The clearest takeaway from President Biden’s State of the Union address last week was that he believes that Donald Trump poses a greater peril to the U.S. than Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, Ali Khamenei, Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis all rolled into one. The president came to the podium less focused on unifying America in the face of proliferating foreign threats than on launching his re-election campaign against the Orange Peril.
That was probably a mistake. Even if Mr. Biden is 100% correct about the danger Mr. Trump poses to American democracy, voter concerns about the competence of the Biden foreign policy may end up helping Mr. Trump return to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Rather than telling voters, again, about Mr. Trump’s shortcomings, Mr. Biden needed to explain why the world situation has grown so dramatically worse on his watch and how he intends to stop the grim slide.