Let me know when we get universal healthcare, the federally protected right to abortion, equal pay across race and gender, federally protected rights for lgbtq folks, federal legalization for cannabis, and all the other things progressives have been demanding for decades…
If I’m wrong and I don’t know how it works, what about the people running the party who made those promises?
Or are you saying I don’t know how it works, because I should have known they were lying to voters? I missed that moderate argument, is it coming back?
I’m not going to defend the claim that all they need is fifty senators and the Oval Office to pass sweeping regulatory changes. I don’t know who said that, but they should be called out for lying. It wasn’t true then and it isn’t true now. The most that can be said for fifty senators is that it gives them enough of a majority (with the Vice President) to set the agenda. It doesn’t stop Republicans from obstructing the way they have been for over two decades, and it doesn’t force the Republican-led House to pass bills that progressives want.
Someone is lying to you. Democrats do their share, but at least they’re not actively trying to make your life worse the way Republicans are. Biden’s policy and legislative record as President are far more impressive than anyone expected, and the author of this piece outlines how and why. I’m sorry if that’s not enough for you, but politics is the art of what’s possible. For fantasy, try Anne Rice.
Yeah, the moderates running the party… They lied to all of us.
No idea how you forgot about that, it was only a few years ago.
It doesn’t stop Republicans from obstructing the way they have been for over two decades, and it doesn’t force the Republican-led House to pass bills that progressives want.
Damn bro, you forgot Biden saying they were only like that with Obama and once Biden became president all his old republican friends would magically do a 180?
He called Mitch McConnell “an old friend” last week, have you forgotten that too?
Yes, Biden lied to you. He’s not perfect. He’s not a saint. I’m not defending anyone’s lies. I’m asking you to acknowledge reality instead of insisting that everything be exactly the way you want it to be the instant you want it. There are things he can’t do, whatever he said during the campaign season. Educated voters know how to parse through campaign promises to assess what’s possible versus what the alternatives will be.
Biden has been a neoliberal shill for most of his political career, in bed with corporate interests. I’ve never been a fan of him. That’s what makes me so surprised that he’s done as well as he has. He’s still handing freebies out to his corporate masters, and I’m not going to praise him for that. But he’s also done an extraordinary amount of good for the entire nation, and it doesn’t compromise my integrity to acknowledge that as well.
Seriously, this black-or-white thinking isn’t how the adult world works. Stop throwing tantrums because you didn’t get the lollipop you were promised.
It addresses in a large part of how the government works and why the person I’m responding to doesn’t understand why Biden can’t just govern by fiat. A concept that a depressing number of people in these comments seem to be ignorant of or purely dismissive.
The problem with governing by fiat is what happens when the opposition gets their turn. It’s how Republicans want to run the country, and it’s not doing us any favors.
We’re seeing state legislatures all over the country ignore the courts to prevent democracy in their domains. The court can’t actually do anything. Biden could tell them to fuck off, abolish student debt, and they’d be powerless.
So you want Democrats to discard the rule of law the way Republicans do, giving Republicans the win at destroying our government so they can replace it with private interests? Seriously?
Yes. I do not care about “the rule of law” if all it does is make my life worse and the capitalists can ignore it whenever convenient. It has no value to me.
One of the biggest battles for republicans, that of ending bodily autonomy, was achieved under Biden. How is that not a better example of republicans winning than whatever you’re trying to say with your link? (I didn’t read it, not sorry)
Because that was a product of the Trump administration getting to replace three Supreme Court Justices and tipping the balance toward conservative extremism. It wasn’t something Biden did, it’s something he couldn’t prevent and not relevant to the topic.
But he could have prevented it. He could have appointed more judges. He could have pushed a legal case. He could have declared the court’s process of judicial unconstitutional, which it obviously is.
How about this: why doesn’t he enforce the rule of law on the Republicans who flout it? He’s in charge of the justice department and could charge the politicians blatantly ignoring the court that he says must be respected. If he believed that, shouldn’t he prosecute the state Republicans ignoring the SCs order to create new district maps? We would accept the legitimacy of the “rule of law” much more readily if it were actually applied consistently.
The gerrymandered house and the gerry-landed Senate make this impossible. Put whatever candidate you want to replace Biden. The results will be the same or worse.
We can't even fill basic pentagon positions thanks to "Coach." But Biden should have unilaterally fixed everything. Sure.