Is this similar to an executive order from a president? ie, it's symbolic but not very durable, and would have been better as a law?
He was incredibly successful at tackling hidden charges, and dark patterns, and extra fees tacked on after the fact
The country ate alive the nicest, most well meaning president we've ever actually had as far as I can tell
Although of course he was up against every media company in the nation, all, including social media, controlled by about... 8 people or whatever
Part of the reason people liked him is he was not intrusive. He didn’t change his mind like Trump does.
The president needs to be clear-headed and cogent as much of the time as is reasonable. Biden is and was far beyond that. So is Trump for that matter.
All they had to do was two things after trump’s first term debacle: - keep to trump’s remain in Mexico policy - have a fair primary (or stick to the person picked in the fair primary)
So is due process, but that went out the window last year. It turns out that the constitution doesn't mean shit if the executive doesn't want to follow it.
According to Gallup [1], only 47% of US Americans thought that immigration should decrease in 2020. That number had held more or less steady since at least 2000. But it grew steadily over Biden's term, reaching 88% in 2024. This, I believe, is a reflection of how the democrats shifted their rhetoric to be "tough on immigration". And it handed Trump a populace that was primed to be more susceptible than ever to his much more aggressive immigration rhetoric.
Of course, this is just a small part of a much bigger picture, but I don't exactly think it helped.
[1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/692522/surge-concern-immigratio...
Domestic enforcement is 1/2 the problem. Controlling your border is the other half.
We have a gestapo kidnapping members of our community in the streets and the xenophobic propaganda still has you believing the most vulnerable and underpaid people in our society were ever a serious problem.
The migrants were a serious problem for democrats and youre still denying that.
2. They feel discriminated against by urban people so they dont like them either
3. Combine those two and its easy to see how they can revel in the suffering caused by the situation. Politics is about narratives and this one spread like wildfire because dems had no counter narrative. End of the day cities are dominated by democratic politics so its easy for republican narrative makers to point at cities that are failing to deal with a crisis and turn that into a reason to not vote for dems.
4. Everyone loves a good told you so. The problem for democrats with this one was that it was so incredibly visible. Made for very good TV on fox news
Even if the Democrats had run a perfect campaign they might not have won. And they probably came closer than many peer groups in other nations
For instance, Trump has said "oranges" instead of "origins", said that Hannibal Lector was a late and great person, praised pedophiles...
And where's the wall to wall coverage of that like there was when Biden screwed up that debate? Where's the weeks on end coverage of those stumbles? How come ABC doesn't even show the public when Trump calls _their own_ reporters piggy and tells them they're incompetent?
Not detached from reality, but thanks for the lame, no effort comment.
Similarly! Where were the weeks of coverage for the IRA which expanded energy production in this country (which most of my friends don't even know what the acronym stands for)
Where was the coverage for the semiconductor act which added 500bn in semiconductor manufacturing.
Biden wanted to do a land on the moon type quest to cure cancer, how much cooler would that have been for our nation than ICE raids on farm workers.
The man was incredibly successful, and barely anyone realizes that, and that's what I'm talking about.
He is geriatric though.
The idea Trump is not in cognitive decline is easily rent asunder by watching any clips of his recent speeches and comparing them to clips from 2016 and 2020.
He's falling asleep in meetings, confusing words, hearkening back to old time shit like flag burning, stumbling, can't walk in a straight line, tweeting rambling word salads filled with falsehoods all night long.
But again, this just proves my point.
tbf he was doing this when he was 40
Biden was 78 when he assumed office, and so was Trump in his second term. Neither of them should have been in any position of power, not at that age - the average American has a life expectancy of ~75 years for males.
The position of the American President is inarguably the position with the most power, responsibility and stress in the world. Personally, I'd say if there is a floor cap of 35 years of age... there should be a ceiling cap as well. Pension age, or even lower.
Under Biden the US reduced inflation faster than any other peer country, reduced student loan debt by billions, secured 1 trillion in mostly green infrastructure investment, secured 500 billion in semiconductor manufacturing, had a low 4% unemployment rate, helped with the NATO expansion, supported Ukraine, fought for consumer protections, expanded transgender rights and visibility, and so much more.
Literally the most successful president in my lifetime, and all I hear is people tell me about how he couldn't do his job.
It just, doesn't mesh with reality. What it does mesh with is the messaging that's been pounded pounded pounded through everyone's heads for the last four years though.
Of course anyone trying to refute 15 lies in 60 seconds while actually performing the duties of his job (instead of say... tweeting, golfing, and calling women derogatory names while fostering hate, and rewarding sycophants with insider trades and contracts) and then also make their own point is going to fail.
Lots more people than Biden, who're a lot more physically fit would fail at debating serial liars and thugs like Trump.
Indeed! But in politics, especially in the two-party systems that are the US and the UK, it is (almost) never about actual actions, policy and even campaign promises to a degree (because no one believes them any more). Individual voters often lack knowledge, context or empathy with others to recognize when stuff happens and if it is important.
In contrast, a politician's public image aka his "story" is much much more important. Even in a country like Germany which one might think focuses more on policy. We had incumbent Chancellor Schröder neck-deep in issues in 2002, then a historic flood disaster happened - and Schröder showed up in rubber boots while his competitor Stoiber was off vacationing. In the 2021 election, Armin Laschet didn't realize Steinmeier was talking on camera, someone cracked a joke or whatnot, he laughed - and got caught by said camera [2], which damaged his campaign so hard that he lost to Scholz.
Biden's age was already under discussion in his first term, and the critics were very vocal. There would have been the chance to set up Harris in the second half of his first term as a successor, prop her up into the spotlight and promise the voters continuation, the DNC didn't do that - and lost.
> Lots more people than Biden, who're a lot more physically fit would fail at debating serial liars and thugs like Trump.
Of course, of course. But still, I wish y'all had less gerontocrats in place.
[1] https://www.stern.de/politik/hochwasser--was-gerhard-schroed...
[2] https://www.rnd.de/politik/laschet-lacht-was-war-der-grund-u...
Guess where Lina Khan is now.
Cf. Jimmy Carter
I’d assume the goal of the task force is to propose new laws which should be pretty easy to get passed.
So, while the next president can just undo executive orders made by any previous one, making them a bit ephemeral, they do have direct and real consequences going as far as torture.