If President Joe Biden’s actions have told Americans anything in recent weeks, it’s that he would rather fight Republicans than deal with outside enemies.
The White House has long been locked in a battle with Republican governors — like Florida’s Ron DeSantis — over mask mandates, particularly for children returning to classrooms.
DeSantis has argued that parents should be allowed to make decisions for their children rather than relying on the school district or the state to make a blanket policy that may not be practical for everyone.
Biden has responded on several occasions by accusing him of “standing in the way” of recovery and has threatened to retaliate in several ways — including funding schools that defy DeSantis’ ban on mask mandates and using the Education Department’s Civil Rights arm to attack states that ban mask mandates. (RELATED: ‘Most Significant Threat To Freedom In My Lifetime’: DeSantis Says COVID Unleashed ‘Medical Authoritarianism’)
Press Sec. Psaki said the D.o.E is looking at a range of options to help protect teachers, students and school leaders in Florida after Gov. DeSantis threatened to withhold salaries if schools defy his executive order against mask mandates https://t.co/ww0zaMuYWY
— Local 12/WKRC-TV (@Local12) August 10, 2021
SCOOP: The Biden administration is escalating its fight with GOP governors over masks in schools. The Department of Education will use its civil rights arm to go after states that block school districts from requiring masks . w/@EricaLG https://t.co/2u3HEGrEp0
— Sheryl Gay Stolberg (@SherylNYT) August 18, 2021
And while the Biden White House is willing to escalate the fight against DeSantis, it appears to be far less willing to directly challenge foreign adversaries — even those that have been openly hostile.
Case in point is the Biden administration’s response to Beijing after the Chinese Communist Party said, “thanks, but no thanks,” to cooperating with a more thorough investigation into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic — a strongly worded letter and a public statement broadcasting Biden’s disappointment with the response.
He’s “deeply disappointed” with China after 600,000+ Americans died — but when a Republican governor advocates for parental control of a child’s health, well, that requires federal government action.
In addition to fighting DeSantis, Biden has also continued to shadowbox with former President Donald Trump. His immediate cancellation of the Keystone XL Pipeline upon being sworn in is just such an example — as well as the abandonment of the Remain in Mexico agreement at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The end results of his efforts to beat back everything Trump did will likely not be fully realized for years to come, but even in seven months illegal immigration has exploded and unemployment remains a problem — complicated in no small part by the thousands of jobs killed along with Keystone.
And while Biden has been busy jabbing at Trump, he’s made serious concessions to hostile actors like Russia — by removing key sanctions that had halted progress on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.
And through it all, Biden has verbally attacked Republicans from the bully pulpit as he attempts to bolster support for his legislative agenda — namely infrastructure (coupled with a multi-trillion dollar reconciliation package) and the For the People Act (HR1) which would assert federal control over elections.
Opposition to Biden’s legislative plan has been decried as “the new Jim Crow,” “Jim Crow 2.0,” “Jim Eagle” and even “the worst threat to our democracy since the Civil War.”
But while Biden was occupied with comparing demands for Constitutional state control of elections to the American Civil War, an actual civil war was brewing in Afghanistan as he quickly pulled American troops from the region without a plan in place to safely extract American citizens, military interpreters or Afghan allies.
The administration’s response after the Taliban rapidly took control of the country, rather than concede that they had not adequately planned for contingencies, was to point fingers — at Trump, at the Afghan Security Forces, anywhere but the White House.
Buckle up, folks, it’s not even 2022.
