I caught part of Nicolle Wallace’s show on MSNBC yesterday, and among others, she talked to Franklin Foer, who has a new book out on the Biden administration called “The Last Politician.” I haven’t read it, but judging from review snippets I saw online, perceptions seem heavily influenced by the reviewer’s priors.
New York Post: Biden comes off as irritable, ‘babied’ elderly man who regularly flip-flops when not bashing Obama, new book reveals
New York Times: In “The Last Politician,” Franklin Foer presents the first half of Biden’s presidency as a series of made-for-television moments meant to inspire doubters and assuage critics.
Blah blah blah. I mean seriously, it’s revealing to look at the curated media hot takes. Like the King James Bible, Foer’s book apparently offers something for everyone looking to reinforce a preexisting bias or advance a preferred narrative, even if selective quote-pickers have diametrically opposed agendas.
But after hearing Foer discuss the book with Wallace, I’m tempted to read it. Forgive the X-Lax embed; I’m unable to find the clip elsewhere, but here’s a portion of that conversation:
“I think culturally [Biden] tries to practice politics and democracy in a way in which he knows isn’t going to change things tomorrow but preserves those things so that we can maybe practice them in the future” – @FranklinFoer w/ @NicolleDWallace pic.twitter.com/AHIMyZJDvx
— Deadline White House (@DeadlineWH) September 6, 2023
Sometimes Dems — inside and outside of the administration — perceive Biden’s emphasis on bipartisanship and collegial treatment of horrific characters like Mitch McConnell as a sign that the president is living in a bygone era and therefore ill-suited to this perilous time.
I’ll cop to having my doubts on this score early in Biden’s term, and though I see it differently now, I don’t think I was unreasonably cynical then. Can a man compromise with an Orc swarm? Can a party win if it scrupulously upholds norms when the opponent ruthlessly flouts them?
But I think what Foer is saying — correctly — is that Biden’s approach is premised on faith in democracy over the long haul rather than naivety about Repubs today. He knows exactly who they are but believes it’s more important to model how things are supposed to work than publicly smack down miscreants.
Reinforcing the culture of democracy is a bet, but Biden hedges it by separating Repubs into two groups — “normal” and “ultra MAGA” — and speaking plainly about the threat the latter pose to democracy. You don’t have to be a cynic to ask if the separation between the two groups has meaning anymore, but I think I understand now why Biden insists on it. He has to believe there’s a way back.
The outcome is still up in the air. Maybe the “Last” in Foer’s title is a warning about what will happen if Biden loses his bet.
Open thread.
Omnes Omnibus
Oddly enough, a few of us were touching on this subject in the thread below.
Alison Rose
I have an extremely hard time imagining Biden ever “bashing Obama” over anything. If you do read the book, I’d be very interested to hear your take on that point. (I’d heard about it and thought I might pick it up, but if it’s gonna be a lot of shitting on Biden, I don’t need a book-length version of a bunch of WATB op-eds.)
Baud
Maybe Biden is right. Maybe he’s wrong. But I don’t see how going to war with him over his strategy is helpful. But that’s the go-to response for a lot of people on social media, it seems.
CaseyL
Biden’s dividing the GOP into somewhat-normal v. MAGA/Ultra-MAGA struck me from the start as a strategic move.
All the talk about giving people “off-ramps” gets on my nerves because people should be held responsible for their choices. I believe that – but I also know (have come to know) that too many people respond unconsciously to stimuli, without thinking much if at all about it.
So maybe you have a fair number of people who are normies, have never thought much or deeply about politics, and respond automatically to the GOP tropes of old. Like, “good for the economy, good for the military” – all things that are not true, but are so ingrained they can’t be dislodged.
So Biden dividing the GOP into two categories gives normies something to ponder: this ain’t your Daddy’s GOP, maybe it shouldn’t be yours. Maybe you can get off the GOP train just long enough to cleanse out the MAGA elements and restore the “real” GOP.
It’s nonsense – the GOP as a whole enabled, protected, and promulgated every MAGA policy, action, and pronouncement – but it may be a useful political tactic on Biden’s part.
