What lessons can be learned from the Biden Administration?

[VBM]

Unfortunately, it is undeniable that most people consider the Biden Administration to be a total failure. What caused this, and what lessons can future administrations learn from this one?

[Hermit For Peace]

Unfortunately, it is undeniable that most people consider the Biden Administration to be a total failure. What caused this, and what lessons can future administrations learn from this one?

Would you care to express how the Biden Admin is a failure?

[ProgressiveModerate]

I disagree with the notion it's a total failure, though there have been some failures within it.

My main one would be to be more assertive in any legistlative agenda you want rather than letting "due process" work until time runs out. Also, try and diversify your speech pattern, I think Biden's repition can give the optics he really doesn't care about an issue even though at first it really defined much of his character and got him a lot of positive media and feelgood vibes.

[Darthpi – Anti-Florida Activist]

I disagree with the notion it's a total failure, though there have been some failures within it.

My main one would be to be more assertive in any legistlative agenda you want rather than letting "due process" work until time runs out. Also, try and diversify your speech pattern, I think Biden's repition can give the optics he really doesn't care about an issue even though at first it really defined much of his character and got him a lot of positive media and feelgood vibes.

Agree with this general sentiment. Biden's administration shouldn't be condemned as a failure yet, but it is also very troubling to see the lack of urgency to address major problems given the state of the country, and if nothing is done to change course then it could easily come to be viewed by most Americans as a failed presidency.

[MarkD]

Let's make a campaign promise to appoint a bipartisan commission that will study ways to reform the Supreme Court. Once we're elected, we keep the promise and we do appoint a bipartisan commission to study ways to reform the Supreme Court. After the commission has spent approximately six months studying various ideas for reforming the Court, such as imposing term limits, expanding the size of the Court, adopting legislative alterations that would affect the power of the Court to exercise judicial review, and implementing procedural reforms, the commission ends up publishing a book over 270 pages long that discusses the pros and cons of all of these ideas. Then, after the publication of that book, the President does absolutely nothing at all to try to persuade Congress to implement any of the ideas discussed in that book, which only goes to show that appointing the commission in the first place was a BIG, FAT, WASTE OF TIME, EFFORT, and MONEY!!!
The lesson I learned from this was that voting for Biden was a waste of my vote.

[Damocles]

Know when it’s time to put your foot down and force the issues at hand. Own the media coverage, take pride in your administration’s achievements, don’t apologize for implementing the policies you promised you would, and force your political opposition to play defense, instead of compromising before you ever actually initiate negotiations.

Exploit the power of sternness and silence when it calls for it. Let your hair down a bit and have a bit of humor when something unexpected or frivolous happens. Use rage very sparingly. Be generally affable, conscientious, and humble.

[PSOL]

Vittorio was 90% in the right, 7% misdirected

[GeneralMacArthur]

I don't think there is any lesson.  We're just completely screwed.  People are really stupid, and Biden basically rolled snake eyes as far as random events happening in his presidency, what with COVID lingering on through endless mutations, the economy headed south, Russia invading Ukraine, China doing this absurd zero-covid strategy that's screwed up all the supply chains, and right-wing populists getting elected all around the globe.

Biden has handled all this stuff as best one can, but nobody wants to give him any credit for it.  The knives are all out for Biden as basically everyone has their own agenda and their own reason to be against him.

Take the above posts for example.  I could ask "what sense of urgency is he missing?  what do you want him to do?"  or "how is he a failure?" but it's just the same conversation again and again and again.  Here's how it goes:

