1st 2 years revealed President Biden's generational ambition … – 69News WFMZ-TV

Still mild with intervals of clouds and sun. Some patchy early morning fog is also possible..
Increasing clouds. Some patchy fog is possible late.
Updated: January 2, 2023 @ 5:48 am
President Joe Biden speaks about manufacturing jobs and the economy Nov. 29 at SK Siltron CSS, a computer chip factory in Bay City, Mich.
President Joe Biden receives his COVID-19 booster from a member of the White House medical unit during an event Oct. 25 in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus in Washington.

The President and First Lady touch down in St. Croix for a New Year’s holiday break
WASHINGTON — When he ran for the White House, Joe Biden told voters his presidency would be a bridge to the next generation. His first two years on the job have revealed it to be a much more ambitious venture.
As he nears the halfway mark on his first term, Biden is pointing to legacy-defining achievements on climate change, domestic manufacturing and progress on the COVID-19 pandemic — all accomplished with razor-thin majorities on Capitol Hill and rather dim views from the public.
Biden’s legislative accomplishments extend to nearly every aspect of American life — although their impact may take years to be felt in some cases — and his marshaling of a global coalition to back Ukraine’s defenses and of democracies against China’s growing influence will echo for decades. He defied history in the midterm elections, persuading voters to stick with his vision of long-term gains despite immediate concerns about inflation and the economy.
President Joe Biden speaks about manufacturing jobs and the economy Nov. 29 at SK Siltron CSS, a computer chip factory in Bay City, Mich.
It turns out his conception of the job is about far more than restoring democratic norms and passing the baton, as the 80-year-old president looks toward an announcement in early spring that he’ll run again despite his record-setting age.
The road ahead will be far tougher: Republicans take control of the House on Jan. 3, the threat of recession looms during stubbornly high inflation, and sustaining support for Ukraine will be harder as the conflict approaches the one-year mark.
The next two years also will be complicated by a heavy overlay of 2024 presidential politics. And whatever Biden’s accomplishments, his job approval rating remains underwater and voters have expressed doubts about his capacity to lead. Biden swats away questions about his ability to hold up with a dismissive “watch me.”
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, echoing a refrain among presidential aides from chief of staff Ron Klain on down, says Biden has been “frequently underestimated.”
“I don’t think he ever thought of himself as a caretaker,” she said. “He came in with an unbelievably ambitious agenda, and a core belief that he had to preside over many investments in America and American workers, American infrastructure, American manufacturing, that presidents had not done or not been able to get done for decades before him.”
In the 2020 campaign, Biden offered himself as an experienced hand ready to step in to stabilize a pandemic-weary nation, but who was also mindful of a clamoring for fresh leadership.
President Joe Biden receives his COVID-19 booster from a member of the White House medical unit during an event Oct. 25 in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus in Washington.
“Look, I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else,” Biden said in March 2020, as he campaigned in Michigan with younger Democrats, including now-Vice President Kamala Harris, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. “There’s an entire generation of leaders you saw stand behind me. They are the future of this country.”
A week later, he swatted back at primary rival Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ agenda saying, “People are looking for results, not a revolution.”
Those statements have often been thrown back at Biden by Democratic critics of two minds: moderates who have wanted him to curb the ambition of his agenda as he’s navigated an often-rocky legislative path, and progressives urging him to step aside in 2024.
“Nobody elected him to be F.D.R.,” Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., told The New York Times pointedly last year as Biden’s agenda appeared at a stalemate, a line that was seized on by House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy to critique Biden’s agenda.
Meanwhile, some prominent Democrats have publicly declined to endorse Biden’s reelection when confronted with the question, and the progressive group RootsAction is running ads in New Hampshire — recently unseated by Democrats as the first state on the primary calendar — calling on Biden to step aside for younger blood in 2024.
Biden aides and allies argue that such critics miss the point — that Biden never set out merely to keep the seat warm for the whippersnappers to follow, nor does he believe he’s finished the job. His successes of late have quieted many doubters — though some in his party still harbor private doubts.
“He couldn’t have thought about it more differently,” said Kate Bedingfield, the White House communications director and longtime Biden aide. “He’s leading with his experience, and the next generation is leading alongside him.”
Bedingfield pointed to Biden’s relatively youthful Cabinet and to Democratic candidates across the country who won election in the 2022 midterms by running on the president’s agenda.
For restive young voters who may have once gravitated toward the younger crop of Democrats, Biden pollster John Anzalone said the president is offering proof of “getting things done for the new generation.”
“You saw that in how they voted in the 2022 cycle, and you’ll see that in 2024,” he added.
Yet while younger voters skewed toward Democrats in the 2022 midterms, their enthusiasm waned from 2020, when dislike for the chaotic presidency of Donald Trump drove them to the polls in greater numbers.
Biden entered the White House almost two years ago with pent-up expectations but long odds for delivering on them with the slimmest of margins in Congress. Right out of the gate, he secured passage of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. But then he quickly ran into hurdles with a series of even larger proposals first billed as the “American Families Plan” and later the “Build Back Better” package.