Ruckus
Betty, I think you are correct. Joe isn’t playing their game, the rules of which screw everyone
but them. They are certifiably crazy, and really don’t seem to have any concept of more than “If I don’t get what I want i’m going to scream and cry and wet my pants.” The obnoxious, whinny 4 yr olds that are the current head of the rethuglican party, like almost all 4 yr olds have no idea of anything more than “Gimme what I want, even if I don’t know what it is that I want!”waspuppet
People forget Biden told Trump, the sitting president at the time, to shut up on a debate stage. He does seem to have too much faith in bipartisanship, but his contempt for Trump takes a back seat to no one’s.
stinger
Interesting post, Betty Cracker, particularly in light of something I read yesterday.
I’ve begun Jon Meacham’s recent Lincoln biography, And There Was Light, and in the prologue Meacham, writing of emancipation, says “… the man at the pinnacle of power… had put antislavery principle into practice, pursuing justice at perilous moments when a purely political man might have chosen a different course…. There were political and practical reasons for Lincoln to do what he did. Yet there were also political and practical reasons for him to do the opposite of what he did. A constant in his calculus — sometimes decisive, sometimes not, but always there — was his moral opposition to human enslavement…. a pragmatic vision with a moral component.”
Throughout that passage, I had double vision, seeing in my mind’s eye both Lincoln and Biden.
Omnes Omnibus
@CaseyL: We also have to remember that most political messages are not aimed at people like us. We don’t need persuading or convincing. We are going to vote, donate, and volunteer anyway. Messaging is for the people who aren’t committed already.
Ruckus
@CaseyL:
It’s nonsense – the GOP as a whole enabled, protected, and promulgated every MAGA policy, action, and pronouncement – but it may be a useful political tactic on Biden’s part.
It gives the not quite insane an offramp. There is no guarantee that they will take it but it’s quite obvious that the current GOP is in the holding their breath and stomping their wittle feet phase.
Josie
The reporting from the FTFNYT lately combined with the latest poll screeching on CNN makes me think that someone is getting nervous about what Biden has accomplished and plans to accomplish in the future. They might be seeing the devastation of the party coming due to their unbreakable bond to Trump.
geg6
This is exactly right. Which is why I try not to flip out when he does things I think are too “bipartisan.” I don’t always succeed but I always end up at the conclusion that I agree with him about how important that modeling is.
Chris
@CaseyL:
I think it’s aimed at the small but decisive fringe of low-infos who could vote for either party or otherwise may stay home. Especially in battleground states in the Rust Belt that Biden won back in 2020 and is trying to preserve in 2024.
Biden may or may not think the GOP itself is salvageable, but at least that’s where I think that approach is most valuable.
MisterDancer
I think The Powers That Be are pretty terrified of Biden, honestly. The horrific pile-on around Afghanistan just fed into the belief he was fundamentally incapable and really just a company man.
They didn’t think the fucker meant it when he said Charlottesville changed him, as did being not just VP to Obama, but becoming besties.
Brachiator
As president , there is no up-side to Biden noting that the Republicans are hypocrites who talk about bipartisanship, but act to permanently oppose the Democrats and treat the party as inherently illegitimate. He has to work with the Republicans no matter what, and there have been a few times when the parties have worked together on legislation.
It should be the job of a non servile press to accurately report on the political climate. But we know that is not going to happen with current Beltway coverage.
But even though Biden may hope for the best politically, and try to reach out to Republicans, it’s clear that he handles them deftly and does not confuse hope with trying to get things done.
Also, he does not condemn Republican voters for making foolish or bad choices, and hopes that he can win more of them over by just doing a good job.
MattF
The unfixable difficulty is that the crazy is very very strong on the Right. Steve Benen gives some examples. How do you deal with that? “I’ll just overlook their psychopathology” is not a plausible long-term strategy.
Albatrossity
@Baud:
Exactly. And I will add that he has been around DC long enough that he might actually know a thing or two about how to successfully function in that environment. His legislative success record during his first two years in office certainly supports that hypothesis.
