With all due respect, Cornell Belcher said—If you’re analyzing the election without reckoning with the surge of white supremacy behind it, you’re part of the problem. Biden’s mistake may have been his trying to will this epoch to be honorable…..and I fear you do too. A right wing structure that uses white fear, and male fear of women, and has conquered the Supreme Court, which took apart much of Biden’s work while allowing billions and billions to flow to the right wing. When you don’t look at the evil Democrats are facing, you miss a national catastrophe and a national responsibility. Black voters overwhelmingly chose Biden. They didn’t miss the message in his policies. He, and Kamala Harris, were both spectacularly better candidates than Trump, yet here and elsewhere their mistakes are analyzed in a vacuum. Love and admire you all….but please, please widen your vision. We need you.
Fair points, Heidi. We did a piece a couple months ago headlined "Kamala Harris's hidden barrier" that gets into many of the points you raise. Today's newsletter isn't meant to be a complete look at Biden's term, but just to unpack a couple big reasons things went off the rails politically after the midterms.
The Biden presidency faced enormous challenges both domestic and international - likely greater than the those faced by most of his predecessors. He also faced the almost unprecedented headwinds of the deranged and powerful cult of maga which included the republican party. There was no possibility of comity and/or bipartisanship. What he was able to achieve given those circumstances is, I believe, phenomenal. It could have and should have resulted in a second term. But, IMHO the fix was in once the billionaires and corp monopolies realized that Biden was beating them at their own game. The Biden admin was making government work in big ways that were threatening to the the control of the power elite. He was taking big steps instead of the baby steps that they had become accustomed to and could tolerate. They couldn’t pull their well placed strings to stop or soften the blow of laws and policies being enacted by the Biden administration. He caught them off guard. (I think he surprised us all.) So the gloves had to come off. Their ace in the hole was control of the media. And with that they won. I’m not sure if they know exactly what they won with Trump jumping the tracks. I’m guessing they are uncertain about what trump will do and how to receive it.
The media exploited the claim that the economy was a disaster. Over and over and over the headlines read about how everyone was troubled by the economy. Yet, purchases were up, money was being spent lavishly and not just by the mega-millionaires. But still they declaimed the price of eggs--while dining out and buying new goods. Very little notice was paid to the recovery, an almost unblievable event that should have had vast and constant coverage.
Then there was the Democratic party itself. Where were they when they should have been extolling the accomplishments of the administration? They were wringing their hands about politicians and the other party instead of getting on their soap boxes and shouting to the world that Biden was actually accomplishing things for four years that the trump administration could only wish for.
And Afghanistan! Only slight acknowledgement was given--hidden deep in only a very few articles--that trump had negotiated a withdrawal that booby-trapped the incoming Biden administration. Admittedly the departure was less than perfect but tiime was of an essence unless Biden would have been agreeable to break the trump pact and allow the fighting to continue with even more loss of American and Afghani lives.
Easy to complain and find fault--and I too have found fault with things I did not like--but Biden did an extraordinary job with what he inherited and with his own guiding principles which I might add seem to be lacking on the other side of the aisle.
I am sorry, but you really cannot talk about the Biden presidency without mentioning how unintelligent the American electorate is. We are the tragedy, not Joe Biden.
I came here to say exactly this. I guess it is easier to blame one guy than for millions of Americans to reflect on how their ignorance and/or indifference will contribute to one of the most fraught and dangerous times for the country.
YES! That's it for me. We cannot continue as a democracy with the state of the electorate. We are paralyzed by the wild swings now and the threat of losing our representative democracy altogether: ignorance vulnerability complacency selfishness. The media fails us and worse. What we have come to is not only about us internally. It goes without saying this regards leading the rest of the world if ever we were up to it. We are the tragedy.. what we have come to...evident, represented plainly in the images of this inauguration.
I disagree with your statement that Biden "didn't sell Americans on his . . . " Let's be realistic and start to think outside of the American box. Trump has been working with the Russians since the 1980's when he bought stolen TV's from the NY Russian mob for his Manhattan hotels. It is the Russians - who are masters at propaganda and spreading falsehoods, that convince the American public that Biden had soured the economy - a complete and total lie.
