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Why Evolution Is True
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution
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WHY ARE BIDEN’S RATINGS SO LOW?
November 28, 2021 • 1:00 pm
Like many of you (perhaps), I’m wondering why Joe Biden’s approval ratings are
so low—43% as of November 24—given that his infrastructure bill has passed and
he appears to have brokered a deal to get the Build Back Better bill passed as
well. Yes, there were hiccups: we still have problems at the border, there’s
inflation, and the Afghanistan withdrawal wasn’t very tidy. But Biden’s
left-centrist agenda is doing quite well. So why the disapproval? A new piece by
the liberal writer Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine has a thoughtful (and
long) take on the issue. Click on the screenshot to read:
The upshot is at the beginning:
> But the truth is that Biden’s presidency began to disintegrate without his
> abandoning the center at all. He found himself trapped instead between a
> well-funded left wing that has poisoned the party’s image with many of its
> former supporters and centrists unable to conceive of their job in any terms
> save as valets for the business elite. Biden’s party has not veered too far
> left or too far right so much as it has simply come apart.
>
> . . . The split within the Democratic Party runs along educational lines. The
> party’s college-educated cadre holds more liberal views and is increasingly
> estranged from its working-class counterparts. Those non-college-educated
> voters are disproportionately Latino and Black, but their worldview bears
> similarities to that of the white working-class voters who have left the
> party. The college-educated wing might have claimed power in the name of
> minority voters, but in reality it has started to drive them away.
Yes, Chait thinks that Biden is the unfortunate but innocent victim of a war
within the Democratic Party. On one side is the Left and the intellectuals,
fervently backing causes (open borders, defunding police, etc.) that aren’t
popular with Middle America and non-college-educated folks. And the
“progressive Left” doesn’t seem to grasp that minorities like blacks and
Hispanics are more conservative than everyone imagines. The Right, of course,
tries to label all Democrats as wokies like AOC and Elizabeth Warren, and
they’ve done pretty well at that game. There is seemingly no end to the
performative craziness that characterizes the extreme Left.
On the other side are the centrists, whom you’d think would ally with Biden. But
they’re fueled, says Chait, by Big Business, which is pumping money and ideas
into the centrist moiety of the party in a way that actually stalls Biden’s
agenda (think Manchin, Sinema, and their allies in the House). In the meantime,
the Democratic Party circles the drain as the internecine squabbling continues,
ignoring the main concerns of Americans.
Here are a few quotes from an article well worth reading. There are many more
examples in each area, so have a look at NY Magazine. I’ve tried to summarize
the argument under a few subheadings. Quotes from Chait are indented.
What Americans want.
> One recent poll asked voters to identify the features of the Build Back Better
> plan that most appealed to them. The top five were, in order, adding dental
> and vision benefits to Medicare, home health care for the elderly and
> disabled, letting Medicare negotiate prescription-drug prices, Medicare
> coverage for hearing, and free community college. Democratic centrists in the
> Senate eliminated three of them from the bill completely and gutted a fourth.
> “Bizarrely,” observed Democratic pollster William Jordan in September, “the
> parts of Biden’s agenda that are most popular seem to be most at risk right
> now.”
>
> The centrists did not, for the most part, object to the spending. What they
> ruled out was the policies Biden had come up with to pay for the spending.
> Most of the money would come from tax hikes on corporations and people earning
> more than $400,000 a year, cracking down on tax cheats, and letting Medicare
> negotiate what it pays for pharmaceuticals, which cost Americans more than
> twice as much as in peer countries. All those measures actually made the
> popular spending plans even more popular. Raising taxes on the rich commands
> near two-to-one support. And pollsters have said negotiating drug costs is
> literally the most popular idea they have ever tested.
What Americans don’t want.
> During the 2020 primary campaign, progressive commentators were writing
> columns on a near-daily basis insisting that none of this could hurt the
> party. Swing voters barely existed, left-wing policies were all popular,
> mobilizing the base mattered far more than appealing to moderates,
> and electability was just an empty buzzword used by a failed Establishment to
> fend off popular changes. For a while, these arguments carried the day as the
> leading Democratic candidates kept racing one another to endorse ideas that
> polled catastrophically: decriminalizing illegal border crossings (27 percent
> approval versus 66 percent disapproval), abolishing private health insurance
> (37 versus 58), and providing government health insurance for people who
> immigrated illegally (38 versus 59).
>
> . . .The grim irony is that, in attempting to court non-white voters,
> Democrats ended up turning them off. It was not only that they got the data
> wrong — they were also courting these “marginalized communities” in ways that
> didn’t appeal to them. For the reality is that the Democratic Party’s most
> moderate voters are disproportionately Latino and Black.
>
> In 2020, even as Biden improved on Clinton’s performance among white voters,
> Black support for Trump rose by three percentage points from four years
> before, and Latino support rose eight points. The California recall
> election and Virginia governor’s race this year both showed at least some
> evidence that Latino voters are continuing to slip away from Democrats. The
> 2021 New York mayoral election was marked by heavily Asian American
> neighborhoods flipping Republican.
>
> Confounding the liberal assumption that immigrant communities demand more
> lenient border policies, many signs suggest the swing is a result of their
> wanting stricter enforcement. Some of Trump’s largest gains came in Mexican
> American precincts in Texas; Biden’s approval rating among Hispanic Texans
> stood at 37 percent in late September, with just 26 percent approving of his
> handling of the border. Their dismay was not that Biden has deported too many
> immigrants; by a 20-point margin, they registered their support for deporting
> Haitian refugees.
How the Left screwed up.
> There was never a world in which a concept supported by less than 20 percent
> of the public [“defunding the police”] was going to emerge victorious.
>
> Yet activist groups of all stripes rushed to join the defund movement,
> including Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and dozens of climate groups. Those
> endorsements have continued to blow back in the faces of Democrats. Virginia
> Republicans in this year’s election learned they could attack any Democrats
> receiving endorsements from these groups as gaining support from “pro-defund”
> organizations, and one Democrat declined an endorsement from NARAL, an
> abortion-rights group, in order to avoid being linked to police defunding.
Elizabeth’s Warren’s campaign exemplifies the toxicity of Wokeism. (Warren was
at one time my go-to Democratic candidate.)
> Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaign in 2020 may offer the single most
> instructive example of the distorting effects of the progressive-activist
> complex. Warren began her presidential candidacy with some liabilities — most
> obviously, she was a woman running after an election many Democrats believed
> they had lost because of sexism — but also many strengths. She had earned a
> reputation as a hard-nosed champion of economic reform. Her platform was
> simultaneously aggressive yet broadly acceptable within the party.
>
> Over the course of her campaign, though, Warren found herself both racing to
> outflank Sanders to her left and unable to expand her base beyond
> college-educated liberals. Persist, Warren’s campaign memoir, chronicles her
> dogged and largely successful efforts to win the approval of political
> activists. She proudly notes that a 2015 address at the Edward M. Kennedy
> Institute in Boston was called “the speech that Black Lives Matter activists
> had been waiting for” by the Washington Post. At another speech in 2018, she
> declared, “The hard truth about our criminal-justice system: It’s racist …
> front to back.”
>
> The book quotes an activist’s tweet approving of her criminal-justice plan,
> her well-received appearance at the “She the People” forum, her endorsement by
> Black Womxn For. At no point, however, does she show any sign of grasping the
> disconnect between the preferences of progressive activists and those of
> minority voters. Indeed, as Warren’s campaign went on, her strategy devolved
> into issuing more (and more left-wing) policy promises, lining up more
> activist groups, getting more positive tweets.