And frankly, I’d rather have a president who made a miscalculation or two about how to govern than one who absolutely cannot, will not, and never will run the government for anything other than his own enrichment and revenge,
MisterDancer
So I’m reminded of my Dad’s reaction when Kamala attacked Joe, during the Primaries, over busing. My Dad — who was for Kamala, who was active in politics during the Civil Rights Movement — defended Joe’s approach to busing, back in the day. (background)
What he told me has stuck for a while. He reminded me that, back then, Joe’s approach was damn close to “the best the politics of the day could support.” That this is an actual case of us needing to be cautious around applying modern viewpoints to older approaches.
Biden has backed some not-great laws, propped up some bad approaches (Anita Hill). It’s more than fair to air criticism about those efforts, or when he fails as POTUS. But stuff like the busing situation, or bailing out the railroad workers when the cameras had pulled away, tells me not to ever underestimate Biden, again. That, for all his flaws, his heart is in the right place, and he can learn.
Maybe the news media, overall, will eventually learn this lesson as well. I can give ’em my Dad’s number, if it helps. :)
Omnes Omnibus
@MattF:
Who is advocating that strategy?
Spanky
As do I. To think otherwise is to bet on a chaotic end to democracy.
Old School
There was a clip circulating on Twitter earlier this week of the Doucey kid asking at a press conference why Biden was treated like a baby.
I assume the question was based on this book.
piratedan
It strikes me that Joe’s actually betting on us (Americans) to defeat Fascism here and then return to a two-party system and the best way to do so is to give the GOP an out of some kind. It does make some assumptions that single party rule by the Dems (in the long run) is just as unwieldy as the current GOP embracement of Fascism. Changes need to be made, peeling back the idea that you can be rich enough to buy a country (politicians, media, judges) and making governance work for enough people to allow them the opportunity to lead the lives they want, a real American Dream, but this time featuring all skin types, all sexual orientations and whatever religion you choose to follow if you feel that you need one. It features the ideals of Lincoln (all men are created equal) and the founders (everyone is equal under the law) as a foundation and adds the peaceful transference of power as a third leg of the stool. While that’s been understood, it’s never been chiseled into the consciousness as Biden intends it to be (imho).
Chris
@MisterDancer:
Coming halfway through the Obama presidency as it did, I always appreciated the Lincoln movie for turning one of the biggest steps forward in American history into a “how the sausage gets made” story, emphasizing that you need the Thaddeus Stevens type hardcore idealists and the Abe Lincoln type pragmatic realists both if you’re going to get anything done.
… And, except in very rare circumstances, the Abe Lincoln type is the one you want in charge of the country. That’s not a judgment on the Thaddeus Stevens types, just an acknowledgment of the kind of job running the country is.
Alison Rose
@Old School: If any president has been treated like a baby, it was TIFG with his staff adding his name every other line in every memo so that he wouldn’t get bored and wander off. Or making sure he got his “executive time” to watch TV and guzzle diet Coke.
MattF
@Omnes Omnibus: That’s implicit in ignoring it. I knew several journalists, back in the day, and would ask them why they hated the Clintons. The answer I got was a shrug. Didn’t wanna argue about it. Can that be the right answer?
Omnes Omnibus
@MattF: You are talking about journalists then?
Hoodie
@CaseyL: It’s also a long game. Hopefully, it will not be lost on a lot of younger people that MAGA = crazy. Sure, they think gramps is too old, but they also know he’s not their crazy uncle. Grandpa’s trying to keep the family together in the hope that better times will come and the craziness will die down. He might not succeed, but it’s a better option than sectarian war. TBH, Biden’s biggest foe is the media, which is addicted to conflict and thus enables the GOP.
Chris
@Spanky:
For my money, there’s no way to preserve the democracy that doesn’t involve the GOP in its present state spending a good long time in minority status, the way the Republicans did after the Great Depression and the way the Democrats did, somewhat more lengthily, after the Civil War.
There are limits to how much a President can do to make that happen, however. That’s very much on the voters, and in particular on the goddamn middle voters who can still swing the election either way.
