this post was submitted on 24 Jan 2024
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Well, for me I actually quite like Biden. His Israel stance and protectionist economic policies are largely the only real policy positions he has that I disagree with him on, and he has done an exceptional job of accomplishing his stated policy goals within an extremely difficult and toxic political environment.
Here's some food for thought: The last time the democrats had a solid hold on the federal govt with a filibuster proof majority in congress, we got the affordable care act. Ever since that term, the dems have been hamstrung by the GOP and rogue DINOs like Manchin and Sinema.
I don't think there's any "controlled opposition" conspiracy. If there's a group to blame here the most, it's the American media for pretending that the reason dems don't get anything done is anything other than obstructionism and "both sides are bad hurr durr" rhetoric.
I'm not claiming there is a secret cabal of evil doers conspiring to ruin everything. But the interests of the rich all align and so they are all largely working towards the same thing. Having money in politics corrupts every single person in it, though to varying degrees. Both sides are very clearly bad. But also very clearly not to the same degree. I agree that Biden has done a lot that is good. But his whole platform is attempting to maintain status quo and while I haven't mentioned this before, my main concern is climate change.
Climate change is going to FUCK everyone. It is already and there is virtually no time to daudle about with half measures and false promises. There have been policies that claim to help and may even attempt to in good faith but they are consistently coopted or corrupted by lobbiests before being implemented or circumvented after. There needs to be strong, decisive action taken to reign in carbon emissions and not just do carbon offsets because carbon offsets are never going to solve this problem. All they do is delay actual action. The main reason I am so fucking angry with Biden is because he's fucking ancient and simply doesn't feel the same urgency as someone who will actually live with the consequences of the recklessness and stupidity of fossil fuels companies.
Everything he has tried to do with regards to this only ends up enriching companies further or passing the blame off to the poor of the country who have no other options than to use fossile fuels. I want someone who will take these oil oligarchs (Oiligarchs is something I saw once and it made me chuckle) to task and actually reign in their insane greed and violence against the natural world. He would and could never even dream of actually doing so. No one the DNC would ever allow to be the candidate would.
There is literally no time left to enact action but here we are twiddling our thumbs while Republicans debate whether Texas should secede for some insane reason. It's all distraction. I'm pissed the fuck off at it all and the ineffectiveness of liberal policy. They are all meek cowards who only exist to lose against the Republicans and then shrug and claim "well at least we tried. :( "
What could Biden have feasibly done other than what he's already done in regards to climate change?
The free market already knows that the fossil fuel industry is rapidly dying, as evidenced by the fact that renewable energy is now the cheapest option for building out new power gen and oil companies have been diversifying away from oil for years now. Don't be surprised if you see Shell building offshore wind farms instead of oil drilling platforms soon.
He's included absolutely massive amounts of funding for renewable projects in the infrastructure bills that have been passed. Enough so that I expect the entire energy landscape of the US to look totally different within the decade. It can't be overstated how big of deal this is, and realistically, this is the most effective climate action he could have taken that wouldn't get stonewalled by republican obstructionism.
Re. fossil fuels and poor people, he's done a good job of both not handing more power to the fossil fuel corps while also not hamstringing the industry and subsequently jacking up the price of energy and transportation across the board. As much as I'd like to ditch fossil fuels, enacting policy that would jack gas prices into the double digits before we're ready to switch by gutting the fossil fuels industry would be political suicide.
Sure, a lot of the legislation he's passing hands money to wealthy corporations. Somebody has to build the infrastructure to get us off fossil fuels after all. That doesn't mean it isn't also improving the world around us at a pace faster than any president in recent history, and being in a position that Biden is bringing us to is a much more stable platform to build real social and economic change off of. There will be no need for a messy revolution if we can incrementally design and build systems that handle the issues we face in a level headed, evidence based fasion.
A giveaway to corporate America and they arrogantly decided not to codify Roe v. Wade. And don't forget, this was right after the financial crash and not one person from Wall Street went to jail over any of that shit.
It's a hell of a lot more than anything the republicans have done for me in my lifetime. I certainly wouldn't call it a giveaway to corporate america, they fought tooth and nail to try and keep anything even close to the ACA from passing. Is it an ideal system? No, but at least I can get a reasonable insurance package while un or self employed now, and that's a huge deal for the economic mobility of the masses.
Diverting any of the efforts that went into passing the ACA to stuff like codifying roe v wade or staging a big crackdown on wallstreet most likely would have ended up with the ACA getting axed. That's why we need to get the dems to have a secure position as the controlling party so they can focus on longer term goals and hammer the right wingers into irrelevancy. If we can get there, I'd hope to see the dems split into a liberal and leftist party so that way we can argue about which way we want to make progress happen instead of desperately trying to make any progress happen at all.
Buddy, I'm not content with "better than Republicans". The Republicans are getting worse every year and Democrats are happy to follow closely behind.
You're free to believe that. I believe they intentionally dragged it out specifically so they wouldn't have to deliver anything else. Because most Democrat politicians are pro-corporate trash who are enabling the drift into fascism if not outright facilitating it.
You shouldn't be content with just "better than Republicans" that's how we get progress. That said, I still think you're overstating how bad the democrats are. Yes, on some issues, they fold to corporate pressures and I'm not happy about that. In many other areas they are hamstrung by obstructionism and having to appeal to a big tent voter base; this is unavoidable until the republican party becomes irrelevant and the dems can split. There are plenty of areas however where they're making incredible progress, here's a list of stuff that the Biden admin has done just in 2023: https://www.reddit.com/r/WhatBidenHasDone/comments/11lohnc/what_biden_has_done_year_three_year_one_two_are/
44 Democrat senators politicians and Joe Biden acted with lightning speed to block the rail strike. Meanwhile Biden has enlisted Yellen and Powell to go to war with American Workers. Fuck Joe Biden.
Respectfully, go fuck yourself. If you genuinely don't think this is bad then you and I are not on the same side. Good luck in 2024 Elect your procorporate trash candidate all on your own.
I will, thanks :)