>
> The progressive-foundation complex was designed to lift up a candidate like
> Warren. Instead, it swallowed her in a trap, luring her deeper and deeper into
> a worldview increasingly alien to the voters she needed to win.
How the Left-centrists screwed up. This is the part that I find the least
convincing, but it is true that those who consider themselves centrists include
those blocking the Build Back Better bill.
> “We can’t go too far left,” warned Joe Manchin. “This is not a center-left or
> a left country. We are a center — if anything, a little center-right —
> country; that’s being shown, and we ought to be able to recognize that.”
>
> The news media, after years of covering the party’s sharp left turn, were
> primed to accept this interpretation. “Tonight really empowers Manchin and
> [Kyrsten] Sinema,” a Democratic strategist told Politico. “Joe Manchin’s wing
> of the Democratic Party will seem much more crowded today,” observed the
> congressional tip sheet Punchbowl News.
>
> But this seemingly intuitive response had its diagnosis backward. Rather than
> helping to correct the Democrats’ problems with the
> electorate, Manchin, Sinema, and their centrist House allies have compounded
> them. The story of Biden’s domestic agenda is that it was crippled by a small
> but crucial faction of Democrats who came to be persuaded by the C-suite view
> of the world. And all the while, those Democrats persuaded themselves that
> they were the authentic voices of the people.
The effect of the lobbyists on the center.
> It was not quite as simple as wealthy people showing up in Washington with
> suitcases full of cash. But in some cases, at least, it wasn’t that far from
> the truth. Former North Dakota Democratic senator Heidi Heitkamp was lobbying
> against changes to a notorious tax loophole permitting capital gains to escape
> taxation if the owners passed it on to their children — a loophole she had not
> long before called “one of the biggest scams in the history of forever.”
> Former Arkansas Democratic senator Blanche Lincoln, who had once campaigned on
> a promise to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices, was lobbying against it
> on behalf of Big Pharma. And former Montana senator Max Baucus was writing
> op-eds arguing against various tax hikes for the rich while refusing to tell
> reporters who was paying for his consulting business.
>
> . . .Over the summer and fall, item after item in the Biden agenda was
> suddenly plagued by a handful of Democrats expressing quiet doubts. Many of
> these doubts seemed new. When Sinema ran for Senate in 2018, she made reducing
> prescription-drug prices a core promise. And yet by 2021, she had turned
> sharply against her previous position.
>
> The most spectacular success of this lobbying campaign was not merely that it
> persuaded a crucial faction of Democrats to ignore both the voters and their
> own policy wonks to side with organized business interests. It was that they
> managed to coat an agenda that was in its specifics as electorally toxic as
> defunding the police with the pleasant sheen of “centrism.”
>
> . . . The independent variable here is not Biden moving to the left; it is
> congressional centrists counterposing themselves against Biden in a way that
> makes them look more centrist but also makes Biden look simultaneously more
> left wing and less effective.
What Biden wants to do, but is stymied.
> Biden’s legislative strategy has closely hewed to Shorist principles. Biden
> has tried to keep the political conversation framed as closely as possible
> around issues in which he and his party have an advantage: handling the
> pandemic and rebuilding the economy. His economic program has carefully
> avoided any controversial social debates and focused on a highly popular
> combination of raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy and redistributing the
> proceeds to the working and middle class through programs like universal
> access to child care, community college, and a child tax credit.
>
> . . . In one sense, the strategy has worked perfectly. Biden’s program has
> avoided generating the kind of angry public backlash that rose up against
> Obama (and Bill Clinton before him). Indeed, Biden’s agenda has proved so
> uncontroversial that Republicans have barely roused themselves to denounce it
> at all, instead focusing on whatever culture-war chum floats across Fox News,
> from Dr. Seuss to COVID-vaccine mandates. Even the expected grumbling from
> progressives has largely failed to materialize because the agenda included an
> ambitious list of progressive economic priorities that no less a left-wing
> eminence than Sanders described as “the most consequential piece of
> legislation for working families since the 1930s.” Democratic pollster Sean
> McElwee told CNN he detected no divide between liberal and centrist Democratic
> voters, all of whom supported Biden’s program.
>
> . . . The dream of a Rooseveltian presidency was always grandiose, not least
> because Biden lacks FDR’s giant majorities in Congress. Yet it was a sensible
> ambition in its form. Biden’s goal was to demonstrate the concrete benefits of
> good government and, in so doing, to disprove the cynical Trumpian claim that
> Washington was merely controlled by wealthy elites. The Democrats can still
> come through on that promise, if they can prevent the left wing and
> plutocratic center from pulling the party apart. But time is running out, and
> Trump is waiting.
It all makes sense, but of course this is all post hoc analysis of why Biden
isn’t polling well. It may well be right, but the only way of testing it is to
get rid of the Biden-impeding factors (which is impossible), and see if his
numbers rise. I suspect that if the pandemic continues waning, and the Build
Back Better plan passes with the bits that Americans actually want, then Biden
will become more popular. But the border issue will remain, as will the
“progressive” left, wedded to principles that won’t fly with the main body of
the Left.
And Trump is waiting in the wings. . .
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Posted on November 28, 2021November 28, 2021 by whyevolutionistruePosted in
politics Posted at 1:00 pm
POST NAVIGATION
Prev Previous post: I need a new word for “woke”
Next Next post: Here’s the snipe!
79 THOUGHTS ON “WHY ARE BIDEN’S RATINGS SO LOW?”
1. Steven Carr says:
November 28, 2021 at 1:37 pm
More people died from COVID under Joe (Shut down the virus, not the
economy) Biden than under Trump, despite vaccines.
Biden campaigned on shutting down the virus.
He failed.
Blaming Manchin and Sinema doesn’t cut it.
Reply
1. Linda Calhoun says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:07 pm
The majority of deaths have come from the non-vaccinated, not from
Biden’s constituency. Most of the attempts he’s made to get people to
vaccinate have been stymied, either by the courts or by the screaming
F-News people.
L
Reply
1. C says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:40 pm
Not to mention that tRump was in office when the virus first started
spreading, slowly, and did nothing, while Biden came into office when
it was already a global pandemic (not officially declared until
3/11/21) and was fully raging across the world and within the US. And
of course, as you pointed out, Biden inherited a nation full of
dumbass anti-vaxx, pro-snake oil, anti-mask, pro-group gathering,
anti-lockdown morons who have continued to spread the virus while
claiming it a hoax or “not that bad”. Blaming Biden is a bit like
pushing a Boulder down a hillside but blaming the person it crushes
at the bottom because it was going faster by the time it hit them!
Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:47 pm
So Trump imposed a racist, xenophobic travel ban but did nothing,
and the virus only became a global pandemic after Biden took
office?
Trump’s Operation Warpspeed developed the vaccine.
The Democrats will get such a hiding in the midterms.
The analysis by Jonathan Crait has not one critique to make of
Biden.
Like Biden explains, everything is always somebody else’s fault.
You can’t win elections starting from a position of being in
denial of the reality.
Biden is doing is utmost to get the inflation rate above his
approval rating.
His latest idea – open the southern border to anybody who wants to
cross and then impose a travel ban is only one part of his
inability to think straight.
Reply
1. ploubere says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:23 pm
You might be a troll. But let’s refute a few of your points.
Trump’s travel ban was limited to a few Asian countries and too
late. And the virus came to us mostly from Europe. His
subsequent response was denial and disarray, with no federal
coordination for obtaining supplies, and trying to use access
to such as a political weapon.