Baud
@Chris:
Agreed.
Spanky
@piratedan: I suspect Joe has read Sun Tzu:
Betty Cracker
@Old School: I didn’t see the Fox News Malfoy clip, but according to an excerpt I read somewhere, Biden felt infantilized when aides rushed to clarify a remark he made during a speech in Poland shortly after Russian’s wholesale invasion of Ukraine. Some people interpreted what he said about Putin as a call for US-led “regime change,” when what he meant was a more generic Putin sucks and should be overthrown. Or something like that. Don’t know if it’s true that he felt infantilized, but it wouldn’t be that surprising.
@Alison Rose: So true! There’s always a double standard.
MattF
@Omnes Omnibus: I guess it’s hard to report factually on craziness, and that might explain why honest reporting on it is rare—but I do think there should be more of it. Whether it would help, I don’t know.
Geminid
I think one reason some Democrats fault President Biden’s approach to partisan messaging is that they confuse tough talk with actual toughness. But I don’t care how tough Biden talks as long as he stays tough in his actions.
CaseyL
@Old School:
Jean-Pierre can’t ignore the malevolent nitwits of the press, but Biden can and has and continues to do so.
I really, really like that about him: he doesn’t respond to every wild-hair-up-the-butt the press gets into a lather about.he doesn’t pay attention to what X is saying about him. he just plain doesn’t take the MSM bait.
Baud
@Geminid:
Agreed.
rikyrah
Joe Biden continues to be the man needed for this time.
I don’t see any difference in the GOPers. But, I’m not his audience. It is a strategic move.
And, one, when he points out the crazy GOP Policy, he can blame the MAGA’s and then pivot to the Republican in front of him and ask
” this is who you are?”
I appreciate that Biden always points out the POLICY. Hammering down on the POLICY issues is a smart thing. It takes away from the Politics of PERSONALITY that the MSM absolutely loves to do.
Biden bringing it back to the POLICY pisses them (the MSM) off, because, they can’t BOTH SIDES the policy, because there isn’t something on our side that is as INSANE.
Old School
@Alison Rose: While a great response, that wasn’t KJP’s response.
I suppose that’s why she’s press secretary.
schrodingers_cat
Biden won the election by largely ignoring social media, especially the Twitter influencers. He knows what he is doing. The press doesn’t like him because he is boring and competent.
Jackie
@geg6: I agree. Biden has managed to retain his “reach across the aisle” strategy with decent success. As much as we hate on McTurtle – deservedly so – he has been an ally to Biden more often than not, pulling the non-MAGA senators towards supporting Bills and getting them passed.
I don’t know if this will ever be achieved again once Biden and McConnell are gone. At least until a majority of MAGA GQP are voted out.
Chris
@schrodingers_cat:
Yeah, a lot of politicians in the last fifteen years (including some good ones on our side) have leaned heavily on their social media presence to reach motivated groups of voters. And without wanting to discount the advantages in that, there’s probably a big percentage in remembering that the average person is not a super-engaged always-online Twitter type. Which is what Biden seems to be doing.
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: Wallace, Foer and the panel discussed the pundit reaction when Biden highlighted the “ultra MAGA” threat to democracy in the runup to the midterm elections. It was tough talk, which was necessary, IMO.
There was a lot of tut-tutting (among pundits at the time, not the panel) about how that was “divisive” and that Biden should focus on “kitchen table” issues instead. But I think it resonated with people who are alarmed about the Trump cult’s threat to democracy.
It’s true that campaign/admin messaging can’t focus solely on committed Dems. But they can’t be ignored either. So far, Biden’s team has done a decent job getting the balance right.
Alison Rose
@Old School: Although I did love her reference to “the last guy who was in the Oval Office”. The diplomatic version of TIFG.
Baud
@Alison Rose:
TLGWWITOO
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: Biden should talk tough when the occasion presents itself. I think the the tough talk is all the more effective against a background of less partisan and more positive messaging.
