Editor's Note:
Julian Zelizer, a CNN political analyst, is a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University and the author of the book "Burning the House: Newt Gingrich, the Fall of a President and the Rise of the New Republican Party."
Follow him on Twitter @julianzelizer.
The opinions expressed in this comment are yours.
See more opinion at cnee.com/opinion.
(CNN) -
President-elect Joe Biden is trying to start his road running.
Even before his January 20 inauguration, Biden has announced a US $ 1.9 trillion stimulus plan, a massive list of decrees that will overturn President Donald Trump's most controversial decisions, and an immigration reform proposal to provide a path to citizenship for 11 million people.
While Trump was more interested in building a wall, Biden hopes to build new communities for citizens.
With Washington in a state of military blockade, the pandemic increasing in all states and an impeachment trial soon in the Senate, the president-elect wastes no time.
LOOK: ANALYSIS | Biden era draws in after Trump's lies and insurrection
As a veteran of national politics, Biden understands that the most valuable asset for any new president is time.
His sense of urgency is reminiscent of another highly experienced president with a deep political background: Lyndon B. Johnson.
Upon assuming the presidency in November 1963 after the tragic assassination of John F. Kennedy, Johnson set a timetable for his closest advisers, including Bill Moyers, and impressed them with how quickly he wanted to open his window to move forward.
Johnson was clutching a notepad with a truncated diary filled with handwritten columns from months running from November to 1968. Johnson's message was that he was about a year and a half before by-election politics kicked in and their chances of legislating will begin to wane.
"Bill, I've been calculating how long we would have to do what we want to do," Moyers recalled Johnson saying.
“I really intend to end the Franklin Roosevelt revolution… In an ideal world… We would be between 110 months and 144 months… I will never get that far, of course, so suppose we have to do it all in 1965 and 1966, and probably in 1966 we lose our big margin in Congress.
That means that in 1967 and 1968 there will be an incredible fight.
Biden hopes to convey the same message at a time of greater urgency.
Even as many Democrats wonder how he will make any progress as the Senate handles impeachment charges and while Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is confident he will be able to obstruct, the president-elect will not be blocked.
Biden's goal is to reverse the damage Democrats believe Trump has inflicted.
Through executive action, he plans to end the travel ban in several predominantly Muslim countries and rejoin the Paris climate accord on his first day in office.
It will also do what Trump refused to do to combat the pandemic, including a mandatory face mask order on federal property and interstate travel and work to reunite separated families at the US-Mexico border.
Biden's stimulus plan would provide the kind of economic assistance to states and localities, worth $ 350 billion, that Republicans have blocked and seeks to move toward a bold immigration plan that undoes the era of restrictionism.
Biden's plan is to stabilize society
Unlike other famous first 100 days, such as those of FDR in 1933, Biden's plan is primarily aimed at reversing the policy direction of his predecessor and stabilizing society from the pandemic rather than embarking on a fundamentally new path that remakes public policy.
However, under the circumstances, the plan is extremely ambitious.
In addition to the decrees and legislation, the biggest problem in the coming months is an implementation problem.
There, Biden has also shown that he will not be passive.
His incoming administration has promised to vaccinate 100 million people in 100 days.
He is working to open new vaccine centers and has said he will use the Defense Production Law to increase vaccine distribution.
If Biden works to put this agenda in motion, Trump's impeachment in the Senate would not stifle Biden's first 100 days.
With the Senate doing the heavy lifting, the trial and the vote will allow Democrats to achieve some degree of accountability.
There is even the possibility that a sufficient number of Republicans could reach conviction.
The strategy will not be easy.
Biden will inevitably come under fire for using the same type of executive action that Trump was criticized for.
Although the Republicans have lost control of the Senate, Senator Mitch McConnell still has immense power if his group stays together and the Democrats do not abandon filibuster.
The fury and anger of Trump's loyal base, part of the Republican Party, will loom large.
And Biden must lead in a world where the conservative media continues to pitch conspiracy theories and smears as it goes.
But Biden's effort to start over could work.
The nation may be in crisis, but he will not act like a trapped president.
The most important power of the president in the early days is to set the agenda: to set the issues to be debated and to push Congress toward the issues that he wants discussed.
While President Gerald Ford tried to end "our long national nightmare" by forgiving President Richard Nixon for the crimes he might have committed, Biden is taking a different path.
It is trying to reset the political agenda, lift us out of our national lockdown, and go back to the period when we had ambitions to make this a more welcoming and engaged nation, one that works to slow climate change, to open up improved world markets, and to get us out of the world that has created covid-19.
