Our government is designed to balance power amongst competing branches, so no radical changes can be made in a short time. It is designed to be slow and ponderous, and not rush to adopt whatever the latest fad is. That's why Obama's second term was so ineffectual; Republicans owned the Senate and held a single solitary belief and policy: anything Obama said was bad and should be quashed. Obama, on the other hand, thought that it was possible to negotiate with the neighborhood bully, and - if he accepted enough punches to the mouth - they would acquiesce on a few of his key policy initiatives. And that gamble didn't pay out. Because he was working with morally bankrupt peons within the performative arm of the GOP, like John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, Ted Cruz, and other people who carry water for the big money interests that actually control the politicians and their positions. (See: The Heritage Foundation. And the shadowy organization that works in the background to position key individuals for Supreme Court seats, and has a 100% success rate... but I am blanking on their name right now...) So. Biden can have all the plans he wants, and all the proposals he wants, and all the ideas he wants. He still needs to win the Presidency, Democrats keep the House, AND Democrats win the Senate, before any of his proposals will EVER BE READ. The Senate Majority Leader (aka Mitch McConnell) decides on the agenda items the Senate will address, every single day. If he decides not to add Biden's plan to the agenda, it never comes to a vote, and can never be passed or made into law. Boom. Headshot. Dead plan. If the Dems take the Senate, they get the item on the Agenda, it gets voted on, and hopefully passes. (Fuck you Rand Paul.) Then, once implemented, every single element in the plan will be fought by Republican partisan lawyers, working carefully crafted cases, through Trump-appointed lower judges, up to the fully partisan and GOP-held Supreme Court... where the policies/plans and everything Biden ever does will be ruled unconstitutional and repealed by the Supreme Court. (Which they can do now to ANYTHING, after their ruling last week in Wisconsin; the Supreme Court is now the ONLY ruler in the land, and is completely owned by the people behind the GOP machine.) Until the Electoral College is abolished, the Supreme Court is increased to 15 (or more) judges, and Trump's judges are removed/die-off from the lower courts, no Biden policy will be actionable. Because, in the end, every businessman responsible for their annual budget expenditures knows this is how it is going to go. So even if Biden were to sign the Green New Deal into law on January 21st, NOBODY will take any action to put the plan into place because they know that it will be tied up in the courts for 4-12 years before even the first step can be taken. (See: The ACA.) It all comes down to how our system was designed; slow, ponderous, and difficult to change direction. And the GOP's puppetmasters who have mapped out their plan in the background to pervert the basic premise of majority rule in our democracy. So I say, Good for Biden for having a plan! But it is too little, too late. The Republicans already have a plan, they have executed on it, and now we live in their world for the next two decades, or so. And we are stuck there until progressives start punching conservatives in the mouth for being dicks. And that ain't never gonna happen.
What is the point in living in America? I don’t mean that tongue in cheek, either, based on your current opinion and this comment, why would you continue to live here if we’re stuck in GOP land for 2 decades?
My wife and my parents, honestly. I've lived overseas in many different countries. And I would do it again, if I could. The issue is that my parents are in their 70's and 80's. My wife owns our house outright, and she loves the place. If we left, I think she would get used to living elsewhere - she'd love it actually - but neither of us would forgive ourselves for not spending as much of the remaining years with our parents as we can. Once they passed away, we would beat ourselves constantly with the knowledge that we didn't share as much time with them as we could. Regret is hard to overcome. But it is easy to avoid. Assuming my parents pass in the next 10 years or so, we could leave the country. We'd be in our mid-60's, though, and that is a HARD time for countries to allow new people in. We would be well past our earning prime, and would not have paid into the socialized systems in place in that country (Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, etc.), so we would largely be a burden (cost) on their systems... which would only continue to increase, until we passed. There's no money in letting old people immigrate to your country. So, due to the love of my family, we may be stuck in this GOP-crafted hell for the rest of our lives.
I think, if nothing else, it sounds like you and your wife crafted out a niche which will make things tolerable. Plus, in some ways there is the benefit of living in the Puget Sound versus most other areas subject to federal law and Supreme Court rulings. I really appreciate where you’re coming from, thanks for that response.
Yeah, we have it very good, in addition to winning the genetic/lifestyle lottery of being white, straight, married, middle-aged, middle-class, home-owning, DINKs. Which honestly makes it even harder to see the shit our friends are having to deal with, who don't have that sept-fecta of privilege. Our housemate is a black man. We have transgender friends. Gay married friends. Disabled friends. Foreign friends whose visa could be revoked for any little thing. Poor artists. Geriatrics with old age issues. Immunocompromised people with fragile healthcare. Musicians. Farmers. Small business owners. Etc... Every one of these demos is being brutalized by the conservative hate machine... and I am largely powerless to materially help make the environment we all live in one in which they have the same opportunities and advantages we have enjoyed. Opportunities that have led directly to our comfortable lives amidst this apocalypse. The dichotomy hurts. Every day. Running away to another country would feel good in one way... and bad in others.