The failed state: USA under Biden
The Biden administration has had a slew of challenges from the very onset, rendering a unique style of governance, the Democratic leader who has appeared at a time when America remains extremely divided, probably more than ever before.
Americans voted for Joe Biden and against the dangers of a second round of presidency by billionaire real estate tycoon Donald Trump, who approached the Office of the President in an unprecedented manner.
However, Biden's presidency has been questioned by Trump and his followers, putting American democracy in very unique peril. Biden has been battling not just the Coronavirus pandemic and a rise in inflation but also attempts to make voting harder in favour of Republicans.
It's sick, deciding in some states that you cannot bring water to people standing in line, waiting to vote, deciding that you're going to end voting at five o'clock when working people are just getting off work, deciding that there will be no absentee ballots under the motion rigid circumstances [sic].
It is all designed and I'm going to spend my time doing three things: One trying to figure out how to pass legislation passed by the House number one, number two, educating the American public.
The Republican voters I know find this despicable; Republican voters, folks outside this White House, I'm not talking about the elected officials I'm talking about voters, voters.
US President, Joe Biden
The US on the verge of losing superpower status
The ups and downs in recent years of US politics and economy and how it has led up to the situation today, from the COVID pandemic to inflation and supply chain issues as well as cultural and political divide, widening ever more in America, the power play in Washington and a democracy in tatters.
The Biden administration's performance and ratings matter perhaps more than any other administration, as the one term former President has expressed clearly that he intends to come back to power.
How can the Biden administration be assessed with respect to how it is handling its responsibilities as a sovereign government?
There's a couple of levels to this [sic]. Overall, I would grade it at poor but I want to explain why, and it's not necessarily anything party based. But like many candidates, what they ran on, what the Biden campaign ran on and what they've delivered, are miles apart.
There's a whole inbox full of executive actions on his desk that he could take without having to go through Congress that he is preferring not to, for some reason.
The handling of the COVID, I know you have a question about that in particular, but it just seems to have been an impetus to return to work as quickly as possible here in the United States, to somewhat minimize, although it became very difficult to with the numbers we've been seeing over the past year.
Other things that could have been done, and he made it he didn't stick to his campaign pledge that he would not sign a Medicare for all If it even landed on his desk, and the chances of that are diminishing quickly anyways [sic].
Kerry McNamara, Educator, Bossier Parish Community College
And now major pieces of President Joe Biden's agenda remain bogged down as his approval rating is at a historic low among many demographic and political groups, even among members of his own party, Biden has proven to be not that popular and many view his administration as a dysfunctional one.
Facing various challenges, the administration has been struggling to take matters into its own hands as voters remain very disappointed.
As far as Big D democracy here in the United States, if it wasn't dead already, I think Citizens United 10 or 11 years ago really put a nail in that coffin. When you have a population that upwards of 75 to 80% favour Medicare for all, but it can't, even if it was [sic] approved by the Congress, it would be vetoed by this President. And I don't think the previous president was really interested in it either.
It is sold to us as a two party system, when in fact, they're all defending the same interests. ... there's very, very little daylight... one thing President, or candidate, Biden did, in one instance, hold to what he said, that fundamentally nothing would change and I think he's held to that. We don't have, as US citizens, any real voice when it comes to foreign affairs, the Pentagon you know, what we're going to hit next. We are never consulted. !!!!
Kerry McNamara, Educator, Bossier Parish Community College
Although Trump has recently lost some of his popularity among grassroots Republicans, he appears to be determined to enter the White House again.
In the meanwhile, innumerable lawsuits and probes are on their way into his conduct, including for his role in the January 6th 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol, yet none have so far yielded a practicable solution to prevent his rise to power.
I don't place as much emphasis on Donald Trump and his followers. I think, largely, he was popular because people did want a change. He promised to change and it was very little change from before or even to the Biden administration.
The January six incidents really seem to spook a lot of people here in the United States. But even while it was going on, watching from this very desk right here, I'm sitting at now, over a year ago, I said to many people, you know, this is nothing compared to what those same members of Congress approved specifically in the Maidan uprising in Ukraine.
I mean, that was orders of magnitude more horrible and more destructive than anything on January 6th. There's [sic] a lot of strange things about January 6th, as well, as far as people gaining easy access.
But it became, like so much in America became, so overblown, and I don't see the rise of Trump or the re-rise of Trump as being (or) causing much of a difference.
Kerry McNamara, Educator, Bossier Parish Community College
The rise of Donald Trump in American politics was unique, even in that he violated decorum and revealed the true face of corruption hiding behind the veil of respectability in Washington.
How has the rise of Donald Trump, and his followers, affected politics in America and what do you think will come next?
Well, I think Trump and his followers have made it where people know overtly, I am not saying that they're the first or only and that it doesn't happen on the left, but putting out facts that are untrue, that are half truths, and sticking by policies that really hurt the country. I think that that would go that road, we're down that road and they're going to continue down that road [sic].
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
On the other hand, some Republican politicians clearly intend to use the 2022 midterms as a launch pad to make sure that Trump can gain enough votes in key states or can challenge the results with no opposition in case he loses the 2024 presidential election.
We have the Republican Party won't talk against Trump [sic]. Trump is still a favorite among a good percentage of Republicans and people forget that it was really a narrow [win for Biden] The fact is it was almost evenly divided and so we have an evenly divided country.