"How is Biden a failure?"
"He hasn't responded with the appropriate sense of urgency to the issues of our time."
"What issue has he failed to address reasonably?"
"{literally any issue}"
"Did you know about the executive actions Biden has taken to address that issue?"
"No, but those don't count because they're not enough, he needs to do more to show he actually cares."
"OK, well what things would you like him to do."
"{list of things that aren't in the powers of the presidency}"
"OK, those are all things that need to come from Congress, the constitution doesn't delegate those powers to the president."
"Well, Biden needs to step up and be a leader, he should tell Congress what to do."
"Did you listen to Biden's State of the Union address or read any of the different things he's asked Congress to do, or listen to any of the speeches where he called on Congress to do things?"
"No, but clearly he doesn't care that much because Congress hasn't done any of those things."
"Actually, most of Biden's agenda has passed the House of Representatives.  It all gets stuck in the Senate, because he can't get enough votes to get around the filibuster."
"OK so why don't they get rid of the filibuster?"
"Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema are against it."
"Biden should stop being a little pussy and make Manchin do what he wants."
"How is Joe supposed to make Manchin do what he wants?"
"I don't know, go intimidate people and use the bully pulpit, how did LBJ make senators do what he wanted?"
"He didn't, LBJ had a 67-33 supermajority and mostly just had to use bribes and pork barrel spending to keep other Democrats in line."
"Well, Joe should give a big speech calling out Manchin.  Then he should have the DOJ arrest Manchin's daughter and open an investigation into his wife."
"None of that will get Manchin to do what you want."
"OK, well, {insert wacky House of Cards plan here} he should impeach the parliamentarian and change the Senate rules so you only need 40 votes to pass legislation!"
"That's not a real plan that's just nonsense."
"Well he should do what Trump did and declare a national emergency and declare all the courts illegitimate and then do whatever he wants."
"Trump didn't actually get any of what he wanted, none of his actions actually went anywhere because they were all declared unconstitutional and blocked."

and so on and so forth.

Basically every conversation boils down to "Biden is a failure because I don't understand basic American civics and I want him to be the dictator that my imagination tells me Trump was."

[MR DARK BRANDON]

Don’t get elected in the middle of a global pandemic IG? I’m not exactly sure what answer you wanted for this, or what “lessons” you want future administrations to “learn” from this one.

[It’s so Joever]

When a fire gets out of control, a simple extinguisher isn’t enough to solve the problem anymore.

[VBM]

Unfortunately, it is undeniable that most people consider the Biden Administration to be a total failure. What caused this, and what lessons can future administrations learn from this one?

Would you care to express how the Biden Admin is a failure?

I didn’t say I think that it is, just that most of the public thinks the Biden Admin is a failure

[Hindsight was 2020]

That the moderate and blue dog wings of the democrat party are the actual problem in the party and not “the left” or “the squad”

[Darthpi – Anti-Florida Activist]

Let's make a campaign promise to appoint a bipartisan commission that will study ways to reform the Supreme Court. Once we're elected, we keep the promise and we do appoint a bipartisan commission to study ways to reform the Supreme Court. After the commission has spent approximately six months studying various ideas for reforming the Court, such as imposing term limits, expanding the size of the Court, adopting legislative alterations that would affect the power of the Court to exercise judicial review, and implementing procedural reforms, the commission ends up publishing a book over 270 pages long that discusses the pros and cons of all of these ideas. Then, after the publication of that book, the President does absolutely nothing at all to try to persuade Congress to implement any of the ideas discussed in that book, which only goes to show that appointing the commission in the first place was a BIG, FAT, WASTE OF TIME, EFFORT, and MONEY!!!
The lesson I learned from this was that voting for Biden was a waste of my vote.

You're such an idiot, dude.  Any changes to the Supreme Court require a 60-vote majority, which we don't have.  All you people want is for Biden to waste his ammo on policies that have a 0% chance of passing Congress.  Since he's much smarter than you, he's been spending his time pursuing policies in Congress that actually have a chance of success -- see the many pieces of legislation he's gotten passed with 0 wiggle room, including most recently the first gun control bill in decades.

Plus I'm so sick of this "I wasted my vote because Biden isn't passing enough legislation" crap.  When you voted for Biden, we weren't even projected to win the Senate.  We completely lucked into the 50-vote tie-majority we currently have because of the Georgia special elections in January 2021.  At the time you voted for Biden, he wasn't projected to get anything through the Senate at all.  And now you act like you voted for him to be a titan of the Senate, rather than what he actually is, which is the leader of the executive branch.

Let me be very real here. I get that Biden does not currently have the votes in the Senate to get much of anything passed. Just because he doesn't have the votes doesn't mean he can't lay out a clearer path of how he would like to get things done, and why voters should give him a larger majority in the Senate to achieve that.