Trump’s administration deserves some credit for Warpspeed, but
it wasn’t responsible for vaccines, it simply helped fund them
and promised to buy minimum amounts. The vaccines would have
been developed regardless. And Trump encouraged the anti-vax
movement. He made it political, which is why the vast majority
of anti-vaxxers are Trumpers, although to be fair there are
some on the far Left as well.
The southern border hasn’t been opened to just anyone, as was
seen with Haitian immigrants. This BS claim makes me doubt your
motives in posting here.
Reply
1. XCellKen says:
November 28, 2021 at 4:48 pm
Stop being so hard on Trump. My stock in the Clorox Bleach
company increased 399% while he was President
Reply
1. ploubere says:
November 28, 2021 at 5:18 pm
Damn, I missed that investment opportunity. Too late for
ivermectin too, probably. I wonder what the next one will
be.
2. Steven Carr says:
November 30, 2021 at 6:32 am
Trumps vaccine was what led Biden to being able to declare
Independence from the virus on Independence Day itself –
July 4th.
Already, the Republican ads are getting ready to repeat
Biden’s claim
When he declared that on July 4th, he said about how many
died , ‘As of tonight, that number is 603,018 people’
How many have died now Joe?
Reply
2. C says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:01 pm
What happened to the damn edit function?! My dumb fat thumbs typed
3/11/21 instead of 3/11/20! Sorry for the error and damn the
inability to correct it.
Reply
2. Laina Eartharcher says:
December 1, 2021 at 1:38 pm
Linda I wish I could say you’re right but that hasn’t been the case.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(21)00258-1/fulltext?s=08#%20
https://principia-scientific.com/official-data-proves-there-is-a-pandemic-of-the-vaccinated/
Reply
2. Dean Reimer says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:58 pm
That’s rich, considering most of these deaths have come from
vaccine-resistant populations, many of which are resistant for partisan
reasons.
Reply
2. Mark Sturtevant says:
November 28, 2021 at 1:39 pm
Is it wrong to hope that Trump gets the Republican nomination? That is the
only way that I see the Dems winning in the next presidential election if
Biden is the candidate again.
Reply
1. Alex K. says:
November 28, 2021 at 1:48 pm
Or maybe how about this, NOT have Biden be the Democratic nominee for
next election or have a bunch of other Democrats compete for the spot
against the incumbent.
Having Biden run in next election, in his current condition against a
Trumpite-Republican candidate (God forbid Trump) would be a disaster
waiting to happen.
Reply
3. Randall Schenck says:
November 28, 2021 at 1:56 pm
What i see is way too much detailed analysis. Biden is and has always been
a low key politician. Anyone with a big mouth and big personality just runs
over him. The trouble with much of his team is they do not sell the
product. All we get on the news is tons of republican nonsense and they do
nothing. Doing nothing is popular. Trump did it for 4 years and yet 75
million voted for the crook. The republicans will win because they have
taken over at the state level. The democrats have done nothing about that.
In the majority of states we have republican control and they have fixed
the vote. The supreme court has allowed them to fix the vote in all of
these states. They also control the close states at voting time with
control of the election. With this in place they can’t lose. Apparently the
democrats cannot pass any voter rights legislation at the federal level and
therefore, they are finished.
Reply
1. StephenB says:
November 28, 2021 at 5:04 pm
What you said, Randall, especially “[t]he trouble with much of his team
is they do not sell the product. This reminds me of what James Carville
said about needing more Dems in sales rather than policy. Also, HCR’s
latest on Substack:
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/november-27-2021?r=2xi1r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy
Reply
4. Linda Calhoun says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:18 pm
“The Right, of course, tries to label all Democrats as wokies like AOC and
Elizabeth Warren, and they’ve done pretty well at that game.”
I think a lot of the fault lies with the press, and the current model of
monetizing the news. Hits and clicks are the means of selling advertising.
Conflict generates hits and clicks; so do negative stories. Boring stories
of policy successes don’t.
The reason the Right manages to tar Democrats is that all they have to do
is quote some far-Left loon about defunding the police or giving everyone a
basic income, and reporters drink that stuff up and run endless stories
which generate hits and clicks.
I have heard many stories on the news about how the Right and Left are
“working from different sets of facts”. Whoever is producing this tripe has
no concept of the definition of the word FACT. The reality is that one side
is dealing in reality, while the other side is generating nonsense about
Jewish lasers starting the CA wildfires and Chinese thermometers causing
voting machines to vote for Biden.
I also heard a story a couple of nights ago about how each philosophical
side is afraid of the other. The Right is afraid that the Left will change
our country forever, whatever that means. There’s just a general attitude
that we are Satan’s spawn. The left has actual reason to be afraid, from a
participant in a Trump rally asking, “When do we get to use the guns?”, to
New Mexico’s own Cuoy Griffin saying that all Democrats should be shot.
Nobody on the Left is saying anything even remotely comparable to that. But
the only columnist I have seen writing anything about that huge imbalance
is Jennifer Rubin. Everybody else is avoiding the reality completely.
L
Reply
1. Paul Torek says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:37 pm
> I think a lot of the fault lies with the press, and the current model
> of monetizing the news. Hits and clicks are the means of selling
> advertising. Conflict generates hits and clicks; so do negative
> stories. Boring stories of policy successes don’t.
Quoted For Truth. The hits and clicks = $ equation is important. But
it’s also not the whole story. I see far more tut-tutting about how
Biden needs to disown AOC than how McConnell needs to disown Lauren
Boebert, for example. And AOC has yet to support a group of
insurrectionists.
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2. StephenB says:
November 28, 2021 at 5:09 pm
I referred to the latest post by Heather Cox Richardson above, q.v.,
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/november-27-2021?r=2xi1r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy.
Reading it got me thinking that for all the righteous railing against
the Woke we old-school liberals have been doing this past year, it’s
time we turned back to countervailing and diminishing the dangerous
craziness on the Right.
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3. Ruth says:
November 29, 2021 at 4:21 am
Perfectly agreed with the first part of your post, was surprised at the
onesidedness of the second part. One of the problems of the left right
now is that the activistas often also do not deal in reality but in
distortions, distractions and conspiracy theories (systemic racism a
major problem in institutions of higher learning, the only or main
reason for overrepresentation of black people among victims of police
violence is racism, the main function of the justice system is keeping
black people down, the verdict in Rittenhouse case is unjust and racist)
and this nonsense gets amplified by clickbait media.
“Nobody on the Left is saying anything even remotely comparable to
that.”
Don’t they? Depends on whom you are comparing to whom. On the loony
fringes, both sides sound dangerous to me. I remember a (white) college
personality wishing for white genocide for Christmas, a black lives
matter activist declaring that melanin-deficient whites are subhumans,
others who say whites have no soul/are born without a soul, and twitter
is full of anti-Jewish rants by people who present themselves a s black
activists.
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5. Historian says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:18 pm
The latest FiveThirtyEight aggregation of polls shows Biden’s disapproval
percentage at 51.8% and his approval percentage at 42.9% – an approximate
9% difference. At the peak of his popularity during the beginning of his
terms the numbers were about reversed. So, the question is: why did he lose
this 9%? My guess is that the vast majority of these people are not
political junkies that care about the internal divisions within the
Democratic Party or know much about them. The problem is cultural. Probably
most of them support his Build Back Better agenda. Rather, they have
swallowed the incessant and relentless right-wing propaganda that the
Democratic Party is the party of the Woke. It is true that there is a small
such element within the party – AOC and the Squad. The Democratic
leadership has failed to forthrightly, publicly, and continually to reject
their positions that the vast majority of Americans oppose. The leadership
has made a calculation that it cannot afford to alienate the extreme
progressives. It should be obvious to it, but is apparently not, that the
poll numbers show that this strategy is not working. All political
strategies entail a degree of risk. In my view the Democrats would be
better off winning back the disaffected 9% or 10% in the hope that in the
end the progressives will not stay home at the next election.
