President Joe Biden on Inauguration Day. (Photo via Creative Commons)
In a talk he gave between the election and the Inauguration, Joe Biden thanked health-care workers on the front lines of COVID-19. He empathized with families who have lost loved ones, as well as the many others “who have fallen on hard times, through no fault of your own.”
Biden is not a lunatic. He is not a despicable human being. That this should be a cause for celebration shows how far the bar’s been lowered.
Biden gave some straight talk about the pandemic and what the nation must do about it. He predicted—accurately, it turns out—that “our darkest days in the battle against COVID are ahead of us, not behind us.” He urged everyone to “mask up, stay socially distanced, avoid large gatherings, particularly inside,” as a good leader should. He said he expected Democrats and Republicans would work together to get the nation vaccinated and address the suffering of people in need.
Welcome to the Biden era. It’s so nice to be here. What a relief it is to hear decency and coherence from the nation’s chief executive. Around this same time, the defeated Donald Trump was raging like a mad King Lear, seriously discussing whether he should declare martial law, trying to coerce state elections officials into criminal conduct, and actively plotting and encouraging an assault on the Capitol. The violence and division he has fomented will burn long after his reign. His casual incompetence has cost tens of thousands of lives, and his infectious disregard for truth will poison the nation’s politics for decades.
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. is, by all appearances, a different story. The nation’s forty-sixth President is not a lunatic. He is not a despicable human being. That this should be a cause for celebration shows how far the bar’s been lowered.
But there is something else that Biden is not: a true progressive. He is a mainstream corporate Democrat with a commitment to compromise. As a U.S. Senator and Vice President under Barack Obama, he was something of a hawk. While he opposed funding for the Nicaraguan contras in the 1980s and voted against the first Gulf War in 1991, Biden supported the war in Afghanistan, the disastrous U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, at least initially, and even put in a good word for Britain’s 1982 war in the Falkland Islands.
As a candidate, Biden assured wealthy donors that “nothing would fundamentally change” if he were elected. When Biden was attacked for suggesting he would end the earth-scarring excavation of fossil fuels known as fracking, his running mate, Kamala Harris, pointedly set the record straight: “Joe Biden will not end fracking, he has been very clear about that.” The American Petroleum Institute responded with glee: “No exceptions, no qualifiers. Fracking can go ahead on private lands and areas under federal control.” It’s a wonder the writer didn’t use an exclamation point.
The problem with such equivocation is that this nation needs to end fracking, as soon as possible. It needs fundamental change in how the economy is structured and run. It needs bold and even radical ideas that happen to make sense—things like single-payer health care, a $15 national minimum wage, forgiveness of student debt, nuclear disarmament, a refocusing of law enforcement resources, a less belligerent foreign policy, and a humane and sane approach to immigration.
All of these ideas were lost causes under Trump but are at least possibly attainable under Biden. This would take a concerted push from the left—which, actually, is in pretty good shape these days, thanks to the infrastructure of opposition that has grown and strengthened under Trump, from Black Lives Matter, to the Fight for $15, to the movements for immigrant and voter rights. There are networks of activists across the country eager to continue the fight now that change is possible.
Biden has shown a willingness to admit when he’s been wrong, as with his vote for George W. Bush’s war in Iraq. He has been open to big ideas, especially with regard to fighting climate change. What’s needed, as the Reverend Jesse Jackson has counseled, is a plan to “create millions of jobs while addressing the climate crisis with a focus on energy efficiency and renewable energy. Biden should describe the program in bold strokes and summon the Congress to meet the challenge.”
The Biden Administration represents an opportunity that progressives have not had since the Obama Administration—and remember how that turned out. Much of Obama’s promise and potential was not realized, both because of the sort of antipathy from Republicans that Biden is sure to also face and because Obama was not effectively pushed in a progressive direction. Joe Biden presents us with another chance.