In my recent post, I said: "In November 1923, Hitler and other members of the Nazi Party attempted to overthrow the German government. The government managed to stop this coupe, and Adolf Hitler was arrested and imprisoned for his role in instigating the Beer Hall Putsch. He was put on trial for treason, convicted, but served only nine months of his five years (due to a sympathetic judge). He then turned his attention to spreading propaganda and gaining votes. " (William Braden, a Substack author) He brainwashed an entire peaceful nation into mass murderers. “He had a firm belief in his own righteousness and that helped him manifest a charisma that drew others to his cause. On the other hand, his belief that he knew better than his generals probably helped him lose the war he started." (Ibid) Substack: From Democracy to Democrazy/ Potential Holocaust.
In a separate post named The Jack Smith Report, I wrote: On November 9, 2016, just a few minutes after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, a man named Vyacheslav Nikonov approached a microphone in the Russian State Duma (their equivalent of the US House of Representatives) and made a very unusual statement. ‘Dear friends, respected colleagues!” Nikonov said. “Three minutes ago, Hillary Clinton admitted her defeat in US presidential elections, and a second ago Trump started his speech as an elected president of the United States of America, and I congratulate YOU on this’.” (Journalist Craig Unger talks about Russia, Trump, and “one of the greatest intelligence operations in history,” January 12, 2019.) All while Donald Trump is telling the American public that he has nothing to do with Russia - another lie. Substack: From Democracy to Democrazy/ The Jack Smith Report.
Trump won this past election due to American massive ignorance regarding Russian interference in our government, our beliefs, our elections, our economy, and on and on. Even the Mariott Hotels provides RT (Russian TV) as a cable choice to their patrons. It is all Russian propaganda.
The Mueller Report attempted to warn Americans about Trump and Russia - but William Barr , Trump's AG, successfully interceded and dismantled the impact of that factual information. It is my best guess that Barr or his family was threatened - either by Trump or the Russians.
During this past election, Fulton County, Georgia's polling sights received bomb threats. Many polls were temporarily closed. Brad Raffensperger, the Secretary of State, investigated and found that the bomb threats came from Russia. Fulton County is where Trump is supposed to be trialed for his attempt to overthrow the 2020 election. Trump's phone call to Raffensperger was taped where he asked Georgia to "just find 11,780 votes" so he could overthrow the election. Because this is a state case, and not a federal case - charges are still bending. This incident alone PROVES the relationship between Trump and Russia.
Yet most Americans do not get it. They want to blame Biden, the Dems, etc. for Trump's re-election. It is almost inconceivable to Republicans and most Americans that Trump is either cooperating with the Russians or is a Russian asset - BUT THIS IS THE TRUTH.
Biden accomplished so much with such thin margins. He could have done even more, but Manchin and Sinema ugh. And he will be rated higher in the future. In retrospect. Sad.
Biden faced the rarely discussed and hidden burden of an overall electorate too tired, fragmented, restricted and distracted to get engaged in government. The research on eligible voters is small. The media reports the highest turnout in decades, etc., but close to 90 million people, who are eligible to vote, did not. (election.lab.ufl.edu/voter-turnout/). Messaging is part of it, sure, but most of why people don't vote is systemic, structural and institutional. Reducing participation in voting has been a conservative ideological pillar since the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Biden can't fight 50+yrs of entrenchment alone. Strict ID laws, reduction in polling locations, fewer days for early voting, restrictions to mail-in voting, gerrymandering, workplace limitations, hidden financial burdens (soon to be citizenship requirements) - all add up to voter apathy and fewer people at the polls. Monopolized corporate local media covers legal/political issues less because they're competing with social media apps, instead of informing the electorate. We don't even know how much foreign influence factors into any of this. Candidates everywhere have to convince more and more people to register and vote during every cycle to overcome gerrymandered districts. When I start to see pieces on how government raises barriers to voting, how media hides the work of state legislatures, how work making ends meet keeps people disengaged, how the hidden costs of voting impact women and young people and minorities - then we MIGHT have a hope of re-prioritizing why government exists in the first place. I enjoy discussing the political circumstances around events., but our Constitution exists FOR Americans - the People. They've been ignored not just by the media and commentators, but in policy, law, and governance. (Luigi's popularity shows this.) Trump voters feel 'seen' because Rs media machines twist this alienation into racist tropes and 'easy fixes', in favor of Republicans. Dems (including Biden) failed to what FDR did and exploit it in the favor of the People and the changes they wanted, including accountability for Jan.6, the fake electors, Gaza, corporate accountability, etc. Biden's presidency was tragic because he didn't swing for the fences - when he had Congress - to bring basic, lasting democratic ideals to life for everyday people.