Ruy Teixeira is a longtime Democratic strategist, who is appalled that the
party has not taken the measures to rid itself of the Woke stigma. In the
below linked article, he offers a practical program that the Democrats
should adopt, one that is certainly liberal, but not Woke, that can win
back disaffected White working class voters. It makes a lot of sense to me.
https://theliberalpatriot.substack.com/p/democrats-can-reach-more-working
Reply
1. JezGrove says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:17 pm
An excellent article, thanks! I’ve forwarded it to my (somewhat) woke
sister in Oregon though I doubt it will do much good.
Reply
2. John Dmytrenko says:
November 28, 2021 at 7:21 pm
I agree that some of the woke culture has caused tremendous damage to
the Democrats. As a reaction to the Rittenhouse verdict Joy Reid
retweeted a video of late night host Amber Ruffin saying, “white people
have been getting away with murder since the beginning of time.” This
kind of nonsense is disgusting and poisonous. Can’t someone in the
Democratic Party just come out and say this is obscene? What is so awful
is that a lot of good things ARE happening in this country. I learned
today that the US has donated more vaccines than all other countries
combined. Some of the work that contributed to that was done by white
people full of bloodlust. It would be a very sick joke if the Democratic
Party gets destroyed by some narcissistic zealots on social media.
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6. Paul Torek says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:21 pm
Chait is largely right, I think. But he neglects the issues Randall Schenck
raises regarding state gerrymandering, voter restrictions, etc., and the
failure to counter these with voter rights legislation. (Or maybe you just
didn’t quote Chait on those subjects? – I haven’t read Chait’s piece.)
That’s an interesting oversight. Maybe it shows how little he expects
Democrats to be able to see the forest for the trees, or act on such
vision.
The pandemic will wax until at least spring/summer 2022, not wane. There is
nothing Biden can do about that unless he can invent a way to turn
Americans sane. Some of Build Back Better, with some but not all of the
popular programs, will pass. The political question is whether the press
will cover the stories of people receiving the benefits. If they do,
conservatives will scream “liberal bias” slightly louder than ever, though
it can be hard to tell.
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7. JezGrove says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:41 pm
The analysis seems pretty plausible (although I freely accept that I’m from
the UK and only have an outsider’s perspective on US politics). It seems
that the Dems are suffering from the same tensions that have blighted the
Labour Party here during its prolonged periods in opposition – an activist
base that is out of touch both with mainstream party members and the
electorate that they should be appealing to, plus an aversion to addressing
difficult issues, such as immigration, for ideological reasons. For some
activists, the mere thought that the party should seek electability is seen
as a betrayal of its core values. Apparently, no number of electoral
defeats will convince them that there isn’t a huge hidden demand for
radical socialist policies. Better, in their book, to retain ideological
purity than to be contaminated by the messy compromises that governing
would entail, no matter the consequences for the millions who will suffer
under years of Conservative rule.
Reply
1. chrism says:
November 29, 2021 at 5:02 am
You’re spot on, and the same has happened with the NDP here in Canada –
the fewer votes they get the further left they go as if that will help a
damn thing. I’m reasonably sure the average American just wanted a
return to some semblance of normality (nope, never going to use
‘normalcy’!) after the roller coaster of Trump. It took a massive
mis-reading of what voters wanted, plus an opportunism by the
furthest-left of the Dems (in truth roughly as left as the average
Centrist Labour pol in the UK) to give the voters exactly the opposite
of their wishes. More roller coaster. And looks like the Republicans are
going to start the next cycle of positive feedback and over-correction
by going more rightwards. I feel like Senna the Soothsayer – “Woe is
me!”
Reply
8. Richard C says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:42 pm
There’s a reason every news item comparing Biden’s low ratings to his
predecessors add the qualifying “at this point in his Presidency” — every
single Democratic President since World War II has had worse approval
ratings during his first (full) term. The only exception would be Kennedy,
who was denied a full term.
Biden is currently polling at 42%. In their first (full) terms, Truman hit
36%, Johnson 35%, Carter 28%, Clinton 37%, and Obama 38%. Truman, Clinton,
and Obama were all reelected after hitting those lows. Only Carter ran for
a second term and lost. (Johnson would have been eligible to run for a
second full term, but chose not to.)
Biden’s unique among Democrats in hitting 42% during his first year. A
lot’s happened his first year, but I think it’s mostly the pandemic not
ending (and all the economic and supply-chain problems that go along with
it), and the Afghani government’s surrender to the Taliban. Fortunately for
him, if the infrastructure package he just signed pays economic dividends
and Afghanistan fades from the news, there will be plenty of time for his
ratings to rebound before 2024.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/democrats-faced-similar-problems-history.html
Reply
1. XCellKen says:
November 28, 2021 at 4:59 pm
Truman and Johnson’s first terms weren’t “full”, having taken over for
predecessors who died.
And don’t forget George HW Bush’s ratings were over 90% after the end of
the Gulf War. A year and a nalf later, he lost his bid for reelection
Reply
9. Randall Schenck says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:48 pm
Another thing that has been a big load against Biden is something he had
little to do with and that is inflation. This was cause by the pandemic
itself mostly – this is economics. A huge drop in demand followed later by
a big rise. The logistics chain is all screwed up. Gas prices go up to get
the inflation going even more. All of this will. pass eventually but for
now it is all bad and Biden gets the blame. He even gets the blame for
anti-vaccine folks dying in large numbers. Not too far into the future the
number in the U.S. will be 800,000 dead. Mandatory vaccines was working but
the crybaby republicans hate it. Can’t you remember in the Constitution
where it said you can’t mandate vaccinations. Just make sure I have a gun.
Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
November 28, 2021 at 2:56 pm
So Biden had nothing to do with increased demand? When he campaigned on
increasing demand?
‘U.S. Oil Product Demand Is Set For A Biden Boost In 2021’
‘The expected stimulus package includes financial aid to low-income
American families, extended unemployment insurance payments, and
billions of dollars in support to state and local governments to avoid
layoffs of state employees. Together with a sizeable infrastructure
package and an increased likelihood of additional short-term stimulus
packages down the road, the Democratic policies create a definite oil
products demand upside.’
‘After a blitz of executive orders in the opening days of his
presidency, Biden is on the verge of achieving the first major piece of
his multi-pronged relief and recovery plan, a $1.9tn coronavirus
stimulus package expected to reach his desk by the end of next week.’
An almost 2 trillion dollar stimulus package, and Biden had nothing to
do with increasing demand?
The midterms will be spectacular!
Reply
1. Randall Schenck says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:38 pm
The trouble with most of that dialogue is – it’s just BS. The build
back better less than 2 trillion that has not even passed as yet, it
could hardly be inflationary. Besides that bill and whatever amount
is over 10 years. Most of it is inflation reducing. The
infrastructure bill that did pass is also not inflationary and covers
many years. The earlier one that was passed because of the pandemic
probably was a cause. Now if you want to talk about 800 billion in
military spending in one year, that is inflationary. Also by the way,
this last bill has taxes in it to pay for most of it. Giving the rich
a 2 billion dollar tax break, the only legislation that Trump even
did, now that was inflationary.
Reply
1. Nicolaas Stempels says:
November 28, 2021 at 9:01 pm
AND, if I’m not mistaken, higher inflation is a world wide
phenomenon, not limited to the US.