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
However, infighting abounds in the GOP with some key figures, such as former Vice President Mike Pence, keeping their distance from Trump and others, such as former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, waiting for an opportunity to present himself as a potential candidate for the office of president.
Division is not limited to the Republican Party and also exists in the liberal camp.
What has happened to democracy in the United States? Do the people no longer have a voice?
First of all, many people in this country have no voice, And as I said before, we've never had a fully participatory democracy, there's always been restrictions on who can go to the poll. Furthermore, we have only one party. It's a capitalist party. Both Democrats and Republicans are Free Market Capitalist parties, and they work together to pass laws. So those of us who are socialists can never have a voice in the running of the country.
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
Voting has never been as democratic as American politicians have claimed, and the divide in America has been there forever. Voting suppression and practices such as gerrymandering are nothing new.
Mostly they're aimed at assuring that people of color, such as African Americans and other minorities, are not given an equal opportunity to have their voices heard.
In terms of racial justice issues, I think that the Biden administration has done some administrative things that sort of promotes racial justice, but the big legal change that we need is voting rights, and that won't occur unless he's willing to get rid of the filibuster and, so far, him and his administration has not been willing to do that [sic]. I also think that with the conservative court that we had, he needs to appoint more people to the Supreme Court.
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
The current voting suppression project is run by the GOP and aimed at certain swing states, like Georgia, where Trump wanted the government to find some votes in 2020 so that he could beat Biden.
Putting a pro Trump governor at the helm in such states would ensure that extra votes would be found in his favour.
What is your view on the divide widening in the wake of the 2020 presidential election and Is it on the path to healing or is it worsening?
I don't think it's getting has gotten any better in the past year. But a lot of that is again back to ... even the two extreme sides realizing at some point that they are in the same boat.
This is a class war not be a culture war. This is not even a political war when one administration to the next, whether it switches from Democrat to Republican or vice versa, nothing really seriously changes. That really should be a wake up [call] but I don't see any, the polarisation was blatantly there all the time. I don't see it. Really just I don't know if you can exacerbate it much, but it is definitely more noticeable.
I think it has a lot to do with everybody's personal Periscope in the social media world where everybody can be a commentator.
Kerry McNamara, Educator, Bossier Parish Community College
The Biden administration has been trying to resuscitate the US failed state both at home and abroad. Although it's not clear how successful it's been, from efforts to create jobs at home and addressing the COVID 19 pandemic and its economic ramifications to taking on the Chinese influence as well as pandering to NATO allies, Biden has been trying to make up for the previous administration's errors and actions which were against Washington's interests.
However, America's seems to be losing its power as a self proclaimed leader of the free world. Many of the Biden critics take issue with his age, representing a symbol for America's loss of power, not just among his people, but also worldwide.
The United States seems to be on the cusp of a new era of voter suppression, the immensity of this round of suppression is incomparable to the previous round in 2011. But the full impact of the latest round of suppression is yet to be felt in 2022. The Republicans have obviously lost favorability, at least at the governmental level.
Well, one thing people have to remember [is] that this country has never had widespread voting rights, from its very beginning it limited voting rights and for instance, in [the] 1700s, only white men who owned land could vote, and so, its history is built on restricted voting rights and the power it gives to people who are not in the category.
What we're seeing is a continuing playing out of that restriction, mass incarceration, Another huge restriction is all the laws that says people who have felonies can't vote. And when you think about mass incarceration, that means a lot of people, particularly black and brown people, can't vote in this country.
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
That historic turnout in the 2020 presidential election stripped the Republicans of any power either at the White House, the Senate or House of Representatives. Americans access to the vote is now in unprecedented peril.
More laws are being passed, requiring strict identification for voting, or banning mail in voting and early voting, which saw huge rise due to the COVID pandemic during the 2020 presidential race.
How do you think voting rights and suppression could pan out in the US in the immediate future?
This is one I'm not quite as close to. I don't have the most admirable record of meeting every election so I kind of fall back. I've never had any that personally but that may have a lot to do with my demographics as well, but I've never had any issue with the accessing my vote, whether I exercise it or not, is a different story.
Of course, it's anti democratic, if we want to use that term, to infringe upon anybody's voting rights. But the United States is famous for having, even in a presidential election, maybe 60% 65% turnout.
And until we see a higher, consistent, voter versus participation rate, I think a little bit of this is a red herring. Not anything explicit that's going to you know definitely disenfranchise a certain group is worthy of fighting against [sic].
Kerry McNamara, Educator, Bossier Parish Community College
The COVID-19 pandemic created a crisis globally, but the US performance was vehemently criticized mostly over the Trump administration's irresponsible response.
The pandemic also revived the socioeconomic divide and took partisanship to a whole new level.
Liberals and Conservatives rush to take their own illogical sides to treat a virus that treats all humans similarly.
I don't see any end in sight, I really don't. I think the Republicans have been captured by, not just by Trump, but Trump wannabe's.
If you look at what Republican governors are doing in all the different states, they're doing some horrific things that they wouldn't have done four or five years ago.
But now that Trump has given them permission to do the most horrific thing they think of because they know that their base will still vote for him.
Vernellia Randall, Professor Emeritus, University of Dayton
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