Please excuse my absence on this blog, I’ve had a busy few weeks. Some of you will be here for the book content, so ignore this if politics isn’t your thing, but it’s one of my passions that I simply can’t help writing about. Ahead of the US Election Result, in this piece, I make the case that despite his many faults, Joe Biden is what America needs right now. If you’re an American reading this and you haven’t already – vote, and vote sensibly.
There was never going to be anything radical, or life-changing about Joe Biden, but rather that is the point.
After 4 rollercoaster years in power, Donald Trump has exhausted, not reignited, the American people. From denying climate change to inciting a war over words with the leader of North Korea, to the more recent trivialisation of a deadly disease that has come to define our lives, the time has come for a bit of normalcy in American politics.
And it seems that American voters are now recognising that too.
In the key battleground states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida and Wisconsin to name a few, Biden is on track for some leads which will be essential for him to dominate the Electoral College, and securing the magic number of 270 needed to win the presidency. The mood has shifted since what seems like a lifetime ago back in 2015 when Trump was given the keys to the White House.
The pandemic has caused the world to wake up in many ways. During national shutdowns, international travel was halted, and the stay at home order for many meant that towns and cities across the world, for the first time in years, became silent. The sound of rush hour traffic became a distant memory. This gave the planet a temporary rebate from impending climate disaster, but has since, made the issue even more imperative for us to solve.
Regardless of who wins the election, the US is on track to leave the Paris Climate Change agreement, thanks to Trump. However, if he gains power, Biden has insisted he will make sure the US is added straight back in. His policies on climate change, including his commitment to a gradual transfer from oil to renewable energy, may have kicked up a storm, created by his rival, but at the heart of it – is a man who cares about the planet. Though seen as radical in some American circles, a Biden presidency would put the US back on track to meeting their climate change targets.
Biden’s Green New Deal directly draws the connection between the economy and the environment, something Trump has labelled this as socialist and clownlike due to the requirement of $3trn required to completely overhaul the US economy. If Biden gets back into power, the US can get back to business and focus efforts on combating the biggest threat to all our futures, instead of ignoring its very existence.
Furthermore, Trump’s branding of this election and his rival candidate as being part of “a choice between a socialist nightmare and the American dream” is deliberately intended as a divisive, political tactic, but it doesn’t work. Trump is drawing on the historic fearmongering tactics to paint anyone who veers against Republicanism with the same brush. We saw it in the 1950s with Communism – and it has been used again to add fuel to Trump’s own fiery, Red wave. By Britain’s political standards at least, Biden could not be further from the left – he is the middle ground candidate who is essential for getting America back on track, getting out of the pandemic and moving beyond.
Biden’s dullness, and the feeling one gets of wanting to snooze doing one of his speeches, is problematic for many reasons, but it is what is needed in American politics right now. During his bid for President in 1988, Biden fought against Ronald Reagan and stated in a series of BBC interviews that the thing he hated the most about this president, was how he divided the American people. Over thirty years on, he is fighting on the same grounds, but it might just be enough this time around. His deliberate reincarnation of the unity candidate is what America needs, and it feels like this has managed to convince voters too.
American’s are fed up. They have had their lives turned upside during this pandemic, the lines of racial, social and gender division are now bolder than ever before. The land of the free is in turmoil – and what does it need? A return to normalcy and the status quo. Only then and after – will it be able to make way for the pathway towards radical change.
