Joe Biden – Susan Feathers

History in the Making

Just when you think the sky is falling…

Biden stepped away from running for a second term, nominates Kamala Harris. Harris gains unprecedented support from youth, from communities of color, from Republican lawmakers worried the MAGA extremists could destroy the democracy each generation has striven to keep. Netanyahu visits and delivers an unapologetic address about the war in GAZA promising not to stop or turn back. Harris comes forward strongly in defense of Gazans in the line of fire while asserting support for Israel as long as it abides by human rights principles. She wants to see a two state solution.

Women from all sectors of the nation are galvanizing behind Harris as the clearest defender of women’s rights in her time in politics (Women for Harris). We have a wave of democratic actions happening and consequent outpouring of funds in record time. Men have galvanized to support her as evidenced by White Dudes for Kamala! Many institutions and nonprofits and civic leaders have voiced their support for the current Vice President.

The nation has awakended and perhaps the clouds, spewing misinformation and nasty digs from the throats of Rump and Rants, will soon part to let in some truth. I’ve been shocked and pleasantly surprised and again recall the edict: the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Well, our eyes are open wide.

Biden has set in motion efforts that will address the extreme rulings and unethical acts of justices on the current polarized Supreme Court. His bill would set standards for justices to hold them accountable for their actions like the rest of us; overturn the presidential immunity ruling just passed that grants immunity to a president for almost any action made while in office and to some extent afterward. Biden calls for shortening the term of justices from life to 18 years. The recommendation dovetails with Constitutional scholars and historians who recently discussed how to reform the Supreme Court to avoid what has become jerrymandering of the Court.

Watch the discussion among scholars invited by the National Constitution Center to review the 2024 Supreme Court.

Anti-Defamation League and the National Constitution Center

Listen to two constitutional scholars discuss President Biden’s new proposal for Supreme Court reforms on We the People Podcast at the National Consitution Center.

IT IS BIDEN: LEADERSHIP & WISDOM

Biden at the 75th Anniversary of the founding of NATO, our great alliance of democraces across the Atlantic, delivers a powerful message. I am solidly behind President Biden as the leader who has the greatest vision of America’s role at home and in the world. Let him lead: elect him to a second term to finish his vision of a free world and more just America, ready and able to help stem climate impacts and secure America’s and the world’s futures.

Biden’s Record: A Great President

Heather Cox Richardson’s July 9 Substack Letter reviews Biden Administration’s accomplishments from the viewpoint of a historian as opposed to “horse race” media reporting.

The most consequential investment in renewable energy and justice for Energy Transistion required to secure American families and the world community during climate change. It is underway and already transforming communities across America while employing Americans in great jobs at unprecented rates. States, red and blue, are benefitting economically.

A record of high jobs creation, low unemployment and business growth. Support of workers’ rights, wages and benefits, and support of unions. Inflation is low and steady.

Legislation to reduce college debt, improve health care, support families and children through reduction of poverty; calling out companies that drain wealth from families through high interest rates and inflated costs of products and services. Reduction of the high cost of pharmaceuticals, and allowances for Medicare to negotiate the cost of life-saving drugs for all Americans.

Standing for the rights of LGBTQ and Transgender individuals to the protections of the Constitution as citizens with equal rights to the bounties of citizenship and the community of a freedom-loving people.

Maintaining the separation of church and state as a fundamental tenet of the U.S. Constitution since its founding.

Unwavering support for women’s reproductive rights and healthcare. This is one of the most important protections of women’s rights now struck down by a partisan Supreme Court. Biden promises to sign reproductive rights into law when reelected for a second term. This is about health and freedom of choice.

Assertive foreign policy with NATO and in new alliances in the Global South and among Pacific allies to protect democracy across the world. Unflinching commitment to support Ukraine in its justified defense against unprovoked aggression by Russia. Biden will continue to support Ukraine to victory with a strong NATO commitment. NATO has grown stronger, adding new countries in Europe during Biden’s term of office. Support for Israel while negotiating for justice for Palestinians in Gaza. We are safer with Biden’s leadership. He has the long vision younger Americans do not possess at this critical time in history. This is the time to support wisdom and experience.

