President Biden’s policy agenda is incredibly popular, much more popular than his opponent’s. But Biden the man? Not so much.
The question now is whom to blame for the approval gap between the president and his agenda: voters, the media or Biden himself.
Democrats have long argued that their policies are more popular than those of Republicans. In a recent blind test conducted by YouGov, that was unmistakably true. The polling organization asked Americans what they thought about major policies proposed by Biden and Donald Trump without specifying who proposed them. The idea was to see how the public perceived ideas when stripped of tribal associations.
Biden’s agenda was the winner, hands down.
Of the 28 Biden proposals YouGov asked about, 27 were supported by more people than opposed them. Impressively, 24 received support from more than 50 percent of respondents.
I support the policies he took from the Sanders campaign to appear more progressive than he is, but he dropped most of those as soon as he got elected.
Almost like we should’ve elected someone who actually had an established history of fighting for those policies, and not someone who adapted them in a stunted form to win an election.
Corporations love his pork barrel spending though, yeah.
If only he were part of a political party that could execute policy matters without him, as opposed to solely developing and passing legislation and department policy by hand…
So if he’s not needed and just being a drag on the ticket why doesn’t he resign?
Because he’s an arrogant, venal sociopath who’s been running for this office since he had to drop out in 1988?
To be clear: these were policy proposals, not actual policies put in place by either candidate.
That’s what this articles is about, but policies passed during the Biden admin have also been popular, though according to these sources some not well advertised enough.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/12/politics/bipartisan-infrastructure-bill-poll-support/index.html
https://apnews.com/article/poll-ukraine-aid-congress-b772c9736b92c0fbba477938b047da2f
I tried but it’s harder to find polling on very specific executive department actions and regulations though, like the SAVE student loan repayment plan changes for example. So harder to say on those.
Biden ran on a bunch of popular proposed policies, but then got into office and suddenly a lot of those policies “weren’t practical”. My point is that I don’t care about what Biden says, his actions speak much louder.
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/biden-promise-tracker/ Honestly, for a politician, that’s a pretty high follow-through rate. If his term ends and all the stalled and in-progress convert to compromise or failed, hes still gonna stack up pretty good.
28% may look low without context, but compare it to previous single term presidents… and if he gets a second term, he’s on track to do very well.
Yes, that’s what happens when you give a party the slimmest margin of victory possible (50/50 in the Senate), and then 2 of the senators end up being corrupt traitors. His agencies have been making good decisions. I am not a young man and these last few years are the first time I’ve seen the federal government make actual pro-worker and pro-consumer decisions.
Biden pivoted to the big money donors.
FDR, the greatest president, welcomed the hatred of the superrich. That’s when the Dems had 80% of the Congress, and presidential term limits were first introduced to defend the ultrawealthy from another FDR.
So FDR welcomed the hatred of his domestic foes, the superrich. Biden is a back slapping whore who wants to be loved by all, because he isn’t decisive, and lacks a clear vision for America. He’s a third way triangulator. He can’t figure out why no one likes him when he tries to cater to two political groups that despise each other and have opposite policy preferences: the poor and the working class on the one hand, and the superrich on the other.
Biden is the one that wrote the war on drugs bill back in the day. Yeah. He isn’t coming up with his policies. He is just a puppet of his presidential apparatus.
Don’t forget about supporting segregation! (Side note: yes, he’s that old.)
I’ve always thought people of all races were people and share the rights as all other human beings. Weird, innit?
He is responsible for a lot of policies that resulted in the mass incarceration we have today.
Biden works with far-right Republican Sen. Strom Thurmond and the Reagan Administration to pass the Comprehensive Control Act. The law expands federal drug trafficking penalties and civil asset forfeiture, allowing police to seize a person’s property without proving them guilty of a crime. Two years later, Biden co-sponsors the 1986 Anti-Drug Abuse Act, which creates new mandatory minimum sentences for drugs, including the notorious 100:1 sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine. A conviction of possession of powder cocaine with intent to distribute carries a five-year sentence for 500 grams, while the same conviction for crack carries a five-year sentence for only 5 grams, so the harshest penalties are enacted on low-level drug sellers and impoverished drug users.
The controversial legislation known as the 1994 Crime Bill is Biden’s most significant contribution to the expansion of policing the drug war. The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, written by Biden, increases funds for police and prisons, fueling an expansion of the federal prison population. It also newly applies the federal death penalty to 60 crimes, including large-scale drug trafficking and drive-by-shootings resulting in death. Biden brags after the law passes that “the liberal wing of the Democratic Party” is now for “60 new death penalties,” “70 enhanced penalties,” “100,000 cops,” and “125,000 new state prison cells.”
The problem is the proposals are either dropped, or poisoned. Like he campaigned hard on unions, then he butchered rail workers bargaining power. He campaigned on renewable energy, then signed into law mandated sales of federal land for oil and gas extraction. The affordable care act has an unintended flaw making millions of Americans too poor to qualify for any kind of assistance getting health insurance, he campaigned on fixing that gap. Instead he raised how wealthy you can be and still qualify for assistance. He’s raised defense spending, dumped a half trillion more on the US highway system, and deported way more immigrants and shutdown asylum.
Like he campaigned hard on unions, then he butchered rail workers bargaining power
It should be mentioned that the people he appointed to the NLRB have been hugely positive for union activity and power. Even with the railroad thing (which they did end up getting concessions on) Biden is still the most pro union president in our lifetimes.
He campaigned on renewable energy, then signed into law mandated sales of federal land for oil and gas extraction.
They also passed the largest climate bill ever.
affordable care act has an unintended flaw making millions of Americans too poor to qualify for any kind of assistance getting health insurance, he campaigned on fixing that gap
The GOP has blocked every single attempt at improving the ACA and has tried to repeal it dozens of times.
He’s raised defense spending
Can you point to a someone who hasn’t? Congress routinely increases military spending without the military even requesting more funding.
I get that half measures don’t feel like wins, but when half the government is controlled by people who want to destroy it, they are. If we want sweeping legislation that fixes more issues, we have to strip enough power from the GOP to make it possible. Until we do that, half measures are really all we can hope for. We elect people because of their platform, and then we don’t give them enough votes to pass legislation. I’m not saying the Democrats/Biden are flawless here, but we have to live in reality.
which they did end up getting concessions on
They ran a hell of marketing on this, a non-rail union, that voted against the strike, made a statement that some rail workers got some sick days. Not all of them, not as much as they could have gotten, and most importantly of all, like i said, their bargaining power for the future is ruined.
They also passed the largest climate bill ever.
Ironically thats the same bill Im referring to. Again, they did great marketing.
The GOP has blocked every single attempt at improving the ACA and has tried to repeal it dozens of times.
Like i said, they did make changes to it. No attempt was made to fix the poor americans not getting any help.
Can you point to a someone who hasn’t?
Doesnt change anything
Okay I get that you don’t find those particular changes to be good enough, and I would agree with you. That doesnt make them lazy, and they’re still the best chance we have. And you’re completely ignoring the structural obstacles that they literally don’t have the votes to overcome, even if every single Democrat in Congress agreed.
If we had given the Democrats a fillibuster proof majority and the White House for more than 2 months in the past couple decades I’d agree with you. But we haven’t done our job well enough here, just as much as they haven’t done theirs well enough. Framing the entire party as a lost cause and ineffective without looking at all the reasons why only hurts us.
ETA: I do believe the ACA and the IRA were absolutely worthwhile and have positive benefits. Just because you don’t like parts of the bill doesn’t mean they aren’t.
