Opinion | Biden’s Speech Casts Him as Maxwell Smart

Joe Biden’s “Soul of America” speech is said to have been inspired by the popular historian Jon Meacham, who used that phrase as the title of a 2018 book. But I think the president owes a debt to Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. His speech reminded me of nothing so much as “Mr. Big,” their 1965 pilot episode of the spy satire sitcom “Get Smart!”

Mr. Big, an agent of the evil spy organization KAOS, threatens to destroy the U.S. city by city using a device called the “inthermo ray,” capable of “converting heat waves into immense destructive power.” KAOS has stolen the inthermo and kidnapped its inventor, Prof. Hugo Dante. (Dante’s inthermo—get it?) Maxwell Smart, agent 86 of the top-secret counterespionage organization CONTROL, is assigned to the case. “Mr. Big must be stopped before he goes any further,” Max’s boss, known only as “The Chief,” tells him urgently.