You place too much blame on Biden, and don't seem to understand the big forces that have caused all incumbents around the world to be swept out, in the wake of the pandemic.
Nothing Biden could have done, could have worked, especially in light of the media being owned by oligarchs! Sure someone at The New York Times and someone at the Washington Post said he should resign – they have been working for the end of democracy for years now, it only became obvious during this election, somehow, and we have LEFT those newspapers to come here to read similar drivel.
At this point, we are quicker to jump off this kind of train. I'm not staying with this newsletter if this is all I'm going to be hearing.
There are bigger forces, the middle class has been doing horribly, the Democrats could not deliver for them, those people looked for "change."
It's not the "price of eggs:" we view them with derision at our downfall.
They don't even read the NYT so, but those who did may have begun to believe that maybe the Republicans would be fine to vote for.
Harris was not appealing to vote for, a large proportion of the population is not excited about abortion, we were fed lies, they were apologists for a genocide, they lost support from all sides, in part because they were in an impossible situation, and in part because the Democratic Party has been blocking good candidates like Bernie Sanders, in my humble opinion.
And they're getting ready to do more of the same, because the democratic party is stuffed with oligarchs that are just not quite as cruel as Trumps crew.
These are fair points, Myrto. We did do an entire piece just after the election headlined, "The global anti-incumbent backlash doomed Kamala Harris" that unpacks some of what you said. There were obviously a lot of factors involved in Trump's victory, but this piece was just meant to address a couple of the big political ones.
Thanks, yes, I have been following and joined as a paid subscriber (I think) before the election.
My concern is that blaming Biden means the Democratic Party doesn't have to make too many changes, and I think that's wrong but also would make me personally despair for all the people in our society who need a lot more help than they've been getting for the last 50 years.
Biden was always considered to be not very progressive, and of course he's preferable to Trump, but still someone that those of us in the progressive wing of the party were never particularly excited about.
Interesting we have that other piece about how many Democrats are profiting from their appointments, beating the market by large margins, suggesting some unfair practice. THAT is what we are talking about when we say that the Democratic Party needs to do more about fairness and the people that they keep saying they are trying to defend
The inflation spike, which really galvanized a lot of anti-Biden sentiment, was shown in a retrospective economic analysis to be much more attributable to the supply chain than to Biden’s stimulus checks. Sadly, information like this only comes in hindsight. Couple that with the common idea that someone is getting something they don’t deserve (thank you our Puritanical and racist history) and Republicans had the perfect wedge issue.
The problem stems from how the last three Democratic party candidate were chosen. With Hillary Clinton, there was no conversation of ideas except for Bernie. And he was roundly dismissed on prejudicial and superficial grounds. The Democratic establishment attacked any sense of populism under the rubric of socialism. Which is really too bad for a party that's been failing ever since.
In the 2020 race, once Jim Clyburn endorsed Biden in the South Carolina, the establishment once again jumped behind him. There were likely better candidates, but none were sufficiently aired publicly. Biden was the shoe-in running against a faltering narcissist. Biden did a good job in his term, but as Stephen Robinson says, he failed the most important test. Not only did he renege on promises to usher in a younger field of hopefuls, he reneged on his promise to hold only one term--which could have enabled him (with no reelection to lose) to marshall a full-on attack on Trump's prodigious lies and authoritarian bent, and blunt MAGA's racist inclinations. Instead he was timid in his messaging while creating strong legislation. Kamala Harris stood silently behind him until called to fix an obvious problem.
Let's hope that these last few episodes inform the leadership that the party of 1980s politics no longer works. Younger, more courageous Democrats must step forward*. We have a crisis at our feet!
I am sorry, but you really can't talk about the Biden presidency and not mention the uncritical support of the Gaza genocide. They also refused to talk about climate change during the terrible North Carolina and Florida storms. This is why nobody I know under 35 voted for Biden, and as a Gaza protester and climate activist, I know plenty of those people. Biden and Harris totally mismanaged a winnable campaign by refusing to see that the base wanted change and they were offering the same old same old. Trump and his vile boys looked like change- and it is, just not the change the rubes were hoping for.
