History caught up to Joe Biden.
True, correlation isn't always the same as causation. But 20 fucked-up years of U.S. involvement in Afghanistan culminated, with impeccable consistency, in our epic debacle of an August escape from the tribal hellhole. And Biden has paid the political price. Though executed poorly — unavoidably poorly — Afghanistan has been a 500-pound albatross molesting the president's every sinew.
In this instance, correlation was causation, or the other way around. In the Reuters graph below, scanning Jan.-Nov., witness the sudden exchange of presidential approval/disapproval ratings. The flip arrived in August's turn to September, when Biden's standing morphed from 51% approval to 51% disapproval.
Suffolk University's polling — which earns an A+ from 538 — is worse. Since August, Biden’s approval has plunged to 38%. When Suffolk asked voters in early November if he should run for reelection, only 29% said yes. (64%, no.)
When Biden vows that polls mean nothing to him, the assertion means nothing to me. And I can assure you his White House staff wakes with polls and with polls they go to bed. They're the standardized testing of publicly perceived, political performance.
For sure, Afghanistan has not been the sole causation of Biden's rolling misfortune. Afghanistan was, however, the megatonnage trigger. This may strike you as too obvious to point out, yet the much-larger-than subtext of Afghanistan has receded in political coverage. Against this, once such negativity settles itself in the electorate's noggin, it's a hard thing to snap and disentangle from.
In the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll we find another case of impeccable consistency: that of the body politic's muddled gray matter. More than 60% of Americans — including one-third of Democrats and 71% of independents — say "he has not accomplished much after 10 months in office." Yet Americans are by and large pleased about infrastructure's passage and they were downright giddy about his almost $2 trillion covid relief package. The potential passage of his climate-social spending plan — supported by 63% — would make for a legislative trifecta.
The incongruence of reality vs. recall is more than short-term memory loss. It's also the Afghanistan hangover.
Last month's 531,000 new jobs, upgraded previous hires, higher wages mostly keeping up with (probably temporary) inflation, and stock-market highs benefiting 401ks? The Wapo/ABC poll finds that Biden's approval on the economy has slipped to 39%. Afghanistan.
Of course Democrats' warm, cooperative, one-big-happy congressional family has done its customary job of spectacularly fucking things up. These Crystal City inhabs have managed to convert a 2020 sweep into registered voters now preferring a Republican Congress by 51%, vs. 41% for Democrats (Wapo/ABC). Still, logic dictates a reciprocal drag. As Biden's fortunes have depleted, so have the Dems'. The genesis: Afghanistan.
Far be it from humble, cliché-intolerant me to say I told you so, but if the shoe fits:
In late August I furiously urged that Biden sack his entire national security team. It made no difference that the team was sandbagged and blindsided by Afghanistan's internal chaos. Shit happened, and someone — a lot of someones — should have paid for it. That's simply the way accountable government works.
Nor did it matter that the commander in chief was determined to plow ahead — with good reason, I should add — notwithstanding whatever counter-advice he received. Biden made a decision and he stuck with it. But skimpily, perfunctorily taking "responsibility" for the Afghanistan fiasco, which, to Herculean confoundment, he then labeled an "extraordinary success" was an Olympic mistake.
A political fact is that Americans love a president who drops to his knees and boldly confesses his sins. The most-cited and indeed revealing example of this was President Kennedy's televised penitence after the swinish Bay. It "humanized" him. And his approval rating went up. Few presidents have followed his liberating lead since.
I can predict the future of Biden's popularity no better than a $2 tarot-card reader. But as for the past of August 2021, I believe tomorrow's historians will confirm this assessment of Afghanistan as the essential down-turning point in Biden's presidency — one fundamentally removed from voters' economic confusion, covid unhappiness and otherworldly notions of legislative failure.
The saddest part: It didn't have to be this way. Had he flamed his national security team while donning sackcloth and ashes, August might well have been his finest moment in the public's eye.