Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s superbly reported “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again” reads like a Shakespearean drama on steroids. During his latter years as No. 46, Biden is portrayed as a lion in winter — shockingly frail and forgetful with a ferocious pride that blinds him to the fact that it’s time to exit the stage. He was assisted in that delusion, the authors claim, by the mythology his family erected around him — that he was indestructible — and by his zealously protective inner circle, dubbed “the Politburo.”

Though Tapper and Thompson’s mostly anonymous sources (it’s jarring that so few went on the record) suggest that the first disturbing signs of Biden’s diminished capacities emerged as early as 2015, many around him chalked them up to the “Bidenness” of it all: “He was known on the Hill for being congenitally prone to long stories, gaffes, and inappropriate comments,” the authors observe. “Even in tightly choreographed Zoom calls with friendly audiences, Biden could step on a rake.”

That propensity appeared to morph into something more worrisome even before Biden was elected president. An unnamed Democrat who witnessed candidate Biden being prepped for a taping prior to the 2020 convention in Milwaukee was startled by his incoherence, commenting that it “was like watching Grandpa who shouldn’t be driving.” Once in office, the White House staff “treated him as very delicate,” and the pandemic gave aides an excuse to build “barriers” around him so few could gain access. The news media and public were kept at arm’s length, as were many members of the Cabinet and Congress, which led to a “uniquely small and loyal inner circle.” “I’ve never seen a situation like this before, with so few people having so much power,” said one unidentified top official.

That elite quintet consisted of domestic policy advisor Bruce Reed, chief strategist Mike Donilon, legislative affairs guru Steve Ricchetti and chief of staff Ron Klain, each of whom had deep ties to Biden. “Five people were running the country, and Joe Biden was at best a senior member of the board,” offered one person familiar with the dynamic. As time went on and more grew concerned about Biden’s behavior, those who inquired were routinely told that everything was okay. One staffer who didn’t have regular access to Biden during this period said that when they did see him in person, they were “shocked, but the other people around him didn’t seem to be, so I didn’t say anything.”

It wasn’t until around the time Biden broke his one-term pledge to be a “bridge” president and made clear he intended to run again that some began to feel a sense of alarm. For example, in 2023, Congressman Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) was with Biden when he visited Ireland. Biden seemed to gain strength from the crowds that greeted him, but then appeared “sapped and not quite there.” The authors write that Quigley “realized why this all felt so familiar to him … This was how his father, Bill, had been before he died.” Similarly, Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips was so disturbed by Biden’s reduced “speaking and walking skills” that he pressed Democratic officials as to whether the president was up to the job. Even those who admitted to having concerns offered the “yes, but,” as in, “Yes, Biden is in decline but can you imagine Trump winning?” Phillips could imagine such a scenario, “especially if Biden were the Democratic nominee.” Failing to get anyone to take his worries seriously, he declared his own candidacy. But “the whale who spouts gets harpooned,” Phillips later noted after the “Democratic machine” set out to quash his chances. He reluctantly pulled out of the race and “watched his party sleepwalk toward disaster.”

Though some top Democratic supporters such as Hollywood mogul Ari Emanuel refused to support Biden’s bid for reelection — even shouting at Klain during a “power-player retreat” that, “Joe Biden cannot run for reelection! He needs to drop out!” — most remained in the president’s corner until his disastrous debate performance in late June 2024. Following that, the slow drip of Biden allies calling for him to withdraw became a downpour, with even loyalists like George Clooney remarking publicly in an op-ed that while he “loved” Joe Biden, “the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time.”

Was there a conspiracy to conceal Biden’s symptoms from the press, public and top Democrats? The authors conclude there was. “The original sin of Election 2024,” they write, “was Biden’s decision to run for reelection — followed by aggressive efforts to hide his cognitive diminishment.” The course Biden’s family and inner circle chose was tantamount to “gaslighting the American people.” Many other key Democratic officials and donors simply felt that even a weakened Biden was the best bet against the “existential threat” posed by Trump, until the debate shattered that rationalization. In any case, Biden allies “who voiced fears were flicked away like lint.”

In the end, I’m not convinced there was a coordinated campaign to hide the truth about Biden’s “condition,” but maybe that doesn’t matter. In the book’s final chapter, the authors quote former Watergate special prosecutor and law professor Archibald Cox on what lessons Americans should take away from the Watergate scandal. He observes that “we should be reminded of the corrupt influence of great power. … Perhaps it is inescapable that modern government vests extraordinary power in the President and puts around him a large circle of men and women whose personal status and satisfaction depends entirely on pleasing one man.”

But Biden isn’t Nixon. He is a man who generated intense love and loyalty, whose life has been filled with tragedy as well as opportunity; who adeptly and passionately served his country for decades. “Original Sin” is not a compassionate account of Biden’s last campaign — at times it’s even a painful, if necessary, piece of journalism. A great takeaway from 2024, according to political strategist David Plouffe, is that “never again can we as a party suggest to people that what they’re seeing is not true.” We don’t know if Trump could have been defeated had Biden opted not to run. But in the future, we can’t afford to be in denial.

