By Nate Odenkirk | Staff Writer
Seeking to make a bold, aspirational, and limited message of hope, President-elect Joe Biden released a long list of ambitious compromises he hopes to achieve his first hundred days in office. “The winds of change are coming,” said the President-elect in a stirring speech. “They’re blowing at around four to five miles per hour.”
The ambitious list of compromises will be pursued within the first one hundred days of a Biden Administration, a time when President Biden will have most political capital to pass low-impact legislation. “He’s seizing on his mandate to accomplish bold compromises,” said Ron Klain, the chief of staff for the president-elect. “They’re compromises nobody paid for, and that’s a promise.”
Biden has stressed his priority of bringing together ideologically different sides of the party. “I will build an administration that liberals, moderates, and conservatives will all dislike equally,” said the incoming president. “That’s how we bring America together—against me.”
“They’re compromises nobody paid for, and that’s a promise.”
The editorial team at The Inquirist took time out of our busy schedule to summarize some of Biden’s most ambitious compromises.
Firstly, the environment. Reflecting the desire to do something but not much, the incoming Biden Administration will implement a mild list of regulatory changes. Dubbed “The Grey New Deal,” Biden will direct the Environmental Protection Agency to add an extra propeller to existing wind turbines. Originally, Biden had set out to also add recycling bins in the White House and Congress, potentially giving progressives a big win. But with the strong likelihood of Mitch McConnell (R-KY) maintaining hold on the Senate, Leader McConnell has pledged to block any initiative that will add recycling bins to the upper chamber.
Judges, too, have been a particular sticking point. Over the last four years, President Trump has taken advantage of a slim Senate majority to push through hundreds of young archconservatives to the federal bench. Biden’s plan to dilute the saturated judiciary includes a radical compromise. The incoming president has pledged to nominate one liberal judge for every five appointed by Republicans. The plan comes with a hard ultimatum to the GOP, however: Biden will go through with this only if they’re okay with that arrangement.
A third goal—using the word “bipartisan” more often—is likely to fail in court. Can all this really happen in the first one hundred days? It’s possible. Striking a markedly different tone, Mitch McConnell has signaled his openness to negotiate with the incoming administration, as long as he gets everything he asks for. And although many liberals are disappointed with the posturing of President-elect Biden, the historic nature of his policies cannot be overlooked. With this platform, he is poised to be the most progressive president since the Obama Administration. ♦