"The filibuster is an impediment to stable government in the United States of America. It has no legitimate basis and needs to be abolished. As of right now, there are unfortunately not sufficient votes in the United States Senate to do so. The American people want to see progress on addressing crucial issues such as gun violence, abortion rights, environmental protections, voting rights protections, reforms to reign in an out of control Supreme Court, and so many other pressing issues, and it is totally unacceptable that this 19th century relic is being abused to prevent votes on bills that would address these issues. The very idea of representative government is being undermined every time a bill with majority support is blocked from receiving a vote by a radical, obstructionist minority who are abusing Senate rules. I am making a commitment to the American people that I will continue to press holdout Senators from my own party on the importance of making this necessary and long-overdue change to Senate rules, and should those holdouts fail to be persuaded then it is absolutely imperative that new Senators be elected who will be willing to make that change."

That's what I want from Biden. Do that, and I'll take it as proof that he really does understand that tinkering around the edges within a broken system isn't enough and that he does understand the magnitude of the crisis we are in.

Edit: And I want to add on to this, I don't feel my vote for Biden was wasted. When the alternative is a fasicst willing to commit a self-coup to stay in power, obviously it was worth voting for Biden in the general election. But that doesn't make Biden immune from criticism when things are going wrong.

[Hermit For Peace]

I don't think there is any lesson.  We're just completely screwed.  People are really stupid, and Biden basically rolled snake eyes as far as random events happening in his presidency, what with COVID lingering on through endless mutations, the economy headed south, Russia invading Ukraine, China doing this absurd zero-covid strategy that's screwed up all the supply chains, and right-wing populists getting elected all around the globe.

Biden has handled all this stuff as best one can, but nobody wants to give him any credit for it.  The knives are all out for Biden as basically everyone has their own agenda and their own reason to be against him.

Take the above posts for example.  I could ask "what sense of urgency is he missing?  what do you want him to do?"  or "how is he a failure?" but it's just the same conversation again and again and again.  Here's how it goes:

"How is Biden a failure?"
"He hasn't responded with the appropriate sense of urgency to the issues of our time."
"What issue has he failed to address reasonably?"
"{literally any issue}"
"Did you know about the executive actions Biden has taken to address that issue?"
"No, but those don't count because they're not enough, he needs to do more to show he actually cares."
"OK, well what things would you like him to do."
"{list of things that aren't in the powers of the presidency}"
"OK, those are all things that need to come from Congress, the constitution doesn't delegate those powers to the president."
"Well, Biden needs to step up and be a leader, he should tell Congress what to do."
"Did you listen to Biden's State of the Union address or read any of the different things he's asked Congress to do, or listen to any of the speeches where he called on Congress to do things?"
"No, but clearly he doesn't care that much because Congress hasn't done any of those things."
"Actually, most of Biden's agenda has passed the House of Representatives.  It all gets stuck in the Senate, because he can't get enough votes to get around the filibuster."
"OK so why don't they get rid of the filibuster?"
"Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema are against it."
"Biden should stop being a little pussy and make Manchin do what he wants."
"How is Joe supposed to make Manchin do what he wants?"
"I don't know, go intimidate people and use the bully pulpit, how did LBJ make senators do what he wanted?"
"He didn't, LBJ had a 67-33 supermajority and mostly just had to use bribes and pork barrel spending to keep other Democrats in line."
"Well, Joe should give a big speech calling out Manchin.  Then he should have the DOJ arrest Manchin's daughter and open an investigation into his wife."
"None of that will get Manchin to do what you want."
"OK, well, {insert wacky House of Cards plan here} he should impeach the parliamentarian and change the Senate rules so you only need 40 votes to pass legislation!"
"That's not a real plan that's just nonsense."
"Well he should do what Trump did and declare a national emergency and declare all the courts illegitimate and then do whatever he wants."
"Trump didn't actually get any of what he wanted, none of his actions actually went anywhere because they were all declared unconstitutional and blocked."

and so on and so forth.

Basically every conversation boils down to "Biden is a failure because I don't understand basic American civics and I want him to be the dictator that my imagination tells me Trump was."

