Exactly who is Joseph R. Biden?

Joe Biden has spent so long not being donald Trump during his presidential campaign, Americans can be forgiven for wondering just who it is Supreme Court Justice John roberts swore in as commander in chief on Wednesday.

It may be a while before they get the answer, given that Biden will soon celebrate his 50th year in Washington yet still provokes the question. He’s not known for soaring rhetoric or towering vision: the bulk of his inaugural address was a heartfelt plea for Americans to stop hating one another. u.s. networks seeking an inspiring moment largely fixed not on the president, but on Amanda Gorman, the exhilarating 22-year-old who recited a poem she wrote overnight after watching the Capitol being ransacked.

Biden’s first hours in office were dedicated not to his own agenda but to reversing his predecessor’s. In a slew of executive orders and directives he started steps to rejoin the Paris climate accord, stop building the border wall with Mexico, cancel the Keystone pipeline and end the so-called Muslim travel ban — though u.s. restrictions on travel during the COVID pandemic largely render that last act moot.

So who is Joe Biden and what’s he going to do? The man has policies, lots of policies, but you’d be hard put to pick one that could be defined as Bidenesque, or that hasn’t been floated by others before him. Of 45 previous presidents only Lyndon B. Johnson could challenge his depth of experience as a legislator, yet voters resisted his two earlier bids for the job, finding him … to put it kindly … uninspiring. Johnson quit after five years as president, exhausted by the Vietnam conflict; Biden, at 78 and already looking creaky, may have only a single term to make his mark.

Canadians are already getting a flavour of what to expect. A key Biden priority is to restore u.s. stature, reassure allies it can be trusted as a friend and mend the many wounds Trump left behind. His decision to make Prime Minister Justin Trudeau his first call as leader demonstrates his appreciation of Canada’s importance as a friend and ally. yet the call comes after he rejected Ottawa’s pleas to hold off on cancelling the Keystone XL pipeline, a move that will cost jobs and do nothing to impact climate change but appeases party activists and anti-oil zealots. Biden got in trouble for pledging to “transition from the oil industry,” in much the same way Trudeau was attacked for suggesting Canada “phase out” the oilsands.

Biden likes to boast that, as a senator, he introduced the first bill on climate change “way, way back in ‘87.” But what’s he got to show for it? The Obama administration he served as vice-president never embraced a carbon tax; it did try for a us$10 per barrel tax on oil, but couldn’t get it past republicans. A planned cap-and-trade initiative also foundered. Biden agrees with Trudeau that the economy and the environment are “completely and totally connected,” and aims to make the u.s. “the world’s clean energy superpower,” but so do Canada, Britain, Germany and a host of other aspirants. As with virtually every Western leader, Biden is keen on pressing motorists to buy electric vehicles, but despite years of hoopla, plug-in vehicles still represent a tiny percentage of sales and aren’t about to stop any ice caps from melting.

If Trump had a claim to success it was the strength of the economy before the coronavirus arrived. He achieved it by slashing regulations and taxes, pouring money into the economy at the cost of a burgeoning debt. Biden says he’ll undo the cuts and raise corporate rates, similarly pouring the money into the economy while the debt, in all likelihood, continues to rise. Whether his approach proves as effective as Trump’s remains to be seen, but it will again appease the left wing of his party, which has to be kept at bay if he hopes to please the moderate wing that is his natural home. Trump insisted markets would collapse should Biden enter the White House, but Wall Street has had two months to panic and has instead concentrated on setting new records. Much of his spending is targeted for big infrastructure projects, a sure way to make investors happy.

Biden is a man chasing the middle ground in a country increasingly ranged along the edges of rival extremes. “We must end this uncivil war that pits red against blue, rural versus urban, conservative versus liberal,” he implored on Wednesday. He could have added “and race against race.” He has moved swiftly on that front, if optics count for anything. Vice-president Kamala Harris’s parents were from India and Jamaica; Biden’s appointees have been a careful mix of colours, genders and ethnicities: the first Black nominee for defence secretary, with the first female to serve in the role of deputy; the first female Treasury secretary; the first Latino — and first immigrant — to head Homeland Security; a gay Secretary of Transportation. Even the inaugural entertainment was carefully considered: a young Black poet, a Latino superstar, a republican country singer and of course Lady Gaga, who is difficult to categorize.

Longtime aides might say the mix of care, caution and careful consideration are very Joe Biden. After five decades in Washington he’s not about to change his spots. Given his age and the array of crises he faces, it’s unlikely he’d get the chance anyway.

CANADIANS ARE ALREADY GETTING A FLAVOUR OF WHAT TO EXPECT.