s certain Reade’s complaint isn’t here. In his official response and his MSNBC interview he practically begs onlookers to pick this card so that he can declare himself vindicated.

Hiding the Remaining Cards

At the time of Biden’s MSNBC interview, his first public interview on the topic, no major media outlet other than Fox News had invited Tara Reade for an interview. And MSNBC was willing to air only Biden’s side of the issue. Smaller news programs such as Democracy Now and Rising interviewed Reade a month earlier, which helped pressure corporate-owned news orgs to finally admit there was a story…and then coordinate with Biden on the best way to frame it.

But without networks giving Reade air time, key details will remain buried for most Americans. Reade has witnesses who back up her claim that she talked to people about the assault in the 1990s, a video of her mom calling into the old “Larry King Live” show and describing the situation, testimony from interns she supervised at Biden’s office, court documents from her divorce alluding to trauma suffered at work, and more. There’s a lot to investigate, report and unpack, but Biden and his media friends have kept those cards safely tucked out of sight.

Joe Biden has been a pillar of political conformity for almost as many decades as the Rolling Stones have railed against societal norms. The Stones vast catalog probably contains at least one song that could be the soundtrack of every Biden scandal. “Paint It Black” seems to fit the bill here:

I see a red door and I want it painted black.
No colors anymore. I want them to turn black.

Let’s insist Biden and major media outlets flip over all the cards in this deck. That’s the only way to expose Biden’s seedy washroom hustle and launch an honest attempt to find the lady!

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