Call me an optimist, but to me Americans “get” all this and will come through to victory against the second internal threat to our democracy in recent history with Trump and the MAGA Republicans. This is not supposition. We experienced four years of Trump in the White House and its termination with an insurrection in the Capitol and assault against the rule of law by convicted criminals. The latter is only the latest odd ball and dangerous internal grab for power and suppression of liberty among our people seen from time to time in America’s history. Recall: the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Now we are the watchmen and we must not fail Liberty.

America is about the steady and determined growth toward plurality and diversity as promised in our founding documents and principles. We are about the steady march to freedom and liberty for all. We have stumbled in the past and sometimes lost that vision, but in this time, in this place in history the future of life on Earth is at stake. Its too high a danger to fail now.

American Aspirations

We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community… Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own.

Cesar Chavez

From the beginning, our nation stands firmly on the bedrock of equality and a system of governance of, by, and for the people.

Those we elect govern only with our consent.

Seeing through the storm of rhetoric and lies – everyone is depending on us to think and make a wise choice in the 2024 election.

I consider the words of Cesar Chavez as the clear vision of America, its hopes and dreams for our citizens and for people across the world. You can view our history as the struggle to realize our common aspirations. Along the way tyrants, baffoons, and artful dodgers have thrown lies and accusations at good people, like Joe Biden … people who tell the truth while the liers seek to topple him. He and his Cabinet work quietly and compentently on behalf of ALL the American people.

Smokescreen of Lies and Fabrications

Here we have a mob of rich contributors with eyes on how a (T)Rump presidency can line their pockets or achieve their sick dreams of making the public act and do as they see fit. We should all ascribe to one religion and we should all be bound by their notions of family and goodness. This is Unamerican and a path to the end of democracy. We have been warding off these people and forces for the whole of our history. Like ravenous predators, they eye Lady Liberty seeking to topple her.

Age and America

We do not generally revere seniors in this young nation. We still worship youth. So where are the younger candidtes? Have we made our politics so vile and vicious that potential young leaders shy away? I think in part that may be true and who would blame them? However, don’t judge a book by its cover. Joe is getting the job done with a strong Cabinet and his long vision. There are also a host of young Democratic leaders behind him. Consider Bill McKibben’s thoughts about Joe and whether a change could invigorate our leadership.

I’d rather have a Biden leading us in the coming years of crucial climate decisions while providing support and protection for the 90% of Americans dominated by a super wealthy elite. It is those same super rich who invest and skew our electoral system with the onerous Citizen’s United Supreme Court ruling that has made our elections so fraught and uncharacteristic of the good humor and deep debate from local to national politics that existed before corporations could fund candidates. Townhalls, discussion around a community gathering space — informal yet vibrant – I am old enough to remember this and my parents even more so when they were alive.

When I was a child, my parents were Republicans. I had a photo of Ike and Maime Eisenhower in my room. They held a high bar for behavior and respect and good sense. Nothing like the present day Repugs.

One last thing: This is not about God. This is about Reason, Compromise, and Truth.

Your destiny and mine are inextricably linked in a democracy. That is the challenge of this system of governing. We are all in or all out. (T)Rump and the MAGA Repugs want out and they plan to take all of us with them.

Think about it.

“I Pray Heaven To Bestow The Best Of Blessings On This House And All that shall hereafter Inhabit it. May none but Honest and Wise Men ever rule under This Roof.”

The words are taken from a letter written to Abigail Adams from the President’s House by Adams in 1800.

Character Matters: Let’s Examine the Facts.