You nailed it. I used to be a vociferous advocate for Biden, but I've been beaten down from all the negative criticism about him from the beginning of his term. You just can't fight this public perception and that's why I think he should retire when the term is over. We need younger leadership, someone full of energy and drive. A fresh face for President.

With Biden it was always what you see is what you get. With Trump it was you get what Trump wants you to have because he's holding all the cards (he believes) and you're not. Whatever. Maybe what we should learn is that it's time for all the elders in the Senate and the House, and the Presidency to hand over the reigns to a younger generation that is full of fire and new ideas they are waiting to run with.

(And frankly I say this with a heavy heart.)

[dead0man]

That a President can be the most progressive in history and still be hated by progressives.

[Darthpi – Anti-Florida Activist]

*snip*

You nailed it. I used to be a vociferous advocate for Biden, but I've been beaten down from all the negative criticism about him from the beginning of his term. You just can't fight this public perception and that's why I think he should retire when the term is over. We need younger leadership, someone full of energy and drive. A fresh face for President.

With Biden it was always what you see is what you get. With Trump it was you get what Trump wants you to have because he's holding all the cards (he believes) and you're not. Whatever. Maybe what we should learn is that it's time for all the elders in the Senate and the House, and the Presidency to hand over the reigns to a younger generation that is full of fire and new ideas they are waiting to run with.

(And frankly I say this with a heavy heart.)

I'm not of the opinion that every last member of the Democratic leadership needs to be purged at once, but I absolutely believe that not having anyone in that leadership below the age of SEVENTY (Biden 79, Pelosi 82, Hoyer 83, Clyburn 81, Schumer 71, Durbin 77) is an enormous part of the problem. The Soviet Union wasn't even that much of a gerontocracy at the end.

[kwabbit]

You need more than 50 senators to pass an ambitious legislative agenda.

It kind of feels like, when Biden was seemingly cruising to a huge victory with 54 senators, he really set out a historic agenda that distorted perceptions of his current accomplishments. It's not like he's done nothing, have passed two 1+ trillion packages, but legislatively he's often seen as a disappointment.

[Damocles]

That a President can be the most progressive in history and still be hated by progressives.

Pretty sure FDR is still the undisputed king of that crown. I don't think many presidents could claim to have his opponents hate him so much that they wrote an entire amendment into the constitution to stop another FDR.

[GeneralMacArthur]

Let's make a campaign promise to appoint a bipartisan commission that will study ways to reform the Supreme Court. Once we're elected, we keep the promise and we do appoint a bipartisan commission to study ways to reform the Supreme Court. After the commission has spent approximately six months studying various ideas for reforming the Court, such as imposing term limits, expanding the size of the Court, adopting legislative alterations that would affect the power of the Court to exercise judicial review, and implementing procedural reforms, the commission ends up publishing a book over 270 pages long that discusses the pros and cons of all of these ideas. Then, after the publication of that book, the President does absolutely nothing at all to try to persuade Congress to implement any of the ideas discussed in that book, which only goes to show that appointing the commission in the first place was a BIG, FAT, WASTE OF TIME, EFFORT, and MONEY!!!
The lesson I learned from this was that voting for Biden was a waste of my vote.

You're such an idiot, dude.  Any changes to the Supreme Court require a 60-vote majority, which we don't have.  All you people want is for Biden to waste his ammo on policies that have a 0% chance of passing Congress.  Since he's much smarter than you, he's been spending his time pursuing policies in Congress that actually have a chance of success -- see the many pieces of legislation he's gotten passed with 0 wiggle room, including most recently the first gun control bill in decades.

Plus I'm so sick of this "I wasted my vote because Biden isn't passing enough legislation" crap.  When you voted for Biden, we weren't even projected to win the Senate.  We completely lucked into the 50-vote tie-majority we currently have because of the Georgia special elections in January 2021.  At the time you voted for Biden, he wasn't projected to get anything through the Senate at all.  And now you act like you voted for him to be a titan of the Senate, rather than what he actually is, which is the leader of the executive branch.

Let me be very real here. I get that Biden does not currently have the votes in the Senate to get much of anything passed. Just because he doesn't have the votes doesn't mean he can't lay out a clearer path of how he would like to get things done, and why voters should give him a larger majority in the Senate to achieve that.

