You expect a party to rally around its leader’s record. But the contrast between the way Joe Biden’s record of nearly five decades was downplayed at the Democratic convention and just how comprehensive the Republican boasts about Donald Trump’s successes were signaled something that is important even beyond the 2020 election. The contrast testified to what a new and transformative force Donald Trump has been, and how tied to the past the Democrats are: tied to a past, that is, of which Democrats themselves are ashamed. NAFTA, signed under Bill Clinton, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, championed by Biden within the Obama administration, are not things that Biden or his party want to celebrate today. Nor is the Iraq War for which Biden voted. Nor is the crime bill that Biden sponsored in 1994. Even Barack Obama’s policy achievements — the Affordable Care Act and the Iran Deal — are not sources of much enthusiasm among Democrats these days. The Iran Deal hardly merits mention, and Obamacare is now an old warhorse. The Democrats are fresh out of ideas, and even the recent ideas, like Obamacare, that they do defend are not thought by anyone to be bold solutions to the 2020s’ challenges.
Exit quote: “Reality is on the President’s side, and it’s a hell of an equalizer.”