Reply
2. Steven Carr says:
November 29, 2021 at 1:37 am
SO you start claiming that inflation is caused by demand, which
Biden had nothing to do with,
I point out that Biden campaigned on increasing demand and lots of
articles at the time of his inauguration boasted about the Biden
effect.
You respond with fury saying Biden hasn’t been able to increase
demand in the way he wanted, just hours after lamenting how
increased demand has derailed Biden’s ratings.
The Democrats are going to get smashed in the midterms and they
will have no idea why it happened.
It will be such fun.
BTW, Biden is giving 70% of millionaires a tax break and Trump’s
bills were not inflationary. I know that because there was little
inflation until the Big Guy said free money was going to go out
the door if people voted Democrat. The Democrat ad was a picture
of a check for 2000 dollars. Biden said ‘Vote Democrat and the
checks go out of the door.’
You can still win the midterms if Biden ups the bribe to 5000
doilars if you vote Democrat. It’s your only chance.
Reply
10. Paul Topping says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:00 pm
Clueless voters that fail to see the alternative to Biden is danger to the
country. Biden and the Dems could sell their story better but I doubt it
would make much difference.
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1. darrelle says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:29 am
That’s the primary factor in my opinion. Clueless voters. The press is
complicit in that of course. Heck, even a majority of ‘our’ side are
part of the problem. If nothing else they talk about the bogus issues
and accusations the Republican machine raises as if they are legitimate.
We are too stupid to hold onto a democratic republic. The Mitch
McConnells of society are well on their way to taking it away from us,
and we are helping them.
Reply
11. JoeK says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:05 pm
The Republican Party, with all its negatives, has an incredible PR
operation. They really know how to message. Lies, truth, who cares. Even
Republican legislators, who voted against the infrastructure bill, are
claiming credit for it in their districts. The Democratic Party has two
major problems. They are utterly incompetent when it comes to messaging,
and they are deathly afraid of the far left minority. They have not been
able to sell the various successes that Biden has had such as the lowest
unemployment in decades, passage of the infrastructure bill, and the BBB
plan that is on its way to passage as well. Sheer incompetence and
continued deference to the far left will cost the Dems in 2022 and 2024.
The mainstream media is also in good part responsible for the current
debacle. They will pick on every wart or problem of a Democratic
administration without compromise and only grudgingly report on the
successes. On the other hand, Republicans can get away with murder and the
MSM will barely report it. I firmly believe the press is deathly afraid of
the Republican party and considers the Democratic Party a bunch of patsies
that are easily bullied.
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1. DrBrydon says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:27 pm
I love when people blame the media. It’s ridiculous. The media couldn’t
be more supporting of Biden and the Dems if Jen Psaki handed out their
talking points. I’d invite you to look at a site like RealClearPolitics
to see the juxatposition of conservative vs. liberal press, or at a
conservative site like Townhall, to see how easy the press is on the
Dems, and how little they do for the Republicans. Maybe the truth is
that no one wants what the Dems are selling.
Reply
2. Geoffrey says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:47 pm
I know this is 50 years old, but have you forgotten the time that a
Democrat literally got away with AT LEAST manslaughter? Ted Kennedy was
the ‘Lion of the Senate’. He died never having been punished for his
crime.
Yah, that’s a long time ago. Things change. No argument. But I would
like to ask when has a Republican politician gotten away with anything
like that? And I don’t mean “This or that policy lead directly to the
deaths of innocent people”. I mean actually drinking, driving, crashing
a car, and then walking away from the scene of the crime. Ted Kennedy
was in the senate for over 40 years after Chappaquiddic. And did
anything happen to him? No. So while the incident was 50 years ago, he
got away with it for 40.
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1. Blood Knight in Sour Armor says:
November 28, 2021 at 6:29 pm
Does Caitlyn Jenner count? I don’t really think he lost his bid for
governor due to his DUI/manslaughter but he didn’t win either.
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1. Geoffrey says:
November 29, 2021 at 8:19 pm
Not familiar with that. But if she killed a man and didn’t serve
jail time, and is a Republican.. then yah, I’d say it counts.
That being said, she’s not part of some political dynasty. If
killing someone prevented her from being Governor, then unlike Ted
Kennedy, she didn’t get a consolation prize of being ‘The Lion of
the Senate’. It’s a much less public and egregious case.
Besides, was she even affiliated with the Republican party at that
point? I mean, presumably she was registered as a Republican, but
I recall seeing South Park mock that from before she actually did
anything political other than simply support Trump.
I mean, you’re not wrong that it does count. But it just doesn’t
have the same feel of excessive injustice as Ted Kennedy at
Chappaquiddick.
Also looking up a brief article about the incident, an LA County
District Attorney dropped the case. It’s not impossible that
someone in the LA legal offices would give leniency to someone
just because they were a Republican, but that seems… unlikely. If
the acquittal wasn’t above board (it mentions there not being
enough evidence, which might be the case) then it’s more likely
that money changed hands, than that a Los Angelos county official
said “I want to keep this pro-Trump trans-woman out in public.”
Kennedys escape was almost certainly due to his political dynasty.
Jenner’s case looks, at a glance, much murkier.
Reply
12. Aneris says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:21 pm
Jonathan Chait triggers the propaganda alert. He was in favour of the Iraq
war, and urged liberals to vote Trump and is now best known for his
spectacularily bad takes. It‘s interesting how he reports on health care.
He picks out specific positions, rather than the big topic. Now compare
will the polls:
Gallup.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/4708/healthcare-system.aspx
Pew
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/09/29/increasing-share-of-americans-favor-a-single-government-program-to-provide-health-care-coverage/
Chait is such a dodgy writer.
Reply
1. darrelle says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:32 am
I agree.
Reply
13. DrBrydon says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:22 pm
Exactly what has he done that is laudable? Not been Trump? He is easily a
bigger liar than Trump about items big and small, from no vaccine mandates
to his homey stories about when his house burned down. The infrastructure
bill wasn’t a win for him, it was a loss. It was Sinema’s bill, and he and
Pelosi tried to hold it hostage by tying it to the Reconciliation Bill.
Then they folded. Afghanistan? The southern border? The transparency of his
administration? The economy? Vaccine mandates? He has done nothing, and at
the same time lost the goodwill that he had as Uncle Joe. What looked
statesman-like during the campaign, with the help of the press, now looks
like senility. Add to that the failure of his stand-ins to recognize the
concerns of average Americans about the economy, whether it is Psaki’s
mocking people about treadmills when they are worried about milk, or
suggesting we all eat tofu for Thanksgiving. This Administration is out of
touch, and it doesn’t care, because it has a compliant Press, and thinks it
can do whatever it wants.
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1. Peter Hoffman says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:34 pm
“He is easily a bigger liar than Trump…”
No need to bother reading anything further from an actually rather
feeble liar himself or herself. And I do not apologize for that word to
anyone. You cannot pretend there is any way that statement contains even
the tiniest shred of truth, taken overall.
If anyone else would like to dispute what I just wrote, I would be
delighted to engage with them—but not with you.
Reply
1. Randall Schenck says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:41 pm
You have to understand – the Doctor gets much of his stuff from fox.
Reply
1. DrBrydon says:
November 28, 2021 at 4:11 pm
I keep telling you, Randall, I don’t watch Fox.
Reply
1. Peter Hoffman says:
November 28, 2021 at 6:00 pm
Drop the period.
Add:
‘, having already given, just above this, a graphic and obvious
demonstration of myself as a liar.’
