![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/biden_clinton-300x200.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Normalcy isn\u2019t what Biden\u2019s base wants.<\/p>\n
https:\/\/www.dnronline.com\/opinion\/viewpoint\/return-to-normalcy-isnt-really-what-bidens-base-wants\/article_3dba44a6-ae88-5d51-a61f-655253bc3afd.html<\/a><\/p>\n Sometimes, it pays to take the daily newspaper, partly because it keeps the guy who delivers it paid to deliver the news in a time of pandemic-this and weird world-that, and partly because you can find articles to read that make you scratch your back and shake your head. Such is the article at the link, which was in my morning newspaper, linked above.<\/p>\n From the article:\u00a0 Joe Biden ran for president on a “return to normalcy.” His challenge is that there are three competing definitions of normalcy for him to contend with.<\/p>\n Biden didn’t actually use the slogan “return to normalcy.” But as numerous political observers (including yours truly) noted during the campaign, that was both Biden’s implicit appeal and his best shot at victory. As Jonathan Martin and Sydney Ember of The New York Times wrote in March 2019, “Biden, in speeches at home and abroad, has used much of the first part of this year pledging to restore the dignity he believes that the country has lost in the Trump years, promising a restoration rather than a revolution.”<\/p>\n For much of the primary season, the competition among Biden’s Democratic opponents was over who could offer the most radical agenda. When it became clear to rank-and-file voters \u2014 and a few key Democratic leaders \u2014 that such radicalism could cost Democrats the general election, Biden surged to front-runner status.<\/p>\n The interesting thing about Biden’s return-to-normalcy campaign is that it predated the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s not how it worked with the original version.<\/p>\n Under Woodrow Wilson, America was racked with extraordinary turmoil. World War I cost more than 100,000 American lives and yielded few tangible benefits for the U.S. In fighting the war, Wilson stirred nativist passions, crushed political dissent, imposed food rationing and widespread censorship, and stoked racial unrest. Race and labor riots and anarchist bombing campaigns made the tumult of the 2020 summer riots and protests pale by comparison. And then there was the pandemic of 1918. Some 650,000 Americans died from the Spanish flu. Adjusted for population, that would be like 2 million deaths today.<\/p>\n It was against this backdrop that Republican Sen. Warren Harding of Ohio promised a return to normalcy. “America’s present need is not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration; not agitation, but adjustment; not surgery, but serenity; not the dramatic, but the dispassionate; not experiment, but equipoise,” he declared. He won the 1920 election in a landslide with 37 out of 48 states and 404 electoral votes.<\/p>\n Biden has accomplished the easiest of the three normalcies already. Simply by refraining from venting his id on Twitter, he has turned down the political temperature. – article<\/p>\n The rest of it is at the link. It is worth it to read the entire thing. The author indicates that Biden’s base does not want serenity and ‘normalcy’; they want the same kind of ‘action’ that was in evidence during the Obama administration, and the author of the aritcle indicates that those on the left feel that the Obama years were a wasted opportunity. Remember, he said he would “radically transform America” and then mostly slouched his way through eight years on the job.<\/p>\n There are cracks, however small, already appearing in Biden\u2019s admin: apparently, Ms. Harris wasn\u2019t notified about the Syria bombing \u2013 left out of the loop \u2013 and is upset about it. Well, frankly, I would be upset, too, because in her position she should have been informed, regardless. If these tiny cracks start appearing this early \u2013 barely six weeks into the job \u2013 what else will follow?<\/p>\n In re: the article: it appears in several other publications and may have a \u201cread number\u201d limit, so if you can\u2019t crack it open one place, try another.<\/p>\n News in my kingdom is that the weather is sunny, temps in the low 40s and the snow is running down the street toward the drains.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Normalcy isn\u2019t what Biden\u2019s base wants. https:\/\/www.dnronline.com\/opinion\/viewpoint\/return-to-normalcy-isnt-really-what-bidens-base-wants\/article_3dba44a6-ae88-5d51-a61f-655253bc3afd.html Sometimes, it pays to take the daily newspaper, … What Is Normalcy? And Is It Really Necessary?<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":653,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[220,430,518],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-floggings-will-continue-until-morale-improves","category-2020-election","category-biden"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/653"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=110856"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110857,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110856\/revisions\/110857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=110856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=110856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=110856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}