The 2020 Election was fair and square.
The former president and hundreds of citizens attempted to overthrow the peaceful transfer of power – an insurrection. Deaths and injury and denegration of the Capitol building were witnessed across the country and the world.
The current MAGA rep for President is morally flawed and unfit to lead America.
President Biden and his Administration have demonstrated a commitment to the welfare of citizens and passed major legislation for the betterment of families, small businesses, and working Americans. Biden is the first among recent Presidents to form and pass comprehensive funding to support a clean energy transition with major goals to combat climate change.
The American economy under the Biden Administration, is booming and by every measure has rebounded after the Pandemic along with American businesses and families. America has the strongest economy and job growth among countries across the world.
Biden’s character is rock solid and proven over decades of leadership in the U.S. federal government. His record stands.
The world is always a very tricky and challenging arena for foreign policy. Under the leadership of Biden and Anthony Blinken, Secretary of State, NATO is robust and added democratic nations after Russia attacked Ukraine.
Our support of Ukraine’s young democracy is vital to democracy across the world and our own democracy. We need to gain back the bravery and national cohesion that the Ukarinian citizens are showing every day of this war.
Finally, America has always been an ally of Israel.
Biden is both honest and wise. Age is little import given what we are up against. Our country is focused on age but would we be better off to invoke John Adam’s blessing that only honest and wise men (and women) inhabit the White House?

Third party candidates and sitting out on your vote will destroy our democracy.

Every vote for the Democratic ticket is needed now to prevent an autocracy and Christian Nationalist government from forning in our Republic. We must come together on that blue ticket as never before; many of you are lifetime Republicans, many of you are inflamed over the murder and injury to innocent Gazans (as we should be). Together we must get past this real threat from MAGA which is clearly and openly telling us they intend to destroy the democracy we have maintained together for nearly 250 years. They tell us openly they intend to install a Christian Nationalist government. Women are one of their targets. After losing the right to choose, families now face the real threat that contraceptives will be imperiled making family planning impossible. I still cannot believe this is happening in the America I know and love.

Think about what’s at stake. See what you can do.

The Battle for Democracy

A nationalist encourages us to be our worst, and then tells us that we are the best. A nationalist, ‘although endlessly brooding on power, victory, defeat, revenge,’ wrote Orwell, tends to be ‘uninterested in what happens in the real world.’ Nationalism is relativist, since the only truth is the resentment we feel when we contemplate others. As the novelist Danilo Kiš put it, nationalism ‘has no universal values, aesthetic or ethical.’ A patriot, by contrast, wants the nation to live up to its ideals, which means asking us to be our best selves. A patriot must be concerned with the real world, which is the only place where his country can be loved and sustained. A patriot has universal values, standards by which he judges his nation, always wishing it well—and wishing that it would do better.”

Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century

Dr. Snyder’s book, On Tyranny, is pocket-sized for a reason. It’s meant as a guide and inspiration to discern antidemocratic forms and pundits while taking action to defend our Republic and democracies everywhere.

Biden’s State of the Union Address

It infuriates me to listen to news commentators pick apart President Biden’s State of the Union Address as partisan. It was not. Biden’s first call for action addressed the assualt on our freedom and democracy. He shined a light on the Republican Party which seeks to destroy democracy – to weaken the Republic – to install a strong man, nationalist govenment. Biden is sounding an alarm, not promoting himself. Everyone of us should be echoing that charge!

We are a society of many religions, genders, and we all have immigrant origins. This vision emanates from the Founder’s vision for a new kind of government. For nearly 250 years the U.S.A. has been striving to achieve that vision.

We are not a nation of one religion, one dictator who makes decisions for us. To claims that nationalism is easier, I wonder how Republicans might react to their personal freedoms being taken away because one man decides to take it. Women on both sides of the political spectrum felt that when a law of the land for reproductive freedom was dramatically ended, after half a century of their god given right to make decisions about their own body. And the assault continues as the right to contraceptives is being threatened.

There are signs everywhere that nationalistic forces are pressing down on Liberty. We must stay vigilant and everyone who cares about American liberty must show up at the polls to vote, and bring along several people with them.