And what a thing. People didn't vote for Biden although Trump said again and again that he would support Israel much more vigorously than Biden.
I know lots of people under 35 who recognized that a vote for Biden was a much better thing for the United States and for Gaza than a vote for Trump. But we will all live in regret together.
Is it the demographic or the people who claim to speak for them? I know people of all ages who threatened on social media not to vote for Biden because of Gaza, encouraging cynicism and disaffection among others. It's a technique that's used time and again and so far has only benefitted Trump.
I actually held my nose and canvassed for Harris in NH. But, at the weekly Gaza protest organized by me and my partner, the mood was absolutely NO for Joe. One of my daughters, actually in her 40's, still claims that there is no moral difference between Biden and Trump. I have mixed feelings about that, due to Biden's total lack of compassion for the Palestinians, but also his past actions regarding Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill, but I do strongly feel that the country is in a much worse crisis under Trump, and heading for possible civil war or collapse.
Remember a circular firing squad is unlikely to illuminate the complexity of any issue we face today IMHO. While each of us have a valid view I appreciate, we might agree there is no single simple solution. (Again I could be wrong). I’m reminded of a movement in the 70s which suggested that reporting on scientific discoveries without explanation of the scientific process specifically involved could lead to confusion. As I watched ivermectin’s acceptance grow as a COVID cure I could see a firmly established gap in understanding. Research was carried out to prove it was no better than placebo. Even though extra effort was used to review any possible benefit none was found and the results were ignored.
In my opinion we have more than one thing to fix and we may need to do all of them.
With all due respect, Cornell Belcher said—If you’re analyzing the election without reckoning with the surge of white supremacy behind it, you’re part of the problem. Biden’s mistake may have been his trying to will this epoch to be honorable…..and I fear you do too. A right wing structure that uses white fear, and male fear of women, and has conquered the Supreme Court, which took apart much of Biden’s work while allowing billions and billions to flow to the right wing. When you don’t look at the evil Democrats are facing, you miss a national catastrophe and a national responsibility. Black voters overwhelmingly chose Biden. They didn’t miss the message in his policies. He, and Kamala Harris, were both spectacularly better candidates than Trump, yet here and elsewhere their mistakes are analyzed in a vacuum. Love and admire you all….but please, please widen your vision. We need you.
Fair points, Heidi. We did a piece a couple months ago headlined "Kamala Harris's hidden barrier" that gets into many of the points you raise. Today's newsletter isn't meant to be a complete look at Biden's term, but just to unpack a couple big reasons things went off the rails politically after the midterms.
Indeed Heidi’s points are fair, but hardly ever mentioned by the media.
Thanks for listening, Aaron
the electorate... sigh
The Biden presidency faced enormous challenges both domestic and international - likely greater than the those faced by most of his predecessors. He also faced the almost unprecedented headwinds of the deranged and powerful cult of maga which included the republican party. There was no possibility of comity and/or bipartisanship. What he was able to achieve given those circumstances is, I believe, phenomenal. It could have and should have resulted in a second term. But, IMHO the fix was in once the billionaires and corp monopolies realized that Biden was beating them at their own game. The Biden admin was making government work in big ways that were threatening to the the control of the power elite. He was taking big steps instead of the baby steps that they had become accustomed to and could tolerate. They couldn’t pull their well placed strings to stop or soften the blow of laws and policies being enacted by the Biden administration. He caught them off guard. (I think he surprised us all.) So the gloves had to come off. Their ace in the hole was control of the media. And with that they won. I’m not sure if they know exactly what they won with Trump jumping the tracks. I’m guessing they are uncertain about what trump will do and how to receive it.
The media exploited the claim that the economy was a disaster. Over and over and over the headlines read about how everyone was troubled by the economy. Yet, purchases were up, money was being spent lavishly and not just by the mega-millionaires. But still they declaimed the price of eggs--while dining out and buying new goods. Very little notice was paid to the recovery, an almost unblievable event that should have had vast and constant coverage.
Then there was the Democratic party itself. Where were they when they should have been extolling the accomplishments of the administration? They were wringing their hands about politicians and the other party instead of getting on their soap boxes and shouting to the world that Biden was actually accomplishing things for four years that the trump administration could only wish for.
