Opinion by E.J. Dionne Jr.: Maybe Joe Biden is just Joe Biden, and maybe it’s neither the 1930s nor the 1990s anymore.
Standing up for D.C.’s democratic autonomy against carping Republicans in Congress would have been the right thing to do, and most House Democrats voted against rescinding the code. One problem: The rewrite was vetoed by Democratic Mayor Muriel E. Bowser. Although she was overridden by the council, her stance complicates the home rule argument.In going along with the Republican effort to scrap the reform, Biden’s defenders say he is simply being true to his history of toughness on law-breaking.
On energy and immigration, Biden’s latest initiatives have faced challenges from the left, but he was searching for a middle ground on these problems, particularly immigration, back when he was being cast as FDR redux. Yet even if you stipulate that Biden is executing some tactical maneuvers to fend off Republican attacks, there is a forest-and-trees problem in using a handful of decisions to declare a wholesale change in his presidency.That’s why, despite some grumbling, there is not a revolt against him among progressives. They see Biden as closer to their view than any president in decades on core economic questions, including taxes, trade, labor, inequality and regulation.
And there’s no going back to the ’90s, because opinion among Democrats and the public has shifted leftward on many issues. Among them: racial justice, voting rights, LGBTQ rights,Biden’s approach reflects these shifts no less today than at the beginning of his term. While he is especially animated when talking about economics and lifting the fortunes of the working class, he has not been shy about addressing matters at the heart of the GOP’s culture wars.
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