Reply
14. ploubere says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:26 pm
The problem with these polls is that just because people are critical of
Biden doesn’t mean they won’t end up voting for him anyway, given the
alternative. It’s more likely that the 2024 election will be as close as
every previous one, coming down to a few hundred thousand votes in swing
states. That’s why stopping Republicans from cheating is so vital.
Reply
15. Geoffrey says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:41 pm
I’m going to assume that the article writer does not believe that Biden has
Alzheimers, or some other age-related degenerate mental disorder.
Otherwise, that would be at the top of the list as to why his approval
rating is terrible.
So then, why is the writer talking like he’s an invalid? Poor Joe! He’s
being bullied by AOC! This guy has been in politics his whole life, he
spent 8 years as vice president, and no small amount of time as a senator
before that. And he can’t handle some 30-something former bartender? He
can’t say “You’re defund the police scheme is absurd. I support criminal
justice reform, but I fully denounce any plan that runs under such an
absurd and radical motto!”
Biden has done NOTHING to get the radical wing under his control. You can’t
even say that’s not his fault, because he was the Vice President for 8
years. If he is not an invalid, then he shares some of the blame for not
warning the Democrat party over the growing power of the radicals in the
party.
But of course, it’s not that Biden is an invalid who doesn’t understand
whats happening. Or that he’s simply flumoxed by the radicals in his party,
that have grown and festered under his watch. In the very first Democrat
Primary debate, Biden said that, yes. He supports free health care for
illegal immigrants. Which, by the necessity of identifying someone as an
illegal immigrant and then giving them free things rather than deporting
them, also includes decriminalizing illegal immigration.
The question was asked, and EVERYONE raised their hands. Sure, this was
only half of the primary candidates, but don’t try to sell me that the
Democrat party hasn’t lost control to the radicals. Biden believed that he
had to raise his hand or lose the primaries. Presumably, he had no
intention of following through on that promise, but he knew it could be
used against him later on when running against Trump. And yet, he decided
that it was better to lie to gain the support of the radicals, and risk the
backlash in the actual election, than to say something sensible and risk
backlash in the primary.
Biden is either incompetent, or he was working under the assumption that
radicals controlled too much of his party, and that even as the
vice-president, he was (and is) incapable of constraining them. Biden has
had more time, power and name-recognition than most to stop the radicals in
his own party. And he didn’t. That’s why his approval is through the floor.
I’m reminded of the old Christian Trilemma now. Except instead of liar,
lunatic or lord, he’s Bad, Mad, or Rad(ical). At least Jesus had one of the
three options be good for him.
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1. Glenn Butler says:
November 28, 2021 at 6:49 pm
“And he can’t handle some 30-something former bartender.”
Ocasio-Cortez graduated cum laude from Boston University with a B.A. in
both economics and international relations.
Referring to her disparagingly as a bartender, doing both her and
hard-working bartenders a disservice, you reveal traits that would have
otherwise gone unnoticed.
Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
November 29, 2021 at 1:41 am
If there is one thing AOC wants people to know about her, it is that
she was a bartender.
But well done on totally ignoring the point that Biden cannot stop
the woke Left from being the face of the party.
Reply
2. Geoffrey says:
November 29, 2021 at 8:05 pm
Whatever AOCs qualifications are… she doesn’t have anywhere near the
actual experience, connections, and power that Biden has. Biden was a
Senator, rather than a Representative (and thus had a bigger
proportional share of the vote). He was one for decades. He was one
for decades when she was born. Then he became the Vice President.
Then the Democrat Nominee. Then the President.
So Biden has always had more power than her, except for the four
years of the Trump administration when he wasn’t holding any office.
He also has more experience at this. He’s had more time to learn the
game than most other people. He’s had more time to build
relationships and partnerships than her.
And he can do NOTHING to stop her and her wing of the party. He DID
nothing to stop her movement when it was growing.
I’m not disrespecting bartenders. However, bartenders are not
politicians. If Jerry Coyne joined the House of Representatives and
achieved as much as AOC did against the will of Joe Biden, I’d be
making fun of him for being beaten by a biologist at his own game.
You ignored my entire post and reduced it to me calling bartenders
idiots. You want to say she was a college graduate with relevant
training? Go right ahead. But experience means something. Time
working in the field means something. And Joe Bidens education AND
decades of experience crippled in the face of someone without any of
the latter. Biden, and the people in the party who think like him,
had every advantage over AOC. And they didn’t stop it.
Perhaps Joe Biden was an effective politician once. I don’t know, I’m
too young. But whether through the limitations of age, or lazy
overconfidence, he got stabbed in the back by some young upstart, and
the movement she represents. Anyone who gets elected to be the POTUS
doesn’t get benefit of the doubt. They don’t get to make excuses. You
are supposed to be the best of the best of the best. And Biden is not
some outsider with no connections, no experience, and no help, who
can be outplayed by a weaker opponent who just has more raw power
than him. He IS the man.
So, we get back to where I started. He’s either crap at his job, he’s
actually gone crazy, or he supports what AOC is doing, and is just
trying to pretend he doesn’t for moderate votes. The first one is the
kindest explanation, and the most succinct.
Reply
16. Peter Hoffman says:
November 28, 2021 at 3:45 pm
Answer to the question seems to me to be simply the statistically and
extraordinarily stupid and ignorant level of the people surveyed,
presumably statistically ‘average’ USian voters. And, quite frankly the
degree of evil exhibited.
These rotten excuses for human beings are ready to re-install as their
leader the national mass murderer (Hitler was not much more than that), the
one who is fast becoming an international one, with probably in the end at
least 3 million deaths caused directly by him and his enablers. From
Economist:

“Globalising discontent
Antipodean anti-vaxxers are learning from America’s far right
They are staging noisy protests, waving Trump flags and threatening
politicians”
Take a look.
It’s pretty hard for people outside US to continue to have any sympathy at
all for USians on this matter.
Reply
1. Ruth says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:24 am
The national mass murderer did a lot to push the vaccines along and
touted the vaccines as the best pandemic control measure, just like
Biden in whose lap they fell. It’s largely state and regional
authorities who are responsible for things like contact tracing or mask
mandates or contact reductions, not the mass murderer (or Biden)
himself. Maybe more of the idiots and ideologues on the right could have
been persuaded to vaccinate if Biden and other democrats had lauded
Trump for the vaccines instead of trying to downplay his role.
COVID-wise, the US and most of Europe have done worse than most East
Asia-Pacific countries so far, largely due to bungling in
non-pharmaceutical interventions and probably also different cultural
priorities (“freedom” over safety, individual over collective, low
versus high trust in government). It’s not a specifically USian or
Trumpian phenomenon.
As regards mass murders, the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations all
have quite a lot to answer for, with direct and indirect war casualties
and the casualties of sanctions that always, hit poorer civilians and
hardly ever achieve their objectives.
Reply
1. Peter Hoffman says:
November 29, 2021 at 10:00 am
Listen to the mass murderer’s early interview with Woodward. Or read
it, online or in the latter’s book.
Reply
2. Peter Hoffman says:
November 29, 2021 at 10:12 am
Adding; due to no EDIT coming up :
I charge a conjectured ~3 million out of maybe ~20 million in the
end. We’ll know a lot of pretty accurate info at least from ‘western’
countries when the (actual minus statistically expected) deaths for
the period become known.
Bolsonaro is another mass murderer.
But many of that remaining < 17 million are hardly anybody else's
almost direct doing, as you attempt to allude to.