And Afghanistan! Only slight acknowledgement was given--hidden deep in only a very few articles--that trump had negotiated a withdrawal that booby-trapped the incoming Biden administration. Admittedly the departure was less than perfect but tiime was of an essence unless Biden would have been agreeable to break the trump pact and allow the fighting to continue with even more loss of American and Afghani lives.
Easy to complain and find fault--and I too have found fault with things I did not like--but Biden did an extraordinary job with what he inherited and with his own guiding principles which I might add seem to be lacking on the other side of the aisle.
1000%
Agree Beryl!
YES!!! But he was SO poor at messaging!
Absolutely right Becky
I am sorry, but you really cannot talk about the Biden presidency without mentioning how unintelligent the American electorate is. We are the tragedy, not Joe Biden.
I came here to say exactly this. I guess it is easier to blame one guy than for millions of Americans to reflect on how their ignorance and/or indifference will contribute to one of the most fraught and dangerous times for the country.
Biden certainly does not take all the blame, completely agree with you there. And I do think we need to save some smoke for voters.
Lots of smoke for the electorate, voters and non voters.
Exactly.
exactly!
YES! That's it for me. We cannot continue as a democracy with the state of the electorate. We are paralyzed by the wild swings now and the threat of losing our representative democracy altogether: ignorance vulnerability complacency selfishness. The media fails us and worse. What we have come to is not only about us internally. It goes without saying this regards leading the rest of the world if ever we were up to it. We are the tragedy.. what we have come to...evident, represented plainly in the images of this inauguration.
I disagree with your statement that Biden "didn't sell Americans on his . . . " Let's be realistic and start to think outside of the American box. Trump has been working with the Russians since the 1980's when he bought stolen TV's from the NY Russian mob for his Manhattan hotels. It is the Russians - who are masters at propaganda and spreading falsehoods, that convince the American public that Biden had soured the economy - a complete and total lie.
In my recent post, I said: "In November 1923, Hitler and other members of the Nazi Party attempted to overthrow the German government. The government managed to stop this coupe, and Adolf Hitler was arrested and imprisoned for his role in instigating the Beer Hall Putsch. He was put on trial for treason, convicted, but served only nine months of his five years (due to a sympathetic judge). He then turned his attention to spreading propaganda and gaining votes. " (William Braden, a Substack author) He brainwashed an entire peaceful nation into mass murderers. “He had a firm belief in his own righteousness and that helped him manifest a charisma that drew others to his cause. On the other hand, his belief that he knew better than his generals probably helped him lose the war he started." (Ibid) Substack: From Democracy to Democrazy/ Potential Holocaust.
In a separate post named The Jack Smith Report, I wrote: On November 9, 2016, just a few minutes after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, a man named Vyacheslav Nikonov approached a microphone in the Russian State Duma (their equivalent of the US House of Representatives) and made a very unusual statement. ‘Dear friends, respected colleagues!” Nikonov said. “Three minutes ago, Hillary Clinton admitted her defeat in US presidential elections, and a second ago Trump started his speech as an elected president of the United States of America, and I congratulate YOU on this’.” (Journalist Craig Unger talks about Russia, Trump, and “one of the greatest intelligence operations in history,” January 12, 2019.) All while Donald Trump is telling the American public that he has nothing to do with Russia - another lie. Substack: From Democracy to Democrazy/ The Jack Smith Report.
Trump won this past election due to American massive ignorance regarding Russian interference in our government, our beliefs, our elections, our economy, and on and on. Even the Mariott Hotels provides RT (Russian TV) as a cable choice to their patrons. It is all Russian propaganda.
The Mueller Report attempted to warn Americans about Trump and Russia - but William Barr , Trump's AG, successfully interceded and dismantled the impact of that factual information. It is my best guess that Barr or his family was threatened - either by Trump or the Russians.
During this past election, Fulton County, Georgia's polling sights received bomb threats. Many polls were temporarily closed. Brad Raffensperger, the Secretary of State, investigated and found that the bomb threats came from Russia. Fulton County is where Trump is supposed to be trialed for his attempt to overthrow the 2020 election. Trump's phone call to Raffensperger was taped where he asked Georgia to "just find 11,780 votes" so he could overthrow the election. Because this is a state case, and not a federal case - charges are still bending. This incident alone PROVES the relationship between Trump and Russia.