UncleEbeneezer
Unpopular Opinion: I think Biden is smarter than his critics and that his Reaching Across The Aisle, good-faith mentality that very-online Progressives and many here loathe, is actually what the majority of the Dem Coalition wants and is WHY HE WON! Both in the Dem Primary and in the General Election. He’s more in touch with the Dem base and the median Dem voter than most of us are.
Alison Rose
YES! Love to see this. Get your money, ladies!
16,000 Euros is barely over $17,000. That’s absurd, even if someone makes the argument that the women’s matches don’t bring in as much. They still deserve to be paid a reasonable wage!
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Spot on.
Kathleen
@MisterDancer: You hit on why they hate him – his prioritizing of inclusion of Black people on a personal and political basis drives media absolutely insane and I’m not just talking about Fox. Add his VP choice and you’ve got full blown media frenzy over his “age” (subtext “that woman would become President if anything happened to him”). It also explains why they hate, hate the Democratic Party in general. Black people wield too much influence and power for their taste.
Alison Rose
@Baud: If you pronounce it like a word, “Telgwitoo” sounds like a Star Wars planet or something.
wjca
Which appears to be exactly what he is doing.
Betty Cracker
@UncleEbeneezer: You think that opinion is unpopular here? Sounds like the bog-standard consensus view in these parts to me. I can’t endorse the entirety of it. I think some of y’all are too motivated by animus toward a part strawman/part real group of gettable voters when you’d do better to focus on the MAGA barbarians at the gate. But I’m not one to kink shame. ;-)
UncleEbeneezer
Comedian, JL Cauvin touched on some of this a bit on a TBGWT episode. The context was in a discussion about SAG, but the brief detour to discuss Biden is perfect for this thread. (YouTube link, Biden segment is only a couple minutes long)
zhena gogolia
@UncleEbeneezer: Absolutely. But unfortunately, they’re being influenced by the “he’s old” refrain. Just like “her e-mails.” I’m seeing it all over again.
HinTN
@CaseyL:
Nietzsche and Kierkegaard, among others, pointed this out a long time ago. Plus ça change…
Princess
Dear Frank Bruni, you utter pant-load:
Trump is old too.
no love,
Me
(Sorry — I got this thing in my inbox from him with the subject header “Biden is Old and Trump is on Trial” and I needed to let off steam with sympathetic people.)
Ohio Mom
I am not a religious person; like carrying a tune in a bucket, it’s beyond my abilities.
Biden, on the other hand, is a deeply religious person (even as he declines to flaunt it). There is some relationship I think, between his religious faith and his faith that our democracy can and will prevail.
UncleEbeneezer
@Betty Cracker: Fair point. I guess I’m more thinking of places like LG&M, DailyKos and very Progressive podcasts etc.
But I do have probably a dozen, very regular commenters here Pie’d because I got tired of their non-stop outraged reactions every time Biden (or Dems in general) shows any good-faith effort to work with Republicans rather than demonize them publicly. They should generate 1/4-1/3 of the comments in many threads, which to me is still pretty significant
trollhattan
@Alison Rose: It’s also how they write out a sneeze in Finnish.
Spanky
OT, but more bad news for Wall Street:
trollhattan
@Spanky: Welp, time for the Fed to raise rates again.
Elizabelle
We should remind these morons that Adolph Hitler was a youthful 56 when he shot himself. In power since his mid-40s.
And that West Germany was put back together by elder statesman Konrad Adenauer. Who became German Chancellor at a sprightly 73 (OK, younger), and served in that post for 14 years. 14 years. And then he lived 4 years after that.
These people moaning about Biden’s age are not serious people. Or, more likely, they seriously detest Democrats.
Biden has been an extremely effective president. His age is the only Achilles heel these nonserious types have to wail about.
gene108
@CaseyL:
People need a way to apologize, change, etc. without being humiliated. We need an “off ramp”, so making the hard decision to change doesn’t become harder.
