22: Joe Biden

What Biden’s Decision Not to Run Means for America By bowing out of the presidential race, he appears to have increased the odds that Democrats can hold onto the White House and compete strongly for control of Congress. He may have set in motion a historic process that could result in a woman becoming the most important person in the world, a step that would reshape gender norms worldwide. ............ Biden’s act of political self-sacrifice caps an extraordinary career of public service, including a presidency more productive than others, even some that lasted twice as long. Biden’s announcement also offers a stark contrast between his devotion to the national interest and Donald Trump’s long focus on his own personal interest. ......... In his 1961 inaugural address, President John F. Kennedy celebrated the torch being passed to the greatest generation. Then, in 1993, President Bill Clinton claimed power for baby boomers, who have since held it for more than three decades. Once more the torch will be passed to a new generation of Americans. ........... Biden’s presidency already has reshaped towns across America with everything from broadband to insulin price caps to a (unfortunately temporary) refundable child tax credit that helped reduce child poverty by half. All that is an immense legacy. .......... My guess is that because a Democrat is now more likely to win the White House, Russia is less likely to defeat Ukraine and China is less likely to go to war with Taiwan. Women are more likely to be able to get a legal abortion. The Education Department is more likely to survive and so, for that matter, is a healthy American democracy. ........... What is clear is that Joe Biden had a productive term in office and should be proud of his accomplishments. But without diminishing those achievements, historians may look back in their assessments of Biden’s presidency and paraphrase what Shakespeare wrote in “Macbeth”: Nothing became his presidency like the leaving of it.