The calm at the center of the storm
Democrats are in turmoil, everyone, that is, except the Democrat at the center of things, President Joe Biden.
Sure that he is on track to administer another thrashing to Donald Trump this November, the president is serene – maybe too serene, to paraphrase movie westerns.
“He betrays no doubts,” writes the New Yorker’s Evan Osnos, whose profile of Biden appears in the magazine’s March 11 edition. “… He projects a defiant belief in himself and his ability to persuade Americans to join him.”
“I’ll beat [Trump] again,” the president vowed to Osnos.
Osnos also spoke to David Axelrod, the current CNN commentator who most famously whispered political advice into the protruding (yes, it’s true) ears of Barack Obama.
“You give me Biden’s record and take 15 years off of him, and this wouldn’t be a competitive race,” Axelrod said, taking note of Biden’s 81 years. “This is the barrier he has to overcome, and it’s a hard one because the march of time is immutable.”
Joe Biden is a very good, even perhaps a great, president of the United States. Consider, for argument’s sake: He ended Covid and masking and reopened the schools; he revived the economy, stabilized prices, and expanded health care coverage to more Americans than ever before; under his watch the United States is producing more energy than at any time in its energy-mad history.
Biden has called out Putin; he’s warned the Chinese about Taiwan; he’s reassured allies, resisted rashness, and, yes, he’s even restrained the Israelis. (Though it’s hardly noticeable, given the level of death and destruction in Gaza since the Hamas brutality of Oct. 7. This fact and Biden’s (now qualified) support for Israel poses a real political problem for the president in battleground Michigan and perhaps elsewhere.)
Responding to the imperatives of the moment, Biden backs a tough bipartisan border bill that was scuttled by far-right House Republicans who, listening to Trump, were for border security until they were against it. (Why help Biden? Trump argued. Why take the border away as a political issue? Republicans listened. The result: the border and immigration remain hot messes, impervious to solution and still subject to GOP incendiaries.)
Legislatively, the Biden microchip and infrastructure initiatives will, in time, help reshape America. Meanwhile, connecting all Americans, especially rural Americans, to the modern necessity of high-speed internet is well underway, thanks to “blue-collar” Biden.
Are there unsolved problems? Of course. Is the world dangerous? When hasn’t it been? Has Biden been perfect? Get real.
“The bad polls for President Joe Biden came one after the other this weekend,” reported Politico last Sunday.
The latest New York Times/Siena College poll placed Biden four points behind Trump in a head-to-head matchup.
Close to 50% of poll respondents said Biden’s age was “such a problem that he is incapable of handling the job of president.” Another 26% said the president was capable but “ineffective.” (Frankly, it’s hard to make sense of that finding. Skilled but unskilled? Able but inept?)
A CBS/YouGov poll found only 17% thought Biden was “healthy enough to serve as president.”
“I think that [Biden’s] health and age kind of get in the way of his ability to be a good president of the United States,” a Wisconsin woman told NBC News.
Americans have variously called Biden “incompetent” and bad on the economy. Joaquin Villanueva, a college professor from Minneapolis, offered a real head spinner: the president wasn’t doing enough to oppose another Trump term.
Oscar Rivera, 36, of Rochester, said, “It looks like we’re weak [under Biden]. We need someone stronger.”
Never mind that Biden’s bombing spree has stopped, at least for the moment, the Yemen-based, Iranian-backed, Red Sea-pirating Houthis. And that he favors a $60 billion military and humanitarian aid package for the Middle East and Ukraine. (The package is being held up by House Republicans.)
The New Yorker’s Osnos, having interviewed Biden before, took note of the president’s “thin and clogged” voice and his slowed gait. But sitting at his West Wing White House desk, Biden, “in our conversation … seemed unchanged. He never bungled a name or a date.”
While Biden is calm, Democrats are nervous. Was the president’s State of the Union performance enough to wash away the doubts? Yes, no, and maybe. What a strange animal this election season is.
Richard Robbins lives in Uniontown. He can be reached at dick.l.robbins@gmail.com.