Elizabelle
@UncleEbeneezer: Agree with your comment #44.
lowtechcyclist
@UncleEbeneezer:
Other than the part about Biden being smarter than his critics, I can’t see what’s unpopular about that. Certainly plenty of progressives were aware that most voters, and definitely most Dem voters, want bipartisanship – and were upset by that because we seemed to be in an era where bipartisanship no longer had a prayer of working.
So the tricky part was making all that bipartisan, reach-across-the-aisle stuff work in practice. That was the surprise, that Biden could do that. I’m still not at all sure how – I still look back on 2022 and think, ‘that was impossible, how the fuck did he do all that??’ – but he did, and America is much the better for it.
Geminid
@Spanky: That’s definitely bad news for Republicans, but I’m not so sure it’s bad news for Wall Street. I think people expect one more rate hike by the Fed anyway. The next set of inflation numbers will be important here.
Paul in KY
@MattF: Pres. Obama is living rent free in their heads!!! God, they are so pathetic.
Paul in KY
@piratedan: Single party rule worked pretty well from 1933 to 1953.
zhena gogolia
@Princess: Bruni is the originator of the idea that GWB was superior to Gore because you wanted to have a beer with him.
Alison Rose
@zhena gogolia: Anyone who preferred to hang out with Bush instead of Gore was making it clear that they were as much of an airhead as Bush was, so splish splash their opinions were trash. Even putting politics aside, I would have MUCH rather hang out with Gore for an afternoon because we could have had interesting, intelligent conversation.
Geminid
@lowtechcyclist: Of the 4 major spending bills the last Congress passed, the American Recovery Act and the “Inflation Reduction Act” were passed on party line votes, using Reconciliation. The Infrastructure and CHIPS+ bills passed with bipartisan votes, although it was only 20 or so House Republicans and 10 or so GOP Senators joining in.
These were quite a set of accomplishments for Joe Biden, but Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and other Congressional leaders did some heavy lifting as well. Rank and file Senators and Reps also showed a lot of discipline and commitment to the the administration’s goals. It was a good team effort all around.
Delk
Fani Willis to Gym Jordan:
Paul in KY
@Alison Rose: I would too! Batshit McChimpy would just be telling you nasty stories of hazing people at Yale & complaining about his dad.
VP Gore did, unfortunately, sometimes come across as that smarty teachers-pet kid in 4th grade who would rat you out if they thought that would be in their best interest. I think it was his voice and sometimes his demeanor that fed into that (also amplified by all the pundits whose job was to up Dubya).
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Delk: 😁 In other news: water is wet and Generallisimo Francisco Franco is still dead.
Alison Rose
@Delk: Love it. Although
would also be true.
Alison Rose
@Paul in KY: I mean, I was also a smarty-pants teacher’s pet in 4th and many other grades, so maybe I’m just like, game recognizes game. I suppose one mistake of Gore’s was talking to the public like they were smart.
Brachiator
@zhena gogolia:
This always falsely presumes that a given political leader would want to hang out with you or me, and that somehow political skill is linked to being a regular guy or a man, or woman of the people.
None of this is necessarily true or a good way of judging a politician.
Also, I don’t particularly like beer.
ETA. In college, I had one small seminar, ten people, where the professor brought in some very notable and famous writers to talk to us. All were pleasant. But some clearly gave the impression that they barely tolerated us and wanted to escape as soon as possible. But this was entirely irrelevant to their talent. But it early on cured me of the notion that wanting to hang out with someone you admire is a big deal.
Fake Irishman
@Geminid:
And don’t forget the PACT Act! Veterans are among the last of the bipartisan issues in DC, but getting 80 percent of the GOP caucus for that particular bill was incredible.
wjca
It is important to distinguish between people who you admire, and people whose work you admire. I discovered that half a century ago, with a writer named Randall Garrett. Really liked his writing. But a disgusting excuse for a human being in person.
The same distinction applies, in my observation, across all fields.
Geminid
@Fake Irishman: Yes, and Biden also signed a gun safety law. It was a pretty modest measure, but it was the first to pass Congress in years.
Chris
@Ohio Mom:
I think the link is optimism.