Haber is a writer, editor and publishing strategist. She was director of Oprah’s Book Club and books editor for O, the Oprah Magazine.

FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES is a bloody horror thriller about a family that tries to stop Death from killing everyone in it in bizarre ways. Stefani is a college student having nightmares about a premonition her grandmother, Iris, had 50 years ago about the gruesome deaths of many people at a glass enclosed, revolving skytop restaurant. Iris saved the people, However, through the years, death eventually came for all the people who didn’t die, leaving only Iris and an elderly black man whom Iris saved. Stefani visits Iris, but Iris dies in a gruesome freak accident in front of her. Stefani warns her family, but they refuse to believe her. However, when two of them also die gruesome deaths, the remainder band together to find ways to stop Death.

Despite its pro-family sentiments, FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES has extremely gruesome violence and contains lots of strong foul language. Also, the story personifies Death, and he seems more powerful than God. In addition, Death shows no mercy whatsoever in FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES. So, the movie has a strong, abhorrent pagan worldview that’s very superstitious.

(PaPaPa, AbAb, FRFR, OO, B, LLL, VVV, A, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong, slightly mixed, pagan, superstitious, unbiblical, and false worldview/theology/philosophy that personifies Death or the Angel of Death, making him more powerful than God, characters repeatedly say that if people mess with Death they will make him more angry, and he’ll fight back even harder to kill you in gruesome and horrifying and bloody ways, there is no mercy in this depiction of Death, plus two women have occult premonitions of terrible fatal accidents but try to stop them from happening, family decides to stick together and thwart Death’s intentions to kill them all, but they fail (also, they never appeal to God or Jesus in the movie for any help);

Foul Language:

At least 34 mostly strong obscenities (including at least 16 “f” words), one profanity mentioning the name of Christ, one GD profanity, and nine light profanities;

Violence:

Lots of extreme and gory scary violence plus lots of strong scary violence such as multiple people are smashed by heavy objects, multiple people are impaled in the head by some objects (such as a flying wooden object), woman gets lots of blood on her face in one scene while standing next to one victim whose face is crunched by such a flying object, a new restaurant in a spinning building high in the air resting on a large spire has a see-through glass dance floor, and the floor gets a small crack that ultimately expands as people jump up and down to the song “Shout,” the glass dance floor eventually cracks totally, and people fall to their death below, people catch on fire horribly during restaurant death sequence, a woman is impaled when she falls from a high pinnacle onto a spike, a man’s head is accidentally chopped up by a falling lawnmower that accidently started, young woman is crushed by a garbage truck when she accidentally falls into the trash pit, a chain wraps around a ceiling fan in a tattoo parlor and gets accidentally attached to a tattooed man’s nose ring, the chain starts to pull him higher and higher (he eventually gets loose, but the place is in fire), young man is crunched by an MRI machine’s powerful magnets because he wears metal objects and has had his nose and ears and breasts and sex organ pierced, a young man’s head is impaled by a flying metal coil, young woman is trapped underwater and almost drowns, but her younger teenage brother revives her with CPR, a building is destroyed by fire, a house on fire explodes, a train derails and runs rampant through a suburban neighborhood;

Sex:

No Sex;

Nudity:

No nudity;

Alcohol Use:

Brief alcohol use at a family BBQ;

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking or drugs; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Young man has tattoos, the same young man doesn’t believe his cousin’s story of Death coming after him so he mocks and taunts Death to kill hm.

FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES is a bloody horror thriller about a family that tries to stop Death from killing everyone in bizarre ways when a grandmother, then a granddaughter 50 years later, have premonitions about the gruesome deaths. FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES has extremely gruesome violence, contains lots of strong foul language and personifies Death that he becomes more powerful than God and has no mercy whatsoever.

Stefani is a female college student who has nightmares about a premonition her grandmother, Iris, had 50 years ago about a restaurant grand opening ending in the accidental deaths of many people, including herself and her fiancé. Iris had the premonition before entering the restaurant and saved many lives. Stefani’s nightmares have led to many sleepless nights and endangered her academic scholarship. So, she goes home to find her grandmother, who became paranoid about Death trying kill her and all the people she saved and became a family pariah.

Stefani finds Iris hiding in an isolated cabin surrounded by all sorts of objects that tried to kill her whenever she stepped outside the cabin. Stefani hears her grandmother’s fears about Death trying to come for her and her family, including her children and grandchildren. The story is too crazy for Stefani. She tries to leave, but the grandmother follows her outside, trying to give Stefani a book she’s compiled about how to survive Death’s attacks. A freak accident kills Iris right in front of Stefani, spraying her face with blood.

Her grandmother’s gruesome death convinces Stefani that her grandmother was right. She tries to warn her uncle, his three children and her brother, but they think Stefani’s gone off her rocker, just like Iris. However, when the uncle and his daughter die gruesome deaths, Stefani, her two surviving cousins, her brother, and her estranged mother band together to find ways to stop Death from killing them all.

