Today the Biden administration starts its second year in
office and the President marked the occasion with a rare press conference,
that, I think, was intended to demonstrate that the 79-year-old President is in
full control of his faculties, does not evade the spotlight cast upon him by
the Washington press corps, and has the stamina to stand on his feet, answering
probing and sometimes hostile questions, for more than two hours. He did
reasonably well in this endurance test, but his handlers must have known that their
boss could not pull this off without some offering up some gaffes that the
President is known for throughout his career in politics. In his press
conference yesterday, he made two of them, which, combined with a lot of
rambling, hesitation, and awkward silences, made for an unconvincing show of governance
control and competence.
The worst gaffe he made was by casting doubt on the
legitimacy of the next election(s) with the John Lewis voting rights act heading
for defeat in the Senate. He can fend off any danger to a free and fair
election outcome by working with Congress on a revamp of the Electoral Count
Act of 1887.
The other gaffe came in answer to questions about Vladimir
Putin’s intentions about the Ukraine, first by speculating that Putin may
decide to invade and then by suggesting that ‘minor incursions’ would trigger a
lesser response from America and NATO than a full-fledged invasion. He seemed
to be saying that Russia would be permitted to trespass on Ukraine’s
sovereignty as long as it stayed short of an occupation. I don’t think that he
meant it that way, but it certainly came across that way in Washington, Kiev,
and Moscow. On this topic, he should have stayed with warning Putin that he
would come to regret any violation of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.
In all of this we need to realize that Joe Biden is fighting
two demons: He needs to pull the country away from the populist,
anti-democratic, and QAnon wave, set in motion by the Trump ascendency in the
Republican Party; and he needs to hold off the activist left wing within his
own party which feeds the right’s narrative that under Democratic Party rule the
country would descend into a socialist backwater. The way out seems obvious. He
should reset his agenda and explore with the same Republicans who voted for his
infrastructure bill, who voted to impeach Trump in February of 2021, and who
voted for the Stopgap funding bill in November, which parts of his agenda can obtain
bi-partisan support. If the Infrastructure Bill passed the Senate by a 69-30
vote and the Stopgap Bill by 69-28, isn’t it worth exploring what else can pass
with at least 60 votes in the Senate?
The best President Biden can do for the country is forging a
coalition that permanently closes the door on Trump and the Trump inspired anti-democratic
movement. For that he will need the support of Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney, Lisa
Murkowski, Joe Manchin, and, maybe, Mitch McConnell. Biden is the
quintessential ‘middle of the road’ man. He now needs to build on his strength
and craft a ‘middle of the road’ coalition of Democrats, Independents, and
conventional Republicans.
Let’s find out what that kind of coalition can agree on. It
is evident that voters need to be swayed, by effective governance, to not only
show their confidence in their election integrity by coming out en masse when
called to the voting booth, but also to convincingly defeat those who are
actively subverting our democratic systems.
The President would be well advised to put the democratic
(small d) credentials of the coalition partners to the test by asking them if
they are for or against:
·
Automatic and same-day voter registration
·
Making Election Day a Federal Holiday
·
Increased accessibility to voting for Native
American and Alaska Native citizens
·
Making it a federal crime to hinder a person
from registering to vote or helping someone to register to vote
·
Universal and free preschool for all 3–4-year-olds
·
Childcare subsidies for low- and mid-income
families
·
Paid family leave
·
Tuition free access to Community Colleges for children
from low-and mid-income families
·
Perpetuating the expanded Child Tax Credit
·
Medicare’s authority to negotiate drug prices
·
Elder care subsidies for low-and mid-income
persons
And then push forward with that part of this agenda that can
gain a majority vote in the House of Representatives and 60 votes in the Senate.
Any such push should include a prescription for how to pay for the proposed benefits.
Don’t say it isn’t possible. Look at the 69 votes in the Senate that created the
Infrastructure Bill and the Stopgap Bill of November of the same year.
Good public governance requires five essential hallmarks:
1.
A vision of where the country should be heading
2.
Competency at each component of the Executive
Branch
3.
Avoidance of corruption and cronyism
4.
Excellence in execution and implementation
5.
Clarity and honesty in communication
If President Biden can avoid further gaffes, build a ‘middle
of the road’ coalition, and lead his administration to gain high marks for each
of these five hallmarks, he can look forward to a very successful one term
presidency and America can dispel the specter of authoritarianism.
