Matt Yglesias: What the Fate of Joe Biden’s Presidency Hinges On

Solid column from Matt Yglesias.

Something like 1% of the public says that voting rights is their top priority. Normies are mad about supply chain shortages, gas prices and the price of everything going up. COVID, crime and illegal immigration are also out of control. We are also in an utterly normal cycle of backlash politics.

New York Times:

“President Biden’s first year in office has been frustrating for many of his supporters. He has disappointed his more leftist supporters by refusing to take aggressive unilateral action in some areas where he has discretion, and he has disappointed his more moderate supporters by choosing to take aggressive action in other areas.

That’s doubly true for the gaggle of youngish, college-educated, city-dwelling liberals who dominate the work force of the media, the progressive nonprofits and much of the Democratic Party itself — people who most likely didn’t back Mr. Biden in the primary and always suspected he wouldn’t deliver enough change for their tastes.

However, these are the banally normal problems of a normal presidency. Even the midterm wipeout that appears to be looming for his party is, by historical standards, a normal course of events. …”

Joe needs to find some way to get rid of this guy.

He needs to publicly whack this guy to reset his image before he sinks any further.

The situation is not unsalvageable. It is conceivable that inflation could ebb, the supply chain issues could be sorted out, gas prices could go down, the border could stabilize and Omicron could be the end of COVID. I think that at least two of these things will likely happen before the midterms.

At the end of the day though, this guy will still be around and dragging the Democrats down to political defeat. He will alienate more people on his own side. We saw last night that inflated rhetoric about 1/6 and “our democracy” and voting rights got the Democrats nowhere. All it accomplished was creating more polarization and gridlock which guaranteed a party split and embarrassing defeat.