A Rude Awakening is Coming for Biden Supporters
By: Elizabeth John
Tags: Politics, Biden, Elections, American Politics, Racism

A Rude Awakening is Coming for Biden Supporters

This vote won’t solve America’s problems

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

I’ve seen a lot of news articles in the last two weeks that seem strangely triumphant and assured that the Trump-era is coming to an end.

While Trump may indeed lose the election, I think that we are a long way away from the end of Trumpian politics. The state of American politics won’t change just because Biden is in office, the polarization of opinion, the simmering of political violence on left and right, racial tensions, economic turmoil, recovery from Covid, the list of issues which a Biden presidency will inherit is long, and there are few signs to suggest the political temperature will come down.

Let’s project ourselves out five months from now.

We’ve finished the first 100 days of a Biden presidency.

What is it that we think America will be like?

There seems to be a lot of utopian sentiment circulating at the moment. Ideas like; if Trump isn’t in office then racism and racial tension will be a thing of the past. I’ve been told that the Covid-19 pandemic will be better handled. A vaccine will magically appear with sufficient testing, and there will be plenty of funding for healthcare workers and hospitals. A Biden presidency has been touted as a return to normalcy, when qualified and expert people will be appointed into the cabinet and to serve as ministers.

The problem is, I don’t think reality will want to cooperate with the Biden dreamers.

There doesn’t look to be any end in sight for Covid-19. There is little evidence that Biden will introduce any drastic changes to federal policy. Besides more public endorsement of mask wearing and social distancing measures, there isn’t much more that can be done. Issuing a stimulus package for Covid affected industries and unemployed people will be the height of it, which is probably why Nancy Pelosi is holding up a Trump stimulus package. She wants to make sure that Democrats get the credit for it; there isn’t any sign that the provisions of the stimulus will be radically different, although Democrats have shown signs that they want more progressive reforms.

Racial tensions might be assuaged with Biden in office, he will certainly bring the temperature down. But Biden and Harris have reputations as law and order type candidates, Harris prosecuted thousands of non-violent drug crimes during her time as AG for California. Biden introduced the 1994 crime bill which massively accelerated the incarceration of individuals involved in drug-related crimes.

On the left, Biden isn’t nearly extreme enough, which means that the trenchant identity politics will continue and likely gain even more credence in mainstream media as identity becomes a convenient way to overlook pressing economic crisis and political corruption.

Political violence will likely continue; if Antifa continues to provoke riots and violence you can be sure that militia groups will also emerge to counter them.

Hardly anyone but Biden expects members of the GOP to go along with his plans. Republicans won their current majority in the Senate by waging all-out resistance to Obama’s programs. Any GOP senator who supports Biden’s plans will almost inevitably face a primary challenge from the right.

“It’s easier to be united when you’re all fighting against Trump,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told the Los Angeles Times. “We know we’ll have to fight to keep these things [in the platform]. Agreements can sometimes come apart.

“I knew we weren’t going to turn Joe Biden into Bernie Sanders,” she added.

The return to normalcy is an alluring and probably smart campaign tactic, but ultimately, the way politics operates has been forever changed by the media-complex and the technology of Trumpian politics.

Biden supporters will have a shock if Trump manages to win the election next week, but I think that unfortunately, the bigger shock may be to find that with a Biden presidency not much will have changed in American life a year from now.