Yet most Americans do not get it. They want to blame Biden, the Dems, etc. for Trump's re-election. It is almost inconceivable to Republicans and most Americans that Trump is either cooperating with the Russians or is a Russian asset - BUT THIS IS THE TRUTH.
WAKE UP PEOPLE, Elizabeth Graham
Thank you Elizabeth! I am listening to you.
Biden accomplished so much with such thin margins. He could have done even more, but Manchin and Sinema ugh. And he will be rated higher in the future. In retrospect. Sad.
Biden faced the rarely discussed and hidden burden of an overall electorate too tired, fragmented, restricted and distracted to get engaged in government. The research on eligible voters is small. The media reports the highest turnout in decades, etc., but close to 90 million people, who are eligible to vote, did not. (election.lab.ufl.edu/voter-turnout/). Messaging is part of it, sure, but most of why people don't vote is systemic, structural and institutional. Reducing participation in voting has been a conservative ideological pillar since the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Biden can't fight 50+yrs of entrenchment alone. Strict ID laws, reduction in polling locations, fewer days for early voting, restrictions to mail-in voting, gerrymandering, workplace limitations, hidden financial burdens (soon to be citizenship requirements) - all add up to voter apathy and fewer people at the polls. Monopolized corporate local media covers legal/political issues less because they're competing with social media apps, instead of informing the electorate. We don't even know how much foreign influence factors into any of this. Candidates everywhere have to convince more and more people to register and vote during every cycle to overcome gerrymandered districts. When I start to see pieces on how government raises barriers to voting, how media hides the work of state legislatures, how work making ends meet keeps people disengaged, how the hidden costs of voting impact women and young people and minorities - then we MIGHT have a hope of re-prioritizing why government exists in the first place. I enjoy discussing the political circumstances around events., but our Constitution exists FOR Americans - the People. They've been ignored not just by the media and commentators, but in policy, law, and governance. (Luigi's popularity shows this.) Trump voters feel 'seen' because Rs media machines twist this alienation into racist tropes and 'easy fixes', in favor of Republicans. Dems (including Biden) failed to what FDR did and exploit it in the favor of the People and the changes they wanted, including accountability for Jan.6, the fake electors, Gaza, corporate accountability, etc. Biden's presidency was tragic because he didn't swing for the fences - when he had Congress - to bring basic, lasting democratic ideals to life for everyday people.
I completely disagree with this analysis.
You place too much blame on Biden, and don't seem to understand the big forces that have caused all incumbents around the world to be swept out, in the wake of the pandemic.
Nothing Biden could have done, could have worked, especially in light of the media being owned by oligarchs! Sure someone at The New York Times and someone at the Washington Post said he should resign – they have been working for the end of democracy for years now, it only became obvious during this election, somehow, and we have LEFT those newspapers to come here to read similar drivel.
At this point, we are quicker to jump off this kind of train. I'm not staying with this newsletter if this is all I'm going to be hearing.
There are bigger forces, the middle class has been doing horribly, the Democrats could not deliver for them, those people looked for "change."
It's not the "price of eggs:" we view them with derision at our downfall.
They don't even read the NYT so, but those who did may have begun to believe that maybe the Republicans would be fine to vote for.
Harris was not appealing to vote for, a large proportion of the population is not excited about abortion, we were fed lies, they were apologists for a genocide, they lost support from all sides, in part because they were in an impossible situation, and in part because the Democratic Party has been blocking good candidates like Bernie Sanders, in my humble opinion.
And they're getting ready to do more of the same, because the democratic party is stuffed with oligarchs that are just not quite as cruel as Trumps crew.
These are fair points, Myrto. We did do an entire piece just after the election headlined, "The global anti-incumbent backlash doomed Kamala Harris" that unpacks some of what you said. There were obviously a lot of factors involved in Trump's victory, but this piece was just meant to address a couple of the big political ones.
Thanks, yes, I have been following and joined as a paid subscriber (I think) before the election.
My concern is that blaming Biden means the Democratic Party doesn't have to make too many changes, and I think that's wrong but also would make me personally despair for all the people in our society who need a lot more help than they've been getting for the last 50 years.
