Fake news about Biden and meat goes viral 1:53
(CNN) -
President Joe Biden's "radical" idea is that government is not the problem in America, but the multibillion-dollar solution that can end the pandemic, balance the economy and improve the lives of millions of workers.
By commemorating his first 100 days in office Wednesday night with a speech at a joint session of Congress, Biden will seize what may be a once-in-a-generation opportunity in the midst of deep crisis to change the trajectory of the country.
The president is not a passionate ideologue, but his goal goes beyond defeating covid-19 and the huge labor crisis it caused.
He is bringing activism and ambition to address inequality in an economy that is doing poorly for millions of citizens.
I'm not trying to punish anyone.
But damn it, maybe it's because I come from a middle-class neighborhood, I'm sick and tired of ordinary people being scammed, ”he said at the White House last week.
Biden's silent radicalism is expressed through a huge pandemic rescue bill, a broader proposal that redefines the concept of infrastructure and a massive health and childcare plan. It's an agenda that holds that the government can still solve national problems, 40 years after an era-defining Republican president put forward the opposite conclusion.
In his inauguration speech in January 1981, Ronald Reagan declared that "government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem."
The 40th President's arsenal of income and capital gains tax cuts for the wealthy, a state contraction, and the destruction of regulations was itself a reaction to previous social changes by Democratic Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson.
Reagan's philosophy fueled years of unbridled capitalism that helped widen economic inequalities that two subsequent Democratic presidents struggled to correct.
advertising
Timothy Naftali, a presidential historian at New York University, says Biden is not consumed by ideology, but sees an opportunity to expand his governing coalition in a way that former President Donald Trump refused to do.
"President Biden has tried to speak over the heads of Washington's elite, which is deeply partisan, and say, 'Look, I think I understand you better than Washington and I think you're more interested in results than being. ideologically pure, '”Naftali said.
“The federal government has some advantages;
it has comparative advantages in dealing with crises.
He is using them to restore a healthier relationship between the American people and their federal government. "
Biden hardly goes to extremes.
But it's still Reaganomy in reverse: He plans to pay off his plans with a modest increase in the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% and with higher taxes on capital gains and higher income.
Biden government announces operation to combat human trafficking, including border trafficking
Republicans think they can label Biden a radical and provoke a backlash
Republicans, however, see a radical, and not in a good way.
They are capitalizing on the cost and size of the president's ambition, portraying him as an extreme liberal, hoping to sow a backlash that will tip them to Congress in the midterm elections.
If they can solidify the idea that Biden has overstepped and campaigned as a moderate but ruled as a radical, they could prosper, as voters often use midterm elections to alter a course set in the previous race for the House. White.
"It is clear that Democrats intend to pursue a radical agenda full of left-wing priorities with the full support of President Biden," Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida said in February.
Last week, Republican West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey used the 'r' word again when threatening to sue Biden if he uses executive power to meet America's global emissions commitments because he cannot pass the plan in Congress.
"President Biden's promise that the United States wants to achieve radical, transformative and too rapid reductions in carbon emissions and carbon emissions by the end of the decade is a colossal domestic and foreign policy blunder of epic proportions," said Morrisey. .
Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the second Senate Republican, clarified the strategy Tuesday when he admitted that Biden could be linked, but predicted the president's approach would backfire.
"This is a very, very liberal and expansive approach of the government," Thune told CNN's Manu Raju.
"I think at some point parts of it may be popular, but when they start paying for it, I think it will be unpopular very quickly."
Republicans have struggled since the presidential campaign to portray Biden, a classic centrist Washington Democrat for 50 years, as some kind of angry socialist who wants to overthrow American society.
As a white and elderly man, Biden is a tough target for Trump-loving conservatives, who like to portray racially diverse Democrats as a threat to what they see as Anglo-Saxon cultural traditions.
And the radicalization in American politics is currently not in the Oval Office but in a Republican base awash in conspiracy theories, which believes in Trump's lies about voter fraud and has all but given up on American democracy.
US Capitol police officer reportedly told units to only monitor 'anti-Trump' protesters on January 6
Progressives back Biden's first 100 days
The breadth of Biden's ambition has been disguised by the restraint of his character.
He does not seem to feel the need to dominate the nation's psyche, a substantial departure from the antics of Trump, who built a presidency in the image of his volcanic temper.
While Biden's detailed plan to tilt the economy toward less well-off Americans has surprised many in Washington, perhaps it shouldn't have - it was a constant theme in his campaign. He has written an entire political career with fables of his own working-class origins in an effort to lift up working-class and middle-class Americans.
But when House Republican No. 3, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, and Democratic Progressive Champion Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York agree that Biden is more progressive than anticipated, something is happening. clearly. The president ran to the right of Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts in the Democratic primary, but both warmly praised the scope of his policies.
At times, the president has shown a boldness that plays on the idea that he is quite radical.
He came out in favor of Derek Chauvin's conviction for the murder of George Floyd hours before the jury returned, drawing criticism from judicial purists and conservatives, but voicing the emotions of millions of blacks who helped him. win the presidency.
Biden also plans to end America's involvement in the war in Afghanistan by September 11.
Both Trump and President Barack Obama promised to do the same, but ultimately resisted.
But Biden has also been careful not to be seen as more extreme than the centrist bloc of voters he courted last year.
In fact, it bogged down liberal demands to expand the size of the Supreme Court by imposing a non-binding presidential commission.
And he has made no secret of his distaste for dismantling the 60-vote Senate filibuster, although it's hard to see how he can pass his boldest plans without doing so.
How Biden is different from Franklin Roosevelt
The size of Biden's projects, however, is surprising.
The covid rescue plan cost US $ 1.9 trillion.
Its infrastructure plan, which provides billions for items like home health care, as well as creaky roads and bridges, is worth about $ 2.2 trillion.
And an American Family Plan, which he will feature in his Wednesday night speech, is valued at $ 1.8 trillion.
For one topic, child care, Biden has already pledged billions of dollars in his infrastructure plan and covid aid package.
It is expected to include new funding for child care, universal pre-kindergarten, expanded tax credits, and paid family and medical leave in the family plan.
It is seeking $ 400 billion for home care for elderly and sick Americans, funds that would not normally be expected to be included in an infrastructure bill.
The president has paved the way for such generosity by presenting himself as a repairman who is using the government to restore a semblance of normal life to the country.
Now he is implicitly arguing that it is time to change the same methodology to solve other problems, siding with Roosevelt, whom Reagan admired as a young man but ended up disowning with his sharp turn to the right.
ANALYSIS |
The two simple principles on which Biden based his first 100 days as president
This is where Biden is often compared to Roosevelt, who took office at a time of deep crisis and then went on to reshape the American economy and the social safety net.
Biden, however, does not have Roosevelt's massive majorities in Congress.
"The message is one of very energetic activism on the part of the president to address the crisis in question, which of course is what Roosevelt also did," said Ellen Fitzpatrick, a history professor at the University of New Hampshire.
“I think the level of activism on Biden's part is very, very remarkable.
His ambition is great.
Its success may be more doubtful.
But I think this change in tone is important in itself.
Speech