Well, I don't consider avoiding the worst case outcome to be a win. By your line of reasoning, if progressives and far-right doomsayers had made you believe that 900 trillion in spending were coming, congressional Dems had introduced a bill proposing 60 trillion in new spending and it is then trimmed down to 17 trillion, that would have to be considered a "win" too.

But alright, I see how you consider the Biden admin to have 'exceeded expectations' in this regard. What about the other fields in which he has utterly failed though?

Covid - still not nearly under control. Just look at the current wave here in Europe to see what's coming to the Northern US in a couple of weeks.
Inflation, gas and commodity prices - running away and the admin is doing nothing to tackle it and instead fans the flames even further with its reckless spending programs.
Job market - needlessly krangled by the policies of this admin.
The border - a complete mess and disaster... and Biden wants it this way - otherwise, his admin wouldn't fight tooth and nail to prevent the court-ordered reinstatement of the MPP.
Afghanistan - worst execution of a withdrawal ever; the admin doesn't seem interested in addressing the utter failure of military leadership.
Good governance - has not materialized yet because the Dem party is too fractured and contains irreconcilable policy differences.
Uniting the country - doubling down on the ideology of Ibram Kendi and trying to smear every Republican (except for Cheney and Kinzinger) as an insurrectionist isn't exactly my definition of 'healing'.



Regarding the Obama admin: Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be someone who was a firm establishment conservative for much of the Obama years, but now (begrudgingly) supports Democrats because you consider the alternative (a trumpified GOP) to be even worse. Perhaps you're subconsciously more willing to cut the Biden admin some slack than the Obama admin.



Regarding Biden's presidency so far, I would say the feared 'big structural change which enshrines a Democratic majority for years' has not come to pass, but the admin has stayed notably below my expectations when it comes to day-to-day politics and traditional governing. I really did not expect the Biden admin to be this inept.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 1 2021 06:04am

Nothing in that quote is ordinary you are still just claiming untrue things like the last thread I saw you in where I had to simply stop replying. >_>

Yup. Biden is still POTUS. Sorry TiStuff and darkhead69.

Oh, I absolutely consider it a win because I don't like change. Slow, steady change that adapts to the modern world is my mantra. Yes, the Biden administration failed in a lot of ways...my point is that he failed less than Trump, Bush, Obama, etc. and I don't really see how that's a controversial statement unless you're willfully ignorant. Obama, for example, had a horrific Syria policy and he was responsible for the largest amount of Navy SEALs killed in the history of this country.

Anyway, let's go through your list:
1. Biden absolutely deserves blame for COVID still lingering because he hasn't acted decisively enough. The pressure from vaccine mandates are demonstrably working and it took him months to get to that point even though the position is very popular. I'm not sure you really care about that though since you support people like DeSantis and Florida ranks 8th in the country in terms of deaths per capita. He managed to pass to pass both Rhode Island and Massachusetts which were some of the hardest hit states in the initial wave. Personally, I think Biden should do what he can to ensure that the unvaccinated see higher health insurance premiums and denial of any COVID related coverage. Scarce resources should be reserved for people who act responsibly.
2. Jobs/Inflation: Laughable and this doesn't really deserve a response. The President will always unfairly take the blame for the state of the economy when the reality is that the Fed has orders of magnitude more control. To say that "reckless spending" that hasn't even happened yet is the cause of everything shows that you don't really grasp the supply chain issues. But I'm sure everything would be fine if Pete Buttigieg stopped breastfeeding his children.
3. Border: He owns it but this isn't a particularly important issue to me. Personally, I'd like to get to the root cause of the issues and I support state-sponsored assassinations of certain individuals in Central America.
4. Afghanistan: Lots of incompetence but after several hearings, it seems that a plurality of the blame for the current administration rests on the State Department. I think we should demand the resignation of certain senior officials there.
5. Good governance: Are you referring to executive agencies or leading on legislation?
6. Uniting the country: If you think that Biden is smearing every Republican as an insurrectionist, then YOU are part of the problem. He's obviously done no such thing but I'm beginning to rethink my position of safe spaces because I think many right wing individuals could benefit from them. Perhaps it's time to take a break from politics so you can come back to reality?

Bold #1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_median_age

I'm not sure we can blame DeSantis for that. It actually looks pretty normal considering the advanced age and population density of Florida. By the latter metric, Massachusetts doesn't really deserve any blame either.

Bold #2 - Voters elected Biden on the premise that he was a moderate. His administration has focused far too heavily on activist concerns re: immigration, culture war fights, and progressive legislation. His priorities are out of step with the voting public, which goes a long way towards explaining his very poor approval figures.

lol this turkey so TDS obsessed

Florida had one of the highest vaccine rates in the country at the time I believe. We should definitely dig into the data, but I suspect that old people were less of a factor in the number of deaths than you'd think. Once you leave the cities, Florida becomes incredibly trashy and there's a lot of obesity. A governor should have policies that promote the welfare of their constituents and he clearly failed in that regard. There's a reason why his approval rating dropped so much.

Do you really get the feeling that the Biden administration is focused on the culture war aspect of immigration? It seems like other culture war issues (i.e. abortion) are sucking the oxygen out of the room. Biden's spending policies are extremely popular and I don't think his approval rating has much to do with them. In addition, his spending policies need to get by legitimate moderates in the House/Senate given how thin the majorities are. People are pissed about costs and lack of supply of goods (and rightly so). You could throw the Delta variant in there as well but I think the salience of that has waned significantly. Until the supply chain issues are worked out, Biden's approval is going to be in the shitter.

I would say that this WT article gets the gist of it right. The Biden administration, and the Democratic party in general, are just out of step with what voters actually care about. "Nobody cares" can be a powerful rebuttal, but not when large tracts of the country actually care.



https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/nov/1/terry-mcauliffe-doesnt-live-in-the-same-world-as-v/

Most elites are out of touch. Anyone who works on policy, national security issues, etc. aren't going to feel the same way as the general population because they are either isolated from the issues or they understand that complexity of said issues. The best we can do is using polling to prioritize the agenda and try and shape the narrative as well. For example, most people couldn't care less about international affairs but it's a good thing we have China hawks, right?

I'm really not sure what to do if the population is easily led astray. Yes, crime is undoubtedly rising but it really is inconsequential compared to where we were even 10 years ago. What's the appropriate messaging there? Just give people graphs? The same principle applies to a wide range of "problem" issues and I think most them can be addressed with a little bit of kabuki theater and messaging. For example, take a look at what DeSantis did regarding the supply chain crisis. All he did was say "Hey our ports our open!" and that did the trick! He knows that it's not economically feasible to do that but playing the game is necessary. I think the Biden administration has done a pretty poor job in that regard.

"The issue are not elites who not only fail to address the issues of everday citizens, but can't even be bothered to try - no, the problem are the gullible masses who have unrealistic expectations. Too bad that the plebs are too stupid and uninformed to realize that the issues they care about are either imaginary or unsolvable. They should just suck it up and be quiet."