Biden’s work was transformational
While many of you hate President Joe Biden, he came into office with the goal of being a transformational president, following in the footsteps of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Lyndon Baines Johnson. In 1936, Roosevelt gave his “Rendezvous with Destiny” speech at Franklin Field at the University of Pennsylvania. FDR believed government should be a companion and partner with the average American, contrasted with today’s GOP which believes government is the enemy “that must be drowned in a bathtub.” FDR said in his famous speech that day, “These economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America. What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power.” The rich get richer, while the poor get poorer. Not much has changed over the past 86 years.
Here we are today with many Republicans brainwashed by their right-wing propaganda to fly “Let’s Go Brandon” flags or bumper stickers on their pick-up trucks.
Curious as to what President Joe Biden has done to get your blood pressure raging?
Let’s see … first and foremost, the most important thing Biden did was defeat the orange monster. While most Democrats were thrilled Biden won, they were even more thrilled that democracy prevailed. Biden also won with the first female and black vice president.
Biden got us out of an endless war in Afghanistan. It didn’t go perfectly, but the end of a war never does. Anyone remember the helicopters on the rooftops in Saigon, Vietnam, in 1975?
Biden got Congress to pass a $1.2 trillion (with a “T”) bipartisan infrastructure package for the improvements of our roads, bridges, airports, public transportation, national broadband internet, water and energy. Every president in my lifetime has campaigned on improving our infrastructure, yet only Biden came through.
Biden passed a $1.9 trillion COVID relief package, which gave an additional $1,400 cash to almost every American, extended unemployment benefits, and put billions into COVID vaccinations. It also gave a temporary child tax credit of $250$300 per child. Kids are expensive. When you have a dual working family and one parent stays home with the baby, your family loses 50% of your family’s income and your expenses go up. This was huge to many workingclass families. Unfortunately, Sen. Manchin killed this after hearing that some of his West Virginia constituents were spending their child tax credits on drugs.
Biden appointed 41 federal judges in 2021, which was more than double the appointments of the former dude’s first year and Biden appointed the first Black female judge (Ketanji Brown Jackson) to the Supreme Court.
Biden recently passed the Inflation Reduction Act, the $370 billion bill to address global warming, allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices with the pharmaceutical industry for the first time and capping out-of-pocket prescription drugs at $2,000 per year for seniors. More importantly, it calls for a minimum 15% corporate tax. Now if only my federal tax rate could be this low.
Biden held together a NATO alliance and provided billions in assistance to Ukraine in their fight against the Russian invaders. Biden lobbied Congress to endorse the inclusion of Sweden and Finland into NATO. Biden also authorized the assassination of Ayman al-Zawahri, the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks.
All these accomplishments against the backdrop of two supposed Democratic Senators (Manchin and Sinema) dropping a monkey wrench in his goals. Also, with every Republican’s main goal of not making hundreds of Americans’ lives better, but to make sure one American (Biden) life is worse. I’m waiting for Biden to increase the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 to something more like a living wage.
I hope Biden doesn’t run for reelection in 2024. Like most Democrats, I’d prefer to see someone like Pete Buttigieg or Gov. GQ. Biden did his job and can now retire.