It takes a certain amount of optimism, probably to some degree an irrational amount, to be able to keep soldiering away in dark times and think it’s going to turn out all right. It’s also necessary if there’s going to be any chance of it turning out all right at all, so…
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I was thinking the other day, as someone who was a long-time Schumer skeptic, he doesn’t get, or seem to seek, any credit in getting from BBB to the IRA with Manchin. And I find myself wondering if the more pugilistic Harry Reid– of whom I am a fan and was generally considered a better cat-herd than Schumer– could have pulled it off.
And maybe you remember: Wasn’t part of Manchin’s willingness to negotiate with Schumer that the Republicans pissed him off by opposing I forget which bill?
catclub
@Elizabelle: Good point on Adenauer. Winston Churchill was over 80 when he was prime minister in the 1950’s.
catclub
@Brachiator:
also fails to mention that GWBush was a dry drunk.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chris: Agree completely.
catclub
@Paul in KY:
I think if there is any bashing of Obama by Biden, it is along the lines of “I think I would have done Afghanistan differently.”
Betty Cracker
@wjca: That reminds me of Jack Nicholson in “As Good as It Gets.”
@catclub: Churchill in the 1950s probably isn’t a good proof point, at least not if “The Crown” is an accurate portrayal.
Chris
@Paul in KY:
Yeah, it did. (90% of Eisenhower’s success can be summarized as “he inherited a government machinery that had been fine-tuned and fully upgraded by twenty years of New Deal governance, and he mostly had the good sense to not go pushing any of the buttons and let it keep running itself.”)
It’s even more than that, though. Short of single-party rule, you still had lopsided dominance of national politics by Republicans from the Civil War through the Great Depression, and by Democrats from the Great Depression through, in some ways, the end of the century (they didn’t lose Congress until 1994). And you know what? There were many, many flaws and injustices in that era, but we managed to avoid the total breakdown in governance that happened in the run-up to the Civil War or is happening today, we had a good deal of continuity of governance that made it possible to do a lot of long-term projects without having to worry that the next election would reset everything back to zero, and many of which projects involved working on remedying the aforementioned flaws and injustices.
The modern bipartisan fetish for divided government and for constant pendulum swings just to “keep the parties honest” is terrible governance. It pretty much guarantees that nothing ever gets done, and in the long term, it doesn’t even reduce partisanship. The partisanship only gets worse, because each party is constantly getting into office, trying to accomplish something, and then having it immediately pulled out from under them, with all the attendant frustration.
Omnes Omnibus
@catclub: Churchill in the 1950s might not be the best example.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@wjca: @Betty Cracker: from the testimony of Anjelica Huston and Richard Dreyfus and especially Geena Davis, I have reluctantly come to accept that Bill Murray is a huge dick
this has not made me change my mind on Chevy Chase, I think if I had witnessed that fight, knowing what I know now, I would’ve rooted for injuries
Chris
@Paul in KY:
IIRC, polls taken immediately after the first debate between them showed most people interviewed thought Gore won the debate.
Then the media spun into massive damage control mode, there was a week or two of media blitz churning out articles about Gore’s “professorial” and “condescending” style, and within a week or two, wouldn’t you know it, most people were now saying Gore lost the debate.
Chris
@wjca:
Last movie I watched was one of the Lethal Weapons. I love those movies, they’re good comfort food viewing that I rewatch every few years ever since I saw them as a teenager. Doesn’t hurt that they all pick a then-current issue out of the headlines and proceed to take as hardcore liberal a stance on it as you can put to film. (This was the one with the apartheider diplomats).
Now ask me how fond I am of Mel Gibson…
stinger
@Brachiator:
And although some idiots might have wanted to hang out with W, W would not have wanted to hang out with them. Bill Clinton, on the other hand, would hang out and talk with anybody. For HOURS.
Brachiator
@catclub:
Churchill and his successor, Anthony Eden, both had serious health issues. The public was kept in the dark about Churchill’s problems.
Churchill had some other serious problems later on, but held on as an MP until 1964.