Here "direct" must be interpreted in a reasonable manner. Adolph
Hitler is quite reasonably regarded as a mass murderer. He did not
himself directly turn the valve for the gas that killed 6 million,
mostly Jewish people, at Auschwitz and other camps.
Reply
1. Peter Hoffman says:
November 29, 2021 at 11:44 am
“….US and most of Europe have done worse than most East
Asia-Pacific countries so far, largely due to bungling in
non-pharmaceutical interventions and probably also different
cultural priorities…”
And local bungling is basically what distinguishes the ‘west from
the east’ is it?
I’d suggest looking at the actual numbers more carefully, and
perhaps dispassionately. E.g.
Right now Canada and US have had very close to exactly the same
amount of time since Covid arrived. The largely heroic, and
sometimes martyr, nurses etc. in the two countries are hardly
different. The availability of FREE vaccine is clear for both. But
the vaccination rates are different, spectacularly different if
you understand a bit the rudiments of exponential increase and
decrease which apply.
And indeed take a look at the Worldometers weekly table for the
whole world, zeroing in on those two countries. Deaths in past 2
weeks:
U.S. —12,132
Canada—293; but adjusts to ~2,650 when multiplied by ~9, the
population difference.
And 12123/293 ~ 4.5
I very much doubt that huge difference factor is somehow mostly a
cultural difference, other than the likelihood that the mass
murderer would be unlikely to get more than 10% of the vote in
other western countries than US.
His efforts to promote vaccines? C’mon, get serious. The idea came
mostly from a Turkish immigrant to Germany and his German born
wife, daughter of Turkish immigrants. Maybe they have long been on
the mass murderer’s list of close personal contacts, but I rather
doubt that.
You could also, for example, compare the present overall death
rates from Covid, say between US and Norway, populations ~> 5
million versus ~> 330 million. You will find the US is about 15
times worse after adjustment, IIRC.
Despite strenuous effort, I just cannot seem to find either Norway
nor Canada on maps of Southeast Asia.
Reply
1. Peter Hoffman says:
November 30, 2021 at 8:44 am
Should be 12123/2650 = 4.5 , of course.
Sorry for four submissions in a row, but this soft-peddling the
mass murderer needs to be countered everywhere with real facts.
Surely tens of millions of USians are not really that
indifferent to human deaths, just naive and easily duped by con
artists.
Reply
17. AC Harper says:
November 28, 2021 at 4:43 pm
There’s an article by David Starkey in The Critic magazine where he sets
out a brief history of Professionals vs Rude Mechanicals – an acute value
distinction between white and blue collar jobs, or professions and trades.
Now ask yourself how unresisted immigration will appear to the poorer
white, black, and Latino people working blue collar jobs. There will be
more competition for their jobs and more pressure to keep wages down.
Now ask yourself how ‘Defund the Police’ will appear to the poorer white,
black, and Latino people living in the poorer parts of cities with higher
crime rates.
So Biden’s approval figures are perhaps a consequence of the Democrats
signalling willingness to lean towards the ‘liberal professions’ at the
expense of the blue collar workers – and the blue collar workers feel
disenfranchised.
Reply
1. darrelle says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:54 am
I am in a business that employs trades people and I can tell you that
immigrants are not cheaper labor than good ole white folk born and
raised here for generations. I’ve heard this claim for most of my life
and yet in over 30 years employing trades people I’ve never seen
evidence that immigrants were taking jobs away from white folk, or
anyone. The only companies that make over hiring cheaper trades people
are ones that are operating illegally, using various methods to avoid
payroll taxes and most especially workman’s comp insurance. And it isn’t
just immigrants that those sorts of companies hire. Plenty of good ole
white boys are happy to leave a legitimate job to work for cash, while
it lasts.
The fact is that good ole white folk apparently don’t even want the jobs
these days because it has been nearly impossible to hire any for years,
well before the pandemic. Of those left in the trades the average age is
old. Too old really, but in the good ole US of A that’s how we do it.
Meanwhile, you can still find immigrants capable and willing to doing
the work, but they are not cheap. Wages have increased dramatically in
recent years, starting before the pandemic. I think that’s great by the
way, wages have been nearly stagnant for decades and this is the first
time I’ve ever seen increases like this. It does make business
challenging when it happens so quickly though.
Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:58 am
The New York Times had an interesting article a few weeks ago about
South African immigrants being hired at 11 dollars an hour and taking
away jobs from Americans willing to do the work for cheaper.
I quote some of it. Very informative article.
Growers brought in more South Africans with each passing year, and
they are now employed at more than 100 farms across the Delta. Mr.
Strong, 50, and several other longtime workers said they were told
their services were no longer needed.
“I never did imagine that it would come to the point where they would
be hiring foreigners, instead of people like me,” Mr. Strong said.
… The Delta is only one of a number of places where South Africans
have been hired for agricultural work in recent years.
Reply
1. darrelle says:
November 29, 2021 at 9:44 am
A valid data point. This sort of thing certainly happens. Does it
happen frequently enough that it’s a problem that should be
addressed? Is this a significant driver of unemployment among
non-immigrants? If so, how should it be fixed? What’s the cause,
who’s at fault? Is it the immigrants? Is it the employers who fire
current employees in order to hire cheaper ones? Is it the whole
system that allows / results in shit wages for jobs like this? Or
is this just the market working as it should?
One thing that’s always been quite clear though is that the
Republican Party propaganda about immigration being a critical
problem and that the Democratic Party never takes it seriously,
never does anything but make it worse, is bunk.
Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
November 29, 2021 at 9:48 am
In the case that the NYT reported upon . American workers
earning about 8 dollars an hour were replaced by South African
immigrants earning 11 dollars an hour.
The Democratic Party does take immigration seriously. They take
it very seriously. Why do they think they made sure that so
many illegal immigrants could make it across the Southern
Border?
Reply
1. darrelle says:
November 29, 2021 at 10:54 am
So the immigrants are making more money? Is it because they
are better at their jobs? Is it because the employer is
doing something illegal like not paying taxes and insurance?
I can guarantee you that the employer isn’t paying nearly
40% more unless they are being compelled to do so in some
way (which doesn’t seem all that likely) or unless by the
time it gets down to the bottom line they aren’t actually
paying more money and are either straight up making more or
making an investment that they hope means more money in the
near future.
In any case, I don’t see how this is the fault of immigrants
or immigration. Immigrants or no immigrants people lose
their jobs to other people all the time. We wouldn’t want
government to help these people against the interests of
their employers, would we? Have the government interfere
with the market? Some call that sort of thing socialism. At
least when it suits them.
Judging by your last paragraph, our discussion is likely
pointless. From my point of view you are either badly
misinformed, or worse.
Reply
1. Dean Reimer says:
November 29, 2021 at 11:33 am
Note how he “quotes” the NYT story, but provides no link.
That’s so that he can present the story in a way that
supports his agenda.
Here’s the story, which is more nuanced than “immigrants
are taking our jobs!”:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/12/us/black-farmworkers-mississippi-lawsuit.html
First, these are not “immigrants.” They are temporary
foreign workers.
Second, it is white South Africans that are replacing
black American workers.
Third, this story is about a lawsuit filed by employees
of one particular farm operation. Take this and the
second point together and make of it what you will.
Fourth, the workers that were let go are older (at a
typical retirement age), where the TFWs are younger and
willing to work longer hours. The story doesn’t suggest
that there is a line up of young Americans willing to
take on the job.
2. Leslie MacMillan says:
November 29, 2021 at 3:46 pm
Lots of Canadian businesses have to hire TFWs, too,
because even in regions of chronically high unemployment
they can’t find Canadian citizens willing to do the work.
