By Stephen Macaulay
Consider what normal people — people who aren’t reading The Hustings, say — think national politicians are doing right now: Arguing. That’s pretty much it.
Meanwhile, kids may or may not be going to school. Shelves at the local grocery store are continuing to be just so-so stocked. And prices are going up on damn near everything.
And should they watch the evening news, they learn that Democrats are arguing with Democrats. And the Republicans seem to be doing not much more than refusing to honor subpoenas (while there wasn’t a Schoolhouse Rock about subpoenas, regular folk pretty much know that when you are served, you are supposed to show up — and you would imagine that those who are in office have that same obligation).
Oh, and there may be war breaking out in Ukraine.
The level of crime and homelessness in big cities is increasing.
COVID cases are rising, and while there is now the availability of free COVID tests coming from the Feds, hospitals’ staff are in the process of burning out.
But most conversation coming out of Washington seems to be about filibuster reform.
Who cares? Certainly not a huge percentage of people in the country.
There are real problems in the country affecting people right now. The top two are COVID and inflation.
They are profoundly different and yet linked. The government is trying to address the former in evident ways, such as free testing and mask distribution. Why wasn’t this happening six months ago?
Inflation is basically an issue of supply and demand (to say nothing of the size of the money supply) and there isn’t a whole lot the president can do about that. (When George W. Bush suggested that people go shopping after 9/11 that didn’t go over well, so one would assume were Biden to suggest people stop shopping, the reaction would be similar.) While some economists think the $1.9-trillion American Rescue Plan was consequential to the state of inflation, let’s face it: The government was dealing with unprecedented conditions caused by a global pandemic, so maybe it erred on the side of excess. Then again, lots of regular folk were probably very happy about things like (1) keeping their jobs, (2) the Child Tax Credit and (3) those $1,400 checks.
All the talk of a “reset” or of worrying about the progressives or the moderates misses the point.
According to a January 18 Morning Consult poll, 65% of Americans think the U.S. is on the wrong track.
That’s who Joe Biden needs to concern himself with. Not Manchin or Jayapal. The 65%. The people who know that he’s not to blame for everything but who want to see him doing something.
One of the things that Trump did with some effectiveness is to take a position regardless of what anyone else thought and run with it (until he became distracted by something else, which generally occurred in fairly short order).
Biden needs to start paying attention to the immediate bread-and-butter issues that are of concern to everyday Americans, because it probably seems to many people in this country, most politicians — on either side of the aisle — are only concerned with themselves.