This piece by Tim Miller is just the latest bit of evidence of the importance of experience:
But as he is poised to sign into law a massive, legacy-defining COVID relief package that will, among other things, fund the vaccine surge that will ensure every desiring adult will be jabbed by May, well ahead of the pace he inherited. I feel compelled to point out that we got here thanks to luck that Joe Biden made for himself, and for all of us.
In November of 2017 Joe Biden did an interview with Peter Hamby of Snapchat and Vanity Fairduring which he laid out what a campaign that he didn’t exactly want to run would be premised on. Hamby summed up the Biden message as one about how “a certain set of ideals tether us together as Americans, and that above all else, character counts.”
This was…not the prevailing view about the state of the country or the path to victory among the other Democratic candidates, strategists, or left wing pundits. Biden was derided for his obliviousness and naivete when he would bang on about bipartisanship. He was underestimated and in every interview I gave about the Democratic Primary his campaign was compared to my former boss, Jeb!
Yet, when he launched his campaign he was undeterred, calling the unity doubters out explicitly saying, “I know some of the smart folks say Democrats don’t want to hear about unity. The angrier a candidate can be, the better chance they have to win the nomination. I don’t believe it. I really don’t. I believe Democrats want to unify this nation.”
It turns out Biden was right and almost everyone else was wrong.
Since, well, just about the time Biden won the South Carolina primary, I’ve felt like I’m watching a professional running rings around the amateurs. Biden’s tactics for each goal he attains are not always obvious, but it’s clear that he’s at least two steps, and sometimes more, ahead of everyone else, from conservative critics to old Senate colleagues to possibly even his old friend, President Obama.
And, unlike Miller and his colleagues, I don’t think this is at all up to luck. I think this is experience and faith in the American character at work here. He’s nearly 80 years old, almost 60 years of public service, and that counts for more than something. That’s marinating in how the political struggle goes, whether working in a polite and even friendly manner with the “other side”, or dealing with political neophytes such as Hawley and Cruz – and I do mean they are neophytes, because those two, along with all the other politicos of their generation or younger, grew up in an environment where compromise with the other side, where actual governing, is no longer taught, at least by the Republican Party.
They are, in effect, cripples when it comes to actual governance. They know how to win a seat in Congress in the environment of five years ago, but they know nothing about the important responsibilities of being a Member of Congress. And when their next election comes up with an electorate who saw them associated with an Insurrection, failed as it was, will they even win reelection?
When Biden first threw his hat in the ring, I applauded, but expressed concerns about his age. With age can come experience, but can also come stultification, even petrification. President Biden appears to have managed to escape the latter two, while collecting the former.
The Republicans may be in for a rough, rough four years, as the smilin’, happy warrior, Joe Biden, teaches them what it really means to be American. Because they don’t seem to know about that.