A tortuous period of on-again, off-again talks with West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin pared back those proposals and weighed down Biden and his White House for months, even after passage of the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure law.
In the legislative morass and the fallout from the darkest moment yet of Biden’s presidency — the chaotic withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan last summer — Biden’s approval rating plummeted.
It wasn’t until mid-2022, as the midterm elections loomed, that Biden was able to break through the gridlock and secure legislation that would make for the most productive first-term Congress since President Lyndon Johnson, with bipartisan action on gun violence and rebooting domestic high-tech manufacturing, and Democrats-only investments in combating climate change and lowering drug costs.
1. “I need ammunition, not a ride.”
— Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, response to U.S. offer to transport him to safety, Feb. 26
2. “Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”
— Donald Trump, post on Truth Social network, Dec. 3
3. “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.”
— U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, writing in the court’s opinion that overturned Roe v. Wade and took away women’s constitutional protections for abortion, June 24
4. “The Court reverses course today for one reason and one reason only: because the composition of this Court has changed.”
— U.S. Supreme Court Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, writing in the dissenting opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade, June 24
5. “Will Smith just smacked the s— out of me.”
— Comedian Chris Rock at the Academy Awards ceremony, March 27
6. “Jackie, are you here? Where’s Jackie?”
— U.S. President Joe Biden, calling out for deceased Congresswoman Jackie Walorski, White House conference on ending hunger, Sept. 28
7. “FTX is fine. Assets are fine.”
— Sam Bankman-Fried, a Twitter post shortly before his cryptocurrency exchange FTX declared bankruptcy, Nov. 7
8. “If you’re the President of the United States, you can declassify just by saying ‘It’s declassified,’ even by thinking about it.”
— Trump, Fox News interview, Sept. 21
9. “The U.S. News rankings are profoundly flawed … As a result, we will no longer participate.”
— Heather Gerken, Yale Law School statement on U.S. News & World Report law school rankings, Nov. 16
10. “African American voters are voting at just as high a percentage as Americans.”
— U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, remarks at news conference, Jan. 19
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) — A tart retort by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to a U.S. offer of help and a call by former U.S. President Donald Trump for the “termination” of parts of the Constitution top a Yale Law School librarian’s list of the most notable quotations of 2022.
In February, only days after Russia invaded Ukraine, the U.S. offered to transport Zelenskyy to safety. That appeared not to sit well with him. “I need ammunition, not a ride,” he shot back, a senior American intelligence official with direct knowledge of the conversation told The Associated Press.
Trump’s comment in a Dec. 3 post on his Truth Social media platform was a late addition to the list compiled each year by Fred Shapiro, an associate director at the library. The former president was again repeating his lie that the 2020 election was stolen.
“A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution,” he wrote. “Our great ‘Founders’ did not want, and would not condone, False & Fraudulent Elections!”
The list assembled by Shapiro is a supplement to The New Yale Book of Quotations, which is edited by Shapiro and published by Yale University Press.
“The items on this list are not necessarily eloquent or admirable quotations, rather they have been picked because they are famous or important or particularly revealing of the spirit of our times,” Shapiro said.
THE LIST
1. “I need ammunition, not a ride.” — Zelenskyy, response to U.S. offer to transport him to safety, Feb. 26.
2. “Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” — Trump, post on Truth Social network, Dec. 3.
3. “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.” — U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, writing in the court’s opinion that overturned Roe v. Wade and took away women’s constitutional protections for abortion, June 24.
4. “The Court reverses course today for one reason and one reason only: because the composition of this Court has changed.” — U.S. Supreme Court Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, writing in the dissenting opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade, June 24.
5. “Will Smith just smacked the s— out of me.” — Comedian Chris Rock at the Academy Awards ceremony, March 27.
6. “Jackie, are you here? Where’s Jackie?” — U.S. President Joe Biden, calling out for deceased Congresswoman Jackie Walorski, White House conference on ending hunger, Sept. 28.
7. “FTX is fine. Assets are fine.” — Sam Bankman-Fried, a Twitter post shortly before his cryptocurrency exchange FTX declared bankruptcy, Nov. 7.
8. “If you’re the President of the United States, you can declassify just by saying ‘It’s declassified,’ even by thinking about it.” — Trump, Fox News interview, Sept. 21.
9. “The U.S. News rankings are profoundly flawed … As a result, we will no longer participate.” — Heather Gerken, Yale Law School statement on U.S. News & World Report law school rankings, Nov. 16.
10. “African American voters are voting at just as high a percentage as Americans.” — U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, remarks at news conference, Jan. 19.
Scroll down for comments if available

Another divisive political year looms ahead. Also, North Korea vows to builds up nukes, singer Anita Pointer dies, and more news today. 

Donald Trump began 2022 on a high. But the former president is facing a very different reality one year later as he runs again for the White House. He’s mired in criminal investigations. He’s been blamed for Republicans’ disappointing performance in the November elections. And the six weeks since his presidential announcement have been marked by self-inflicted crises.
Brand New App to watch all of WFMZ-TV News and Syndicated Programing 24/7 on your Streaming App enabled TV.
Brand New App to watch all of WFMZ-TV News and Syndicated Programing 24/7 on your Streaming App enabled TV.
Get up-to-the-minute news sent straight to your device.

source

Leave a Comment