E.J. Dionne identifies the central difference between the Dems' huge cast of presidential candidates.
A significant number of Democrats (and many candidates in this field, especially Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sanders) say fervently that a return to "decency" and "honor," to use Biden’s words on ABC’s "The View" on Friday, is not enough. Trump’s victory, they contend, revealed deep injustices in American society that must be righted, and they see 2020 as an opportunity to move "much further and much faster toward progress."
On the other hand,
That Biden has potential within so many factions is a sign of the strength he brings to
his third quest for the presidency. Unlike an earlier candidate who succeeded on his third try, a 69-year-old Ronald Reagan in 1980, Biden draws not on his party’s ideological passions but on the comfort he creates by occupying the Democrats’ center of gravity. His hope is that Trump has created a thirst not for adventure and experiment but for reassurance and a glorious tranquility.
I, for one, cannot imagine a more sublime objective of moving "faster toward progress" than by eradicating the blight of Trumpism. This must be done by first reinstating America's "decency" and "honor," which, as Dionne notes, is Biden's principal goal: a thoughtful, measured return to "normalcy," which was Warren Harding's winning message in 1920.
The turbulent events of the 1910s had badly wounded Americans' confidence and pride in themselves: major-scale industrialization that reeked disaffection among the nation's growing middle class, and the "status anxiety" that came with it; bootless fears of domestic, violent radicalism; a war mobilization whose outcome proved disappointing at best — to many, just pointless; and an extended battle over President Wilson's botched, ham-handed obsession with joining the League of Nations. Unlike his presidency, Harding's appeal was pitch perfect: Just let us return to normality.
What America does not need in 2021 is the immediate snd concentrated continuation of ideological warfare over what we might call the sexier of progressivism's proposals. I don't mean that in a heartless or ultraconservative way. Its timing is simply off; there is no chance — zilch — that any proposed progressive plans would survive a congressional vote. Chiefly a cooling-off period against the madness of Trumpism is what's needed, and that would begin by the newly elected president's restoration of allied cooperation and a committed war against foreign interference in our national elections. Without the former, we'll remain a dangerously powerful rogue nation; without the latter, our confidence in democracy will gradually die (indeed, that's already in progress.)
Until America's decency and honor are restored, all those tempting progressive plans are for naught. For a while, just let us return as a nation to some solid sense of Joe Biden's watchwords.