The Obama administration guided the nation into recovery from the Great Recession. It placed the economy on a stable foundation for sustainable growth capable of withstanding the vicissitudes of global events. Under Obama’s leadership Congress passed the Affordable Care Act bringing lower cost health insurance to millions of families. This in spite of unyielding opposition from Republicans who had given up governing in favor of grasping raw power at any cost. The cost was high. Issues strengthening equity and justice were blocked and a Trans Pacific trading partnership was torpedoed that would have checked a growing threat from China. Nevertheless, by the end of his term, the economy was thriving, the deficit declining, and prospects for better yet to come looked bright. It was not to be.
Right wing talk radio and Koch Network machinations had worked hard to build an anti government movement of disaffected voters steeped in two decades of conspiracies and flat out lies. It convinced enough of them to elect a wannabe dictator who promised to make America great again. He did just the opposite.
In four chaotic years,Trump undermined economic stability, degraded relationships with allies, colluded with dictators, started a tariff war that helped set fire to inflation, and blew the lid off the national debt and deficit. All in the name of making America great again. The COVID pandemic would have thrown the country into an economic slump no matter what but the Trump administration’s bumbling and his own strange announcements, drove it into a deep recession, and the deaths of a million persons. Trump led a growing white supremacist, fascist movement built on bizarre conspiracies and scapegoating. Even now as battles loom, led by usurpers eager to push the doddering old man out of the way, the Trump movement will outlive him. He won’t go down easily, as proved by the insurrection he fomented in his last days in office, an insurrection that came dangerously close to succeeding.
A majority of American voters had had enough. They rejected Trump and trumpism in favor of Joe Biden. With a bare and contentious majority in Congress, the Biden administration has led us out of a long and pointless war, repaired the nation’s economic foundation, guided us out of the Trump recession, begun the work of rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure, and reestablished American credibility in the global arena. Even as inflation troubles family budgets, the economy remains robust.
For all of it, Biden’s approval ratings remain in the 30% range, miserably low for any president. The reasons are many and a little scary. Media pundits harp on the low ratings with predictable results. Readers and viewers are led to believe if so many others think he’s doing a bad job, it must be so, even if the evidence says otherwise. The right wing propaganda machine is in full swing with exaggerations of street crime, economic woes, bizarre conspiracies, and more flat out lies. There is no responsible loyal opposition from Republicans, the GOP having turned to neo-fascism abetted by cowardice among genuine conservatives. They’ve made good use of the old war horses of illegal immigration, fear of street crime, reckless spending, opposition to gun regulation, and various other hard-times-are-upon-us tropes. They’ve added a few new ones such as Critical Race Theory, the decline of White hegemony, and the usual grumbling about radical leftist socialist agendas.
Taken together they have created an avalanche of conflicting “news” leaving too many ordinary folk unable to tell what is real or unreal, true or false, fake or genuine. Low poll numbers are the predictable result of well sown “bad” news even in the face of a surprisingly successful and effective administration. That’s today’s American politics for you. Not promising.
Could the polls be wrong? As any student of Sir Humphrey (The British series “Yes Minister,”) knows, the pollsters could easily produce high marks for Biden simply by rewording their survey instruments. The midterms could show that the pollsters have been asking the wrong questions. Or maybe not. November will tell.
Actually, this “explains it all”, IMHO!