VIDEO - Democratic debate: Biden raises eyebrows with ‘record player’ comment - nj.com
Updated Sep 12, 11:45 PM; Posted Sep 12, 11:37 PM
Win McNamee | Getty Images
Former Vice President Joe Biden at the Democratic debate on Thursday in Houston.
By Amy Kuperinsky | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
*Record scratch*
*Freeze frame*
Yup, that’s former Vice President Joe Biden. You’re probably wondering how he ended up in this situation.
Biden caused a fair bit of head-scratching during the Democratic debate in Houston on Thursday after he endorsed ... record players ... as part of a long, winding response to a question that seemingly had little to do with his comments.
At the ABC debate, Biden was reminded about a statement he made 40 years ago about slavery in which he said he shouldn’t be responsible for what happened 300 years ago.
“But as you stand here tonight, what responsibility do you think that Americans need to to take to repair the legacy of slavery in our country?” asked ABC News correspondent Linsey Davis.
“Look, there’s institutional segregation in this country,” Biden began. “And from the time I got involved I started dealing with that ... redlining, banks, making sure that we were in a position where ... look, you talk about education. I propose that what we take is those very poor schools, the Title I schools, triple the amount of money we spend, from $15 to $45 billion a year. Give every single teacher a raise ... the $60,000 level.”
“No. 2, make sure that we bring in, to help the teachers deal with the problems that come from home ... we have one school psychologist for every 1,500 kids in America today. It’s crazy. I’m married to a teacher ... my deceased wife is a teacher. They have every problem coming to them.”
The record player moment arrived as Biden talked about bringing social workers in to help parents “deal with how to raise their children.”
“Play the radio, make sure the television ... the excuse me ... make sure you have the record player on at night ... the ... the phone ..." Biden said (see video clip below). “Make sure the kids hear words," he said. "A kid coming from a very poor school — a very poor background — will hear four million words fewer spoken by the time they get there.”
First, there was the issue of record players not exactly being something that people have in every household in 2019. Second, viewers wondered why the candidate’s mind turned to record players at all.
Biden, 76, seemed to be making some kind of link between the record player and children’s education, but the explanation wasn’t all that clear, along with how any of that was supposed to repair the legacy of slavery.
At the previous Democratic debate in July, Biden also created some confusion when he signed off by telling people to “go to Joe 30330 and help me in this fight." (He was supposed to tell everyone to text “Joe” to “30330.″)
Of course, in no time at all, social media made a meme of Biden’s insistence on record players.
Was Biden just a big fan of vinyl, angling for the hipster vote? Was he really hankering to say phonograph? Speculation abounded.
for those confused right now Joe Biden said 'record player' but I'm pretty sure he meant 'phonograph' #Demdebate
— Matt Oswalt (@MattOswaltVA) September 13, 2019
Have a tip? Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AmyKup or on Facebook.
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