I just published a piece called Why Not Bernie? I am currently undecided, I wanted Warren, so I’m reasoning through my options in public. It’s time for me to tackle Joe Biden. I’m finding it a bit difficult to write about Biden. He’s literally been in Washington for my whole life. But I’ve never given him much serious thought before now.
I’m not happy that I’m forced to think seriously about Biden. He’s basically what the status quo was before Trump. He’s a moderate Democrat, no more and no less. His policy ideas are forgettable. He’s not really smart, but not really not smart. He seems decent enough, but isn’t in any way inspiring. I agree with him on some things and disagree on others. To put it succinctly, he’s meh. He’s a completely average old, white man.
It’s hard to overstate how bad that is. I really don’t want an average person to be president. The status quo before Trump was, in most ways, bad. I’ll grant average would be better than the actively bad person we have as president now, but the president has a very difficult job. Average isn’t a qualification.
There’s not much more to say about Biden. But doing this little exercise has demonstrated that I definitely prefer Biden over Bernie. They basically have the same ceiling. If we’re lucky, either one of them can be a placeholder president. But, it seems like Biden’s floor is almost the same as his ceiling. Bernie’s floor is much lower.
Sadly, none of this seems to matter. By the time my state’s primary gets here, Biden will be the unofficial nominee. At least the November decision will be easy, whatever gets Trump and the Republicans out of office. That will likely mean a vote for Biden. Too bad I can’t be more enthusiastic about it.