"The filibuster is an impediment to stable government in the United States of America. It has no legitimate basis and needs to be abolished. As of right now, there are unfortunately not sufficient votes in the United States Senate to do so. The American people want to see progress on addressing crucial issues such as gun violence, abortion rights, environmental protections, voting rights protections, reforms to reign in an out of control Supreme Court, and so many other pressing issues, and it is totally unacceptable that this 19th century relic is being abused to prevent votes on bills that would address these issues. The very idea of representative government is being undermined every time a bill with majority support is blocked from receiving a vote by a radical, obstructionist minority who are abusing Senate rules. I am making a commitment to the American people that I will continue to press holdout Senators from my own party on the importance of making this necessary and long-overdue change to Senate rules, and should those holdouts fail to be persuaded then it is absolutely imperative that new Senators be elected who will be willing to make that change."

That's what I want from Biden. Do that, and I'll take it as proof that he really does understand that tinkering around the edges within a broken system isn't enough and that he does understand the magnitude of the crisis we are in.

Edit: And I want to add on to this, I don't feel my vote for Biden was wasted. When the alternative is a fasicst willing to commit a self-coup to stay in power, obviously it was worth voting for Biden in the general election. But that doesn't make Biden immune from criticism when things are going wrong.

So you want Biden to endorse repealing the filibuster, even though you know it would be doomed to failure.  Biden already tried to get Manchin/Sinema to make a carve-out in the filibuster for voting rights, and they wouldn't do that.  Biden also said he's in favor of a carve-out for abortion.  Can you please tell me what is the point of Biden staking out a politically unpopular position that he knows has a 0% chance of success???

[GeneralMacArthur]

Also what is with this weird notion I keep hearing that Biden doesn't "understand the magnitude of the crisis we're in"?  What, do you think Joe Biden just doesn't have any idea what's going on in his own country?  Do you think Biden doesn't understand the magnitude of the threat to democracy when Jan 6 was an attempt to stop Biden himself from becoming president?  Do you think Biden doesn't understand how much power the right-wing Supreme Court is wielding when that same Supreme Court has been striking down parts of his own agenda?  It's just so arrogant that people think Biden is some clueless guy who doesn't know what's happening and needs randos on the internet to clue him in.

It's even more strange because this is usually coming from the same people who mock Dems for always saying "this is the most important election of our lifetime."

[Damocles]

Also what is with this weird notion I keep hearing that Biden doesn't "understand the magnitude of the crisis we're in"?  What, do you think Joe Biden just doesn't have any idea what's going on in his own country?  Do you think Biden doesn't understand the magnitude of the threat to democracy when Jan 6 was an attempt to stop Biden himself from becoming president?  Do you think Biden doesn't understand how much power the right-wing Supreme Court is wielding when that same Supreme Court has been striking down parts of his own agenda?  It's just so arrogant that people think Biden is some clueless guy who doesn't know what's happening and needs randos on the internet to clue him in.

It's even more strange because this is usually coming from the same people who mock Dems for always saying "this is the most important election of our lifetime."

Sir, this is an Arby's.

[dead0man]

That a President can be the most progressive in history and still be hated by progressives.

Pretty sure FDR is still the undisputed king of that crown. I don't think many presidents could claim to have his opponents hate him so much that they wrote an entire amendment into the constitution to stop another FDR.

well that's the difference, FDR's opponents hated him, that's normal.  But the people who should be Biden's biggest fans hate him.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Does it matter? The relevant people are paid to not learn anything.

[Hammy]

That when running for president, you need to run for the entire government, not just the post of the presidency itself.

Most of us expected a larger House majority and more than a tied Senate to happen by default, so the biggest lesson that can be taken is that needs to be a much bigger campaign priority in the future--two more Senate seats and we would've had the filibuster gone entirely and a lot more would've gotten done.

[Hermit For Peace]

I don't think Biden's age is transferring over to the main population, who is nowhere near his age. I'm glad he is our President and I think he's smarter than most people in Congress, and he has a hell of a smart wife, and he has compassion and heart. That's what was missing with Trump. No heart. All cold and chaos and bullying. We needed Biden to calm our frayed nerves after Trump. Biden will always be my favorite President.