All the small things you can look forward to in a
Biden administration
Opinion by
Columnist
Oct. 27, 2020 at 9:00 a.m. CDT
If
polling is accurate and former vice president Joe Biden wins handily next week,
we can look forward to some very big changes: competent Cabinet officials,
coherent policy initiatives, respect for the Constitution, a foreign policy
that favors democracies rather than brutal dictatorships and depoliticization
of the Justice Department, to name just a few.
But
apart from concrete policy, we can also look forward to a host of things that
we once took for granted:
·
White House news releases without typos, weird punctuation and
other glaring errors.
·
Official documents that read like official documents in tone and
that come out by email or hard copy, as opposed to tweets.
·
The absence of childish name-calling, insults, racist remarks,
gaffes characterized as “jokes” and singling out of individual companies simply because they
failed to boost the president’s ego.
·
A White House press shop that earns the presumption of
trustworthiness until proven otherwise and — at worst — relies on “I don’t
know” or vague evasion rather than outright lies.
·
News conferences in which the president does not personally
insult members of the media, exclude them for writing things he does not like
or dub them “the enemy of the people.”
·
Presidential interviews with respected news figures, not
sycophantic media personalities.
·
A normal presidential schedule in which hours of TV time are not built in.
·
No more Stalinesque Cabinet meetings in which officials try to top one another in
fawning over the president.
·
A president who communicates directly with the leaders of the
House and Senate.
·
An administration that knows climate change is real and that
more intense forest fires don’t result merely from insufficient sweeping of the
forest floor.
·
An engaged first lady who takes up
important public causes with tangible results.
·
An administration without relatives working in the White House.
·
A president who does not make money from funneling attention and
revenue to his holdings.
·
No judicial nominee who is rated “not qualified” by the American Bar
Association.
·
An administration in which “Infrastructure Week” is about
infrastructure.
·
A president who can comfort the nation in times of tragedy.
·
A president who does not use the military as props.
·
A president who has some basic grasp of American history,
including racial injustice.
·
A president whose advisers are not overwhelmingly White men.
·
No presidential awards for political hacks, contributors
and toxic media figures.
·
A president who never utters the phrases “red state” or “blue
city.”
·
A White House counsel’s office that at least tries to get it
right by providing advice in accord with the Constitution and statutes and
polices unethical conduct.
·
An administration that favors easy access to voting.
·
Policy pronouncements issued only after consideration by
relevant experts and departments.
·
A president who does not celebrate police brutality or excuse war crimes.
·
A president who does not embarrass us on the world stage.
·
A president who knows that there are no NATO “dues” and
consumers pay for tariffs.
·
A president who understands the benefits of forward deployments
and alliances.
·
A president who does not encourage Chinese detention camps or defend the human
rights record of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
We
could go on, but you get the idea. When you start making a list, you realize
just how abnormal and infuriating President Trump’s conduct and rhetoric have
been. You also remember that having a president who is a decent human being and
tries to put the voters’ interests above his own is no small thing.
