OPINION: Why Don’t You Like Biden? You Know You Do, at Least a Little. Isn't it Time to Admit It?

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It's been almost three years since Joe Biden was elected President. Verified as President through various Constitutional processes and in spite of the January 6 Insurrection.

Three years of relative calm in DC, not counting the House Republicans' fireside chats on how to Impeach him for reasons that test one’s ability to follow a circuitous path to inane conclusions like - Well, because they did it to Trump.

Three years of economic growth and relative stability as defined loosely as things generally going better but not completely. Inflation being one of the bugaboos that we are all suffering through. Especially those Californians going to the gas pumps every day and seeing the price per gallon at over $6.

But many people like to blame the current President for inflation because it happened under his watch. Despite there being ample evidence that rising costs come about when corporations raise their prices well beyond the normal increase in cost of goods because they can.

Like the Pfizer Pharmaceutical Corporation seeing tremendous profit in recent years as a direct result of the Pandemic. Always heartening to know corporations still know how to generate dividends for their shareholders. No danger of that becoming a lost art - like say, manufacturing so many things we used to make in the US.

And with a number of economic initiatives being implemented by the President to bring manufacturing jobs back to Americans and generally focusing attention on unions and the middle class like we used to do for so many years.

The years leading up to a healthy and prosperous middle class that kept the American Dream alive and well.

Three years of good deeds and effective actions, well as good as it gets in Washington these days. Sort of like routing a marathon through swamps, deserts, and old abandoned mine fields just to make it interesting for the runners.

But with a generous variety of positive things and the usual amount of genuine negative things happening throughout the US, most Americans would rather walk barefoot through Death Valley on July 4^th than say, Yeah Joe Biden is doing a good job.

You know he’s doing at least an okay job. You know by looking at the numbers, those same kinds of numbers and stats that come from every president - so no point in making his numbers jump through more hoops before you recognize them as anything important - showing there are improvements happening.

Money spent on infrastructure throughout the US, coupled with major investments from the private sector.

Not great changes. Not America coming out of the Great Depression kind of changes, but realistically, do we even want to go there for comparisons?

It does beg the question - what the heck do you want? What would qualify as a good result?

We have Major League Baseball players hitting .198 but at long as they hit lots of home runs, it’s a great season.

It used to be that striking out 200+ times a year was a bad thing. Now it’s a sign that they are REALLY trying hard.

Not sure if that means the bar has been raised, lowered, or done away with altogether.

Biden is not a bad President. He’s not the greatest. The most well-spoken or filled with youthful vigor. But honestly, take a closer look at some of the others working in DC and ask yourself, do they clearly stand head and shoulders above the man?

And before you shout - Hell Yeah - do yourself and all of us a favor and actually look.

Don’t react like you’re from Pittsburg and someone just shouted that the NY Jets are a better team than the Steelers ever were. (We all know they aren’t. The Steelers are much better and it’s easy to tell - just by looking at the stats.) The same kind of stats coming from the White House.

At the end of the day having someone in office who was younger, not genetically modified to be a politician, was articulate smart compassionate, and capable of relating to people at least one generation different from her own would be a really good thing.

We know that.

We also know (even if we try to deny it with a straight face) that many would vote for a lawn chair for political office as long as it was a Republican lawn chair and not a Democratic one.

But we really need to move beyond this.

Biden is not perfect. No president in the last 200 years was perfect. Good, capable, and dedicated - sure. A few.

But not perfect. But then no one is.

Our system of government isn’t perfect either. Look at the level of cooperation we currently have as the norm in DC and that pretty well answers that point. But it’s better than 99% of whatever else is out there.

But not for much longer. Not if we keep mucking about and vote party and answer survey questions with Hell No.

You know you think Biden is okay. Not good, not great, but okay. And okay isn’t good enough - but relatively speaking, okay is better than bad or incompetent or even worse, indifferent.

And at the end of the day or the next election cycle, it doesn’t mean you have to vote for him again. Just let that knee rest for a little bit and don’t react and vote for something that isn’t actually better.

Listening to most of the politicians in Washington these days induces a major headache. I think it may actually be intended.

So, much of it is double-speak and gibberish that when we hear someone say something that’s completely wrong but articulate and makes a little sense, we pump our fists and say - at last.

Let’s just not be so easy to please in the future. It’s kind of important.