I don’t have a problem with Biden’s age. And I truly believe that he would step aside if he thought that he could not be effective. But aged members of Congress like McConnell and Feinstein are being propped up to protect party power, and this may have some impact on voter perception. But right now I don’t think that the “concern” over Biden’s age will prevent the Democrats from winning big in 2024.
Alison Rose
@Chris: Gibson is the only piece of proof needed to debunk the “Jews control Hollywood” myth. If we did, that motherfucker would be a carcass in the Australian outback.
Chris
@Brachiator:
And then there’s JFK, who despite his youth had so many health problems that some people have raised questions about whether he’d even have survived his hypothetical second term, or at least if he’d have been able to make it through without resigning…
(Always thought a great JFK conspiracy theory would be that he ordered himself killed, because he preferred going out in a blaze of glory to a slow and painful deterioration).
Chris
@Alison Rose:
Yeah, no kidding. He’s also a nice rebuttal to the “conservatives can’t catch a break in Hollywood!” narrative. Yeah, he eventually got taken down a peg, but the fact that he had to go on a full-blown Nazi rant into a live microphone before that finally happened should be a pretty good indication of just how far you have to go for your politics to affect your job.
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, I hated learning that about Murray, who was so convincing as a loveable goofball.
jashead
Biden bashing Obama? Biden is too smart a politician to bash the idol of a large part of his base. Did he really bash him or is this more inside bullshit from highly paid journalists who read their own fan mail?
Alison Rose
@jashead: I’m sure it’s a case of absurd exaggeration. Like, if Biden once or twice said “I wish we had done X in Y way” and that gets turned into OMG U GUYZ BIDEN HATES OBAMA!!!
Paul in KY
@Alison Rose: Games does recognize game…
Paul in KY
@Chris: I saw that debate and thought VP Gore mopped the floor with him. Was so whacked out when the ‘spin’ changed the dynamics of what occurred in that debate (VP Gore whupped his ass).
Paul in KY
@Chris: That would make a great movie.
Frank Wilhoit
“…Biden’s approach is premised on faith in democracy over the long haul rather than naivety about Repubs today. He knows exactly who they are but believes it’s more important to model how things are supposed to work than publicly smack down miscreants….”
Never even mind whether this is true — tho’ we must hope it isn’t, and here is why. It is trying to be a charitable framing; but on its own terms, it depicts Biden as neglecting the lessons of 1974 and 1980, and therefore not even fighting the last war, but the ones four or five back.
The way things are supposed to work is that miscreants are supposed to get smacked down. The index of where we are is the fact that that proposition is itself, today, confounding.
LadySuzy
@zhena gogolia: Call me conspirationist, but I get the feeling that corporate media is slowly creating an environment in which they hope that the presidential candidate of “New Labels” could be elected. (The candidate won’t be Manchin, but probably Governor Hogan, or another republican).
Corporate media, and the whole corporate elite, want to rebuild a conservative party without the crazies so they need all indies and some moderate democrats. “New Labels” is a ruse by supply-siders to maintain power. Joe Biden and democrats are a menace to them. Hence the constant negativity despite a pretty good record on policy and on the economy. As well as on global leadership.
EACH AND EVERY TIME Americans elect a president who tries to help ordinary people and tries to restrain the power of the oligarchy, the oligarchy fights back. I mean… Biden’s record on the economy is pretty good, the US has regain some international leadership, and the coverage of President Biden is constantly negative !!!
In the specific case of the media, there’s another factor at work. Joe Biden is too “middle-class” and not glamorous enough for them. They don’t have ANY real respect for the man. They NEVER HAVE. They mock his little manierisms, they think he is not intelligent enough, you name it. His little speech handicap, sadly, makes him less good of a communicator and for the media, it’s a mortal sin.
Paul in KY
@Paul in KY: What would make it work is that there are the other people really trying to assassinate him (Oswald being one of them) and in Dallas, one of the ‘fake’ assassins’ (going to do some kind of stunt where Pres. Kennedy is shot, but only after heroically confronting the ‘assassins’, etc.) thinks Oswald is part of their team and lets him go up in the School Book Depository bldg.