Despite its pro-family sentiments, FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES has extremely gruesome violence and contains lots of strong foul language. Also, however, the story personifies Death, who becomes more powerful than God. In addition, Death shows no mercy whatsoever in FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES. So, the movie has a strong, abhorrent pagan worldview that’s very superstitious.

In reality of course, the Bible doesn’t teach that there’s a specific Angel of Death or some supernatural being called Death created by God. Some angels may take part in the destruction or death of people upon God’s orders, as in 2 Kings 19:35, but it is God who decides when to punish people with death or when to let people die, and how. Also, God can give people an authority, or enable, people and human rulers to kill other people. A person may ask, what about the references to Death and Hades in 1 Corinthians 15:55 and Revelation 6:8? In 1 Corinthians 15:55, the Greek word for death there is not personified, so, when translated into English, it is lower case, not upper case. Revelation 6:8 is the only biblical verse that seems to personify death, and that occurs only once, just before the Day of Judgment, where many people will be sent to Hades, also known as Hell or the grave, for eternal punishment. However, those who trust in Jesus Christ will escape such punishment and receive eternal life in Heaven.

Amid all of Casandra Ventura’s troubling testimony this week about life with Sean “Diddy” Combs and his “freak-off” fetish, don’t be troubled thinking about what might have happened between Combs and Justin Bieber, who was launched into the mogul’s circle when he was a teen.

Despite persistent speculation as footage of the two together has surfaced, Team Bieber said Thursday that nothing happened. Move along, nothing to see here.

The speculation comes at a time when Bieber has been worrying fans with photos showing him smoking — a shot posted Thursday had the self-declared former substance abuser sitting with a bong quite obviously in his lap — and “It’s a cult” rumors about the church he has been attending, Churchome in Beverly Hills. (Churchome pastor Judah Smith denies those rumors, by the way.) Bieber’s decision in recent years to sell his catalog for $200 million is said to have been motivated by the pop star allegedly finding himself completely broke despite generating many millions for himself and others while touring.

The new dad’s marriage is rumored to be in trouble as well, though on Friday the Biebs tagged wife Hailey in an Instagram story showing a male lion lovingly caressing a female lion with its nose and teeth.

Combs, of course, is on trial on charges of sex trafficking, racketeering and more. This week in court has seen dramatic testimony from Combs’ former girlfriend Cassie.

But back to Bieber, who was discovered by Scooter Braun in 2008 and quickly signed to a label run by Braun and Usher. Usher was a Combs protégé who was sent by record executive and producer L.A. Reid to live with the mogul in the ’90s and maybe learn a few things. The “Yeah” singer was 15 when he moved to New York. Combs became Usher’s legal guardian.

Reid wrote in his 2016 tell-all memoir “Sing to Me,” via Rolling Stone, “‘Will you take this kid and teach him your swagger?’ I said. ‘Can you just give him some of your flavor?’ And so I sent Usher to New York for what I called the ‘Puffy Flavor Camp.’”

He added, “I was turning him over to the wildest party guy in the country at an age when I still needed to get his mother’s permission, but he went to New York for almost a year. I didn’t know whether I was being irresponsible or having an epiphany.”

Usher would tell Howard Stern in 2016 that he “got a chance to see some things” while living with Combs.

“I went there to see the lifestyle, and I saw it. I don’t know if I could indulge and understand what I was even looking at,” he said on Stern’s show. “I had curiosity of my own. I just didn’t understand it. It was pretty wild. It was crazy.”

Usher said he was mostly focused on making music at the time, no matter what “curious” things might have gone on around him.

So when Bieber and Usher connected, could a Combs meet be far behind?

Combs and the “Baby” singer made news with an interview on Jimmy Kimmel’s show after the “Justin Bieber’s 48 Hrs with Diddy” video was posted on YouTube in November 2009.

In the video, Combs showed Bieber a silver Lamborghini and told him, “The keys is yours, you know, when you hit 16.” That was after Bieber pitched driving it right away with Combs in the passenger seat, because he had his permit. After staring at the kid for a moment, Combs simply said, “No.” Then he promised him the mansion when he turned 18. Combs didn’t have legal guardianship of Bieber like he did with Usher, he said, but they would be together for the next 48 hours.

“He knows better than to talk about the things that he’s done with big brother Puff on national television,” Combs said later in the Kimmel interview, adding, “Everything ain’t for everybody.” That was after he described Bieber as “a little brother” and “one of the greatest kids you could ever know” who could always call up and ask him for industry advice.

The two would continue to cross paths, including at parties for Combs’ vodka Ciroc, a brand the embattled mogul cut ties with in January 2024.

Bieber’s camp released a statement Thursday asserting that nothing untoward ever happened between the two.

“Although Justin is not among Sean Combs’ victims, there are individuals who were genuinely harmed by him,” a spokesperson for Bieber told TMZ. “Shifting focus away from this reality detracts from the justice these victims rightfully deserve.”

The Times was unable to reach a Bieber representative Friday.