It is Time for Biden to Be Bold, Not to Stand Down
For the past few days, Democratic Party poohbahs have been clutching their pearls, fearing the worst from the November elections. Media from The New York Times to The Washington Post to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution have called for President Joe Biden to step aside prior to the August Democratic National Convention. Influencer columnists read and liked by Biden himself have done the same. All claiming that, for the sake of the nation, Biden should be thanked for a lifetime of public service as the next generation of leader takes his place at the top of the 2024 ticket.
All of this, of course, at a time when many of the same Dem voices have been shouting from the rooftops that the most important issue this election is the potential threat to democracy, similar to what the party ran on in 2020. Discounting a growing number of public opinion polls on what voters are truly concerned with, they believe that the existential threat to our democratic systems will drive voters to the polls to pull the blue lever, an altruistic vote on behalf of a nation in need.
Both the doomsdayers and the democracy savers are missing the big picture, though, and in the process are focusing on the wrong solution. Voters don’t want to be lectured on how they don’t understand the economy is far better than they think, even if they can’t afford to fill their gas tanks. Voters don’t want to be told that the job market is strong when they need to work two jobs in order to pay the rent and car insurance. And they certainly don’t want to hear about how their own kitchen table concerns are the wrong things to focus on, and instead we need to focus on obtuse issues whose definitions have baffled the nation since Benjamin Franklin told crowds at the Constitutional Convention that he had given them “a republic … if they can keep it.”
Rather than turning up the heat on demands for the leader of the free world to step aside a month before his official renomination, concerned patriots should be asking what can we do, what should we do, to demonstrate that Biden is a strong leader, that he has the best interests of the nation at heart, and that he is taking definitive action to address growing voter concerns. The President needs to act. He needs to act decisively. And he needs to act in a meaningful way.
How? By executive order. Yes, I get that many Democrats have wrung their hands for three and a half years about the dangers of executive orders. They’ve worried about the next administration, presumably Republican, undoing anything that they do. But that sounds like a tomorrow problem, not a today one. They worry about the balance of power and the rights of Congress to act. Yet Congress has been given the opportunity to act on many of our top concerns, with both Democrats and Republicans leading Congress, and have, time and again, chosen not to. If the current time wasn’t built for executive orders, what time is?
Forget what could happen in 2025 or in 2029. Imagine a series of bold policy announcements that both call a Republican House of Representatives derelict of duty, that highlight Donald Trump’s influence on a previously uninfluenceable Senate, and that beg the Supreme Court to settle policies and laws once and for all.
An executive order on immigration and how to proactively manage the growth of undocumented immigrants in a way that makes sense for the business community and those jobs that most Americans would never do.
An executive order on guns, restoring some of the bans of the 1990s so that our schools, our churches, and our community centers are safer than they have been for years.
An executive order on drug prices, ensuring that all Americans have access to necessary medicines without bankrupting their families.
An executive order on crime and violence, particularly one that takes a tough line on domestic terrorism and threats to women and the BIPOC communities.
An executive order on climate change, enacting common-sense policies that move beyond electric vehicles.
An executive order on the deficit and growing federal debt, ensuring that future generations will not be saddled with the expenses of the now.
An executive order on racism and violence-based ideology, respecting all individuals in the United States as human beings, while ensuring that hateful speech and ideology-based acts of violence will no longer be tolerated.
An executive order on homelessness, looking to use the growing number of unoccupied office buildings in our urban centers to provide alternatives to those currently without a home.
An executive order on hunger, particularly child hunger, using the schools to ensure families have access to our plentiful food supplies.
An executive order on prescription drugs, ensuring that resources are focused on helping and healing those who are addicted instead of incarcerating them.
Rather than focus on the political party platform that is part of the national convention, a platform that few read and that fewer understand, the Biden Administration can telegraph its plans for a second term with a series of executive orders, then deploy Cabinet members and administration surrogates to spend the next three months promoting executive order after executive order, all in the name of a cogent federal political strategy.
Biden looks strong and aggressive announcing these in a series of Rose Garden or Oval Office announcements. The campaign trail is a discussion of actual policies that affect our lives, not of intangible belief systems. And if Biden is re-elected, Congress has a clear blueprint on what policies need to be codified into federal law, as the voters have spoken.
The law is clear that Section 1 of Article II of the U.S. Constitution grants the President the authority to issue such orders. So it’s time for Biden to maximize the powers granted to him and be bold, be strong, and be a leader. Congress has abdicated its responsibility on most of these issues. So it falls to the President to do what he can do, what he should do, to address the significant concerns of the American people today.
This isn’t a red issue nor a blue issue. This isn’t a progressive or a MAGA cause. We are in a period of serious concerns that require serious actions. It’s time to answer Ben Franklin’s call and keep this republic intact. It is time to follow Teddy Roosevelt’s wise words and demonstrate that Biden is the Man in the Arena. And it is time to heed JFK’s proclamation and embody a profile in courage.
Or in the lyrics of Elvis Presley, it is time for a little less conversation and a little more action. Nothing speaks more powerfully than action. We know it. Now Biden has to show it.
