Joe Biden and Kamala Harris Have the Floor

The saving grace is that after four years of Trumpian immaturity and ignorance, Joe Biden is the adult in the room — an adult with a lot on his shoulders. His presidency will certainly stumble, given the scope of the combined crises his government will have to juggle over health, the economy, politics, climate and so on. He will be called upon not only to forge compromise, as he hammered away at many times during his campaign in the name of calming the American political situation, but in order to act with foresight and make progress that will last. American democracy, among other things, very much needs it.

So there he was at noon on Wednesday, surrounded by George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, masked ex-presidents, in a reassuring portrait of a return to a certain normalcy and the reaffirmation of the democratic norm, although in fact, nothing is truly normal in a pandemic. There was Biden taking his oath of office in a capital freed from the unhealthy presence of Donald Trump while at the same time still besieged, if only symbolically, by the nebula of the extreme right.

At 78, Biden has the mind and familiar language of a politician from another time, with a career spanning 50 years and some baggage with respect to scandals. But here he is at the end of the journey in the role of president, where he is expected to be progressive and contribute to the transformation of this black and white America to a multicolored America, which the United States is becoming anyhow, whether white supremacists want it or not. It is not enough for Biden to want to repair it; he said as much in his inauguration speech. He must also move matters forward.

Oscar Wilde, of Irish heritage like the Biden family, said, “Progress is the realization of Utopias.”

The years to come will judge Biden’s determination and evolution. He has many ambitious plans, notably for health care and immigration. The man is empathetic, which is already a lot given the president who is making his exit. But I don’t say this from behind rose-colored glasses. For the men and women Biden has surrounded himself with up to now, starting with Vice President Kamala Harris, he is making clear his plan to be a more progressive president, even if he did come up in the conservative wing of the Democratic Party. If the obvious task is to undo the damage caused by Trump on environmental issues and international relations, and to “build back better,” according to his campaign slogan, Biden also shows encouraging signs of wanting to break with the commercialism that has undermined the Democratic Party since Clinton, something Obama did not do.

From here on out, Biden has the floor. As does Congress, where the Democrats hold a small majority for the next two years. As does the left wing of the party, which finally has a voice. And, clearly, Harris has the floor, as she will attract much interest just for being the first woman and the first person of mixed heritage to become vice president, given the likelihood that she will be a presidential candidate in 2024.

Things will have to move quickly. In the short term, the new president should sign a series of symbolic executive orders such as a directive to rejoin the Paris climate agreement and repeal the odious anti-Muslim travel ban issued by Trump in 2016. Obviously, nothing is more urgent than containing the pandemic Trump continued to minimize and bring to a vote a third stimulus package to the tune of $1.9 trillion. The new president will not have too many of the 100 days he has given himself to get this done.

On this beautiful, sunny Wednesday, Trump was the elephant in the room. Enveloped by a typically American speech, dripping with religiosity and calls for patriotic unity, Biden duly noted in strong terms that the cancerous threat of white supremacy represents. The attempted “Coup Klux Klan,” to borrow the title from an Indian newspaper, might have served the purpose of calling our attention to that threat, since the murder of George Floyd was apparently not enough to ensure that the political class and white public opinion finally get their heads out of the sand, and that Biden squarely makes the cause of racial justice his own.

Trump will be tried in the Senate on one count of impeachment for “inciting an insurrection.” Some suggest that, rather than embark on a punitive expedition, given the chances that there will not be enough Republican votes to convict, that the Senate engage in introspection by way of a “truth and reconciliation” commission. The proposal merits reflection. The American cure Biden is calling for could effectively take place through a similar process.