Politicians Continue to Fail the Country’s Recovering Addicts
America has a major substance abuse problem. Biden showed one path forward.
In a painful-to-follow presidential debate marked mostly by insults, interruptions, and dog whistles, one exchange stood out. Trump disparaged Biden over his son Hunter’s cocaine addiction, and Biden showed us something the president never could: empathy.
“Hunter got thrown out of the military. He was thrown out, dishonorably discharged,” President Trump thundered. “For cocaine use. And he didn’t have a job until you became vice president.”
“That’s not true he was not dishonorably discharged,” Joe Biden retorted, getting a rare word in.
“My son, like a lot of people, like a lot of people we know at home, had a drug problem. He’s overtaking it. He’s fixed it. He’s worked on it. And I’m proud of him, I’m proud of my son.”
Trump might have thought he had the edge in going low in order to humiliate Biden, who had, before the president interjected, been talking about his other son, the late Beau Biden. It was a direct assault designed to unsettle the former vice president and shift public focus onto the private crisis of his family. But it was Biden’s earnest response, his acknowledgment of his son Hunter’s addiction…
