Dem old guard: Let It Rip in the Next Debate, Joe

Two fans of Joe Biden say he needs to come out swinging at the next ­debate to “show Americans he is the tough warrior who had convinced people he was the best bet to take on Donald Trump.” Problem is, ex-Gov. Ed Rendell (D-Pa.) and Philly-based journalist Larry Platt write at The Hill, “he’s been playing defense” since soon after he entered the race — such as with his “nervous, tortured and legalistic” response to Kamala Harris’ ­attack in the first debate. Yet “the Joe Biden we know could have done any of a number of things that would have made him look firm and strong.” This week, “we hope to see the real Biden — a happy warrior” and the “change agent these divided times call for, someone who can restore ­decency, fairness and common-sense values to our politics.”

2020 watch: Bernie’s ‘Incongruous’ Gripe About His Union

At The Washington Examiner, Michael Watson finds it “most incongruous” that Bernie Sanders is griping about union members on his staff ­“going outside of the process and going to the media.” Huffs Bernie: “That’s not what labor negotiations are about.” In fact, going to the media “is precisely what modern labor negotiations are about,” Watson contends. And Bernie himself has pushed for “secondary boycotts” (strikes against a company that does business with another employer targeted by the union) — a “particularly chaotic form of ‘going outside the process.’ ” Sure, sympathize with Sanders: “The last thing he wants is a nasty internal fight spilling into the newspapers,” says Watson. “It’s just a shame he can’t see that other American employers deserve the same consideration.”

Morning Joe: Resolution Condemning the Rev’s Bigotry

The editors of The Federalist published the text of a 2000 House resolution condemning the Rev. Al Sharpton’s numerous racist and anti-Semitic statements. “Whereas the Reverend Al Sharpton has referred to members of the Jewish faith as ‘bloodsucking Jews’ and ‘Jew bastards,’ ” it read, and “whereas the Reverend Al Sharpton has referred to members of the Jewish faith as ‘white interlopers’ and ‘diamond merchants,’ ” and “whereas the Reverend Al Sharpton’s vicious verbal anti-Semitic attacks directed at members of the Jewish faith and, in particular, a Jewish landlord, arising from a simple landlord-tenant dispute with a black tenant, incited widespread violence, riots and the murder of five innocent people” and so on, “be it resolved . . . that the Congress condemns the practices of the Reverend Al Sharpton, which seek to divide Americans on the basis of race, ethnicity and religion.” The author of that ­resolution: Sharpton’s future MSNBC colleague, then-Rep. Joe Scarborough.

From the right: Green Hysteria Springs Eternal

A BBC correspondent recently claimed that the world has just 18 months to deal with “global heating crisis, among other environmental challenges.” That bit of green hysteria prompts J. Frank Bullitt of Issues & ­Insights to wonder: “Is there something in the Thames?” In issuing each new prediction, the alarmists forget “the encyclopedic catalog of failed predictions. They just delete them from memory much the way that Moscow erased historical figures whose existence reflected poorly on the ­Soviet way.” The “smorgasbord of baloney” includes Al Gore’s “point of no ­return” (predicted 13 years ago) and James Hanson’s 2009 declaration that the “incoming president had a mere four years to save the world.” No matter how wrong their predictions turn out, “the alarmists plod on.”

Culture desk: Looking for Outrage at the Whitney

The coerced resignation of Whitney Museum board member Warren Kanders is “the most bizarre museum story in years,” asserts Brian Allen in City Journal. Kanders’ “crime” was owning a business that sold “tear gas to the federal government,” sometimes used to “control crowds trying to enter the country illegally via Mexico.” When word got out, open letters “signed by marginal academics and cranks” demanded his ouster. ­Astonishingly, the Whitney soon caved. Allen sighs: “Whose money is clean and whose dirty is now a judgment made by people whose agendas have nothing to do with the arts or the future of the museums in which they’re meddling.”

— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board