(In those high-unemployment areas, those Canadian
citizens are mostly white.) And we’re not talking field
farm labour, either, although we do hire many TFWs for
the harvest season in farm country. These are steady
manufacturing jobs, perhaps not the most desirable work
imaginable but it’s inside out of the weather. There are
standards for their pay, benefits, taxes, and workers’
comp. insurance.
White folks in high-unemployment areas prefer short-term
seasonal work that’s not too demanding and reliably ends,
like when fishing season closes. Then they can apply for
generous employment insurance benefits to tide them over
for the rest of the year. That frees them up to do casual
labour like home repairs off the books whenever they feel
like it. A steady job in a chocolate factory or a
meat-packing plant doesn’t fit that lifestyle, so TFWs on
renewable contracts are the way to go. Since there is
competition to attract TFWs and white local labour won’t
take it at even twice the wage, “because I’d lose my
benefits”, it could well be that the business has to pay
more for a TFW than it would for a citizen in an economy
where there was no disincentive for white natives to work
at all.
This is what we mean by “structural unemployment.”
3. JezGrove says:
November 29, 2021 at 4:59 pm
British workers are equally happy to complain about
immigrants stealing jobs that it turns out they are not,
in fact, willing to do themselves: “The Day the
Immigrants Left”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00r3qyw
That TV show was from 2010 – long before Brexit – and
should have been a warning about the underlying reality.
Instead, something like 5 million tonnes of cauliflower
and other crops have been ploughed back into the soil
this year because they couldn’t be harvested – a shocking
waste of food and a serious loss of income to the
farmers. Similar things are playing out in the livestock
sector of the UK’s agriculture industry – farmers are
slaughtering pigs in ways that mean that they can’t go
into the food chain, because there’s a chronic shortage
of veterinary staff at licensed abattoirs.
4. Steven Carr says:
November 30, 2021 at 1:05 am
Badly informed? I was going by the NYT article.
It said the employers used iSouth African immigrants
because they had a much better work ethic than the
American workers that were displaced.
Sorry if that upsets you.
18. StephenB says:
November 28, 2021 at 5:19 pm
Reading Chait’s litany of senators and their corporate sponsors reminds me
that the Senate is a club of multimillionaires.
Reply
1. Neil Wolfe says:
November 28, 2021 at 8:19 pm
I think it was the late Robin Williams who suggested that politicians
should have to wear NASCAR-style jackets covered with the logos of their
sponsors so we know who owns them.
Reply
1. StephenB says:
November 28, 2021 at 8:37 pm
😄
You may be interested in Snopes on this.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/robin-williams-nascar-drivers/
Reply
1. Neil Wolfe says:
November 28, 2021 at 8:56 pm
I remembered the joke from one of his stand up routines though I
don’t care enough to find out which one. He did say it, he just
wasn’t the first. It’s strange that the Scopes article doesn’t
seem to acknowledge his stand up career.I guess they don’t care
either.
Reply
19. J says:
November 28, 2021 at 5:33 pm
Until the last line, no mention of the #1 thing.
Biden’s “support” in getting elected had little to do with Biden. It was a
one-issue campaign …
“We hate Trump.”
Reply
20. Barry Lyons says:
November 28, 2021 at 8:10 pm
I want Biden to be The New FDR. So does Robert Reich. See his Twitter
profile for more on this.
Most voters, including many Republicans, DO want universal child care, DO
want universal healthcare, DO want taxes raised on the super rich, DO want
to see a fuller Build Back Better program, DO want to see cannabis
legalized on the federal level, etc. The problem with the Democrats is that
they are lousy at selling ideas. (Also, “defund the police” seems like a
straw man to me now, as I am not aware of anyone in the past few months
calling for this. True, some people are calling to de-militarize the
police, which I favor, but that’s not the same thing.)
I still don’t know what this so-called “far left” is. Sanders isn’t “far
left.” He’s a Democratic Socialist. He just wants to see this country have
policies on par with what Scandinavia has, which is to say there’s nothing
“far left” about the above-mentioned items. (I always surround those two
words with quote marks because those two words coupled together annoy the
crap out of me. “Far left” seems like a talking point created by
Republicans in order to create disarray among the Democrats, but that’s a
subject for another day.)
Reply
21. Steven Carr says:
November 29, 2021 at 1:52 am
Do Americans actually know that the entire world is laughing at Biden and
there are endless clips of him talking gibberish, forgetting things, being
unable to read the teleprompter, and rambling on about long dead sportsmen
in true Grandpa Simpson style?
As for Kamala Harris….
Reply
1. Don Quijote says:
November 29, 2021 at 4:44 am
Here in Spain, I am not laughing at Biden. I do laugh at many Americans
though.
Reply
2. Guillaume Laurent says:
November 29, 2021 at 5:36 am
Sorry to break it to you, but it’s Trump we were laughing at. A lot. He
was an absolute buffoon, way worse than G W. Bush was. Biden is quite
respected here in France, except by Trump/far right fans.
Reply
3. JezGrove says:
November 29, 2021 at 5:19 pm
Biden is respected far more in the UK and the rest of Europe than Trump
ever was. In the Reagan years Spitting Image remorselessly mocked the
Gipper, but even he looked relatively compos mentis compared to Trump.
(Sadly, not much of the show’s “The President’s Brain Is Missing”
sections are available online: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_NDinsd8Qc0
)
And it takes quite a bit to make Dubya appear statesmanlike, but the
Donald managed that, too.
Reply
22. onionsack says:
November 29, 2021 at 7:51 am
Imagine being so tribal and deluded as to call his long string of absolute
policy debacles “hickups”, and to characterize his presidency as even
remotely “centrist”. The Afghanistan withdrawal was “untidy”? It was
inarguably the worst foreign policy debacle since Vietnam. We gifted our
arch-enemy not just a country, but a multi-billion dollar taxpayer-funded
arsenal. Thousands of Americans, green card holders and allies abandoned to
the Taliban. Launched a “revenge” drone strike, told America he’d struck
back at ISIS, when in fact he’d merely killed aid workers and children. The
worst border crisis in the history of our country, with millions of aliens
streaming unchecked and unaccounted for into our nation. Worst economy
since the Great Depression, with inflation not only getting worse, but
facing the prospect of a 7-trillion dollar boondoggle added to it. People
paid not to work. Hyperinflation imminent. Completely nonsensical and
authoritarian Covid plan. Unconstitutional mandates. Civil liberties
suspended. An entire generation of children kept out of school for a year.
The right to private property banished. Killed thousands of jobs on a
pipeline for the sake of “environmentalism”, tanking gas prices, and then
supported a different RUSSIAN pipeline in Europe. Men in girl’s bathrooms,
locker rooms, and sports. Systemic racism in school curricula, elimination
of standards. A total embrace of “equity”, and a complete rejection
“equality of opportunity” and everything Martin Luther King stood for.
Completely divisive president, made the preposterous claim that white
supremacists were the greatest threat facing the nation. His physical and
mental decline have made him an international figure of pity, if not
ridicule. I could go on and on and on. If this guy didn’t have all of MSM,
big Tech, academia, Hollywood, and partisan bloggers like you running
interference for him, he would be rightly regarded as what he is: the worst
president in the history of the country.
Reply
23. Chris says:
December 1, 2021 at 7:39 am
Should the compensation for US slavery include teeth knocked out by a slave
master to his own slaves?
Is it enough to provide dental care for slaves and their families to have a
clear conscience?
Should slaves whipped with whips, their master should provide them with a
cream with substances that soothe irritations and prevent infections?
Reply
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