Biden was always considered to be not very progressive, and of course he's preferable to Trump, but still someone that those of us in the progressive wing of the party were never particularly excited about.
Interesting we have that other piece about how many Democrats are profiting from their appointments, beating the market by large margins, suggesting some unfair practice. THAT is what we are talking about when we say that the Democratic Party needs to do more about fairness and the people that they keep saying they are trying to defend
The inflation spike, which really galvanized a lot of anti-Biden sentiment, was shown in a retrospective economic analysis to be much more attributable to the supply chain than to Biden’s stimulus checks. Sadly, information like this only comes in hindsight. Couple that with the common idea that someone is getting something they don’t deserve (thank you our Puritanical and racist history) and Republicans had the perfect wedge issue.
The problem stems from how the last three Democratic party candidate were chosen. With Hillary Clinton, there was no conversation of ideas except for Bernie. And he was roundly dismissed on prejudicial and superficial grounds. The Democratic establishment attacked any sense of populism under the rubric of socialism. Which is really too bad for a party that's been failing ever since.
In the 2020 race, once Jim Clyburn endorsed Biden in the South Carolina, the establishment once again jumped behind him. There were likely better candidates, but none were sufficiently aired publicly. Biden was the shoe-in running against a faltering narcissist. Biden did a good job in his term, but as Stephen Robinson says, he failed the most important test. Not only did he renege on promises to usher in a younger field of hopefuls, he reneged on his promise to hold only one term--which could have enabled him (with no reelection to lose) to marshall a full-on attack on Trump's prodigious lies and authoritarian bent, and blunt MAGA's racist inclinations. Instead he was timid in his messaging while creating strong legislation. Kamala Harris stood silently behind him until called to fix an obvious problem.
Let's hope that these last few episodes inform the leadership that the party of 1980s politics no longer works. Younger, more courageous Democrats must step forward*. We have a crisis at our feet!
*I can name five just off the top of my head.
I love this analysis!! Thank you, SER!
Thank you!
I am sorry, but you really can't talk about the Biden presidency and not mention the uncritical support of the Gaza genocide. They also refused to talk about climate change during the terrible North Carolina and Florida storms. This is why nobody I know under 35 voted for Biden, and as a Gaza protester and climate activist, I know plenty of those people. Biden and Harris totally mismanaged a winnable campaign by refusing to see that the base wanted change and they were offering the same old same old. Trump and his vile boys looked like change- and it is, just not the change the rubes were hoping for.
Gaza is mentioned in the piece
sorry! I am always moving too fast.
And what a thing. People didn't vote for Biden although Trump said again and again that he would support Israel much more vigorously than Biden.
I know lots of people under 35 who recognized that a vote for Biden was a much better thing for the United States and for Gaza than a vote for Trump. But we will all live in regret together.
Very, very, very, very tired of this demographic. They know everything, including how not to vote in their best interests.
Is it the demographic or the people who claim to speak for them? I know people of all ages who threatened on social media not to vote for Biden because of Gaza, encouraging cynicism and disaffection among others. It's a technique that's used time and again and so far has only benefitted Trump.
You’re right: it is the people who speak for them.
I actually held my nose and canvassed for Harris in NH. But, at the weekly Gaza protest organized by me and my partner, the mood was absolutely NO for Joe. One of my daughters, actually in her 40's, still claims that there is no moral difference between Biden and Trump. I have mixed feelings about that, due to Biden's total lack of compassion for the Palestinians, but also his past actions regarding Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill, but I do strongly feel that the country is in a much worse crisis under Trump, and heading for possible civil war or collapse.
And the young voters thought Trump would be better on Gaza and the climate?
Vote in haste; repent in leisure
Remember a circular firing squad is unlikely to illuminate the complexity of any issue we face today IMHO. While each of us have a valid view I appreciate, we might agree there is no single simple solution. (Again I could be wrong). I’m reminded of a movement in the 70s which suggested that reporting on scientific discoveries without explanation of the scientific process specifically involved could lead to confusion. As I watched ivermectin’s acceptance grow as a COVID cure I could see a firmly established gap in understanding. Research was carried out to prove it was no better than placebo. Even though extra effort was used to review any possible benefit none was found and the results were ignored.
In my opinion we have more than one thing to fix and we may need to do all of them.