(Sorry, I couldn't resist that title.)
Here is a spunky little thread sure to push JoJo over the top with voters.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/128791866
DU POLL Undecided 41% Joe Biden13% Kamala Harris11% Pete Buttigieg10% Elizabeth Warren9% More...
Fri Apr 26, 2019, 11:56 AM
Star Member ancianita (9,159 posts)
More Biden Baggage For The Debates -- Pick On THIS
Be careful not to provide the Republicans with all their media and election talking points while you're picking at Joe's baggage, so they don't pass themselves off as smarter than they are.
Any fair and productive discussion of Joe Biden's baggage -- Democrats are nothing if not fair, right? -- just remember to credit Biden with advising, helping and standing by the guy who gets most, but should not get ALL the credit.
Here's more than half of Joe's baggage.
Joe helped Obama with so much of the sausage making that he can ride on Obama's successes without being accused of riding on his coattails. Obama knows this: Biden helped MAKE Obama's coattails.
Think about the list below. Sure, his Democratic opponents helped vote for these, some of them.
Think about this list as he talks about governmental experience that is greater than any Democrat debating him.
Biden's got muscle memory about governing the way that Trump's got muscle memory about lying.
What Trump has put asunder, Biden will join back together as befits the country's current and future economic, social and national security needs.
Joe Biden is the one who best knows which of the following should get revived from Trump's wrecking ball.
Joe can rightfully ride on his work in the previous administration that
1. Passed Health Care Reform
2. Passed the Stimulus
3. Ended the War in Iraq
4. Began Drawdown of War in Afghanistan
5. Eliminated Osama bin laden
6. Established Stress Tests As the Condition of Recapitalizing Banks
7. Repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”
8. Reversed Bush Torture Policies
9. Improved America’s Image Abroad: With new policies, diplomacy, and rhetoric, reversed a sharp decline in world opinion toward the U.S. (and the corresponding loss of “soft power”) during the Bush years.
10. Kicked Banks Out of Federal Student Loan Program, Expanded Pell Grant Spending.
11. Created Race to the Top: With funds from stimulus, started $4.35 billion program of competitive grants to encourage and reward states for education reform.
12. Boosted Fuel Efficiency Standards: Released new fuel efficiency standards in 2011 that will nearly double the fuel economy for cars and trucks by 2025.
13. Coordinated International Response to Financial Crisis: To keep world economy out of recession in 2009 and 2010, helped secure from G-20 nations more than $500 billion for the IMF to provide lines of credit and other support to emerging market countries, which kept them liquid and avoided crises with their currencies.
14. Passed Mini Stimuli: To help families hurt by the recession and spur the economy as stimulus spending declined, signed series of measures (July 22, 2010; December 17, 2010; December 23, 2011) to extend unemployment insurance and cut payroll taxes.
15. Began Asia “Pivot”: In 2011, reoriented American military and diplomatic priorities and focus from the Middle East and Europe to the Asian-Pacific region. Executed multipronged strategy of positively engaging China while reasserting U.S. leadership in the region
16. Increased Support for Veterans: increased 2010 Department of Veterans Affairs budget by 16 percent and 2011 budget by 10 percent.
17. new GI bill offering $78 billion in tuition assistance over a decade, and provided multiple tax credits to encourage businesses to hire veterans.
18. Tightened Sanctions on Iran: to deter Iran’s nuclear program, signed Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act (2010) to punish firms and individuals who aid Iran’s petroleum sector. In late 2011 and early 2012, coordinated with other major Western powers to impose sanctions aimed at Iran’s banks and with Japan, South Korea, and China to shift their oil purchases away from Iran.
19. Created Conditions to Begin Closing Dirtiest Power Plants: New EPA restrictions on mercury and toxic pollution, issued in December 2011, likely to lead to the closing of between sixty-eight and 231 of the nation’s oldest and dirtiest coal-fired power plants. Estimated cost to utilities: at least $11 billion by 2016. Estimated health benefits: $59 billion to $140 billion. Will also significantly reduce carbon emissions and, with other regulations, comprises what’s been called Obama’s “stealth climate policy.”
20. Passed Credit Card Reforms: Signed the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act (2009), which prohibits credit card companies from raising rates without advance notification, mandates a grace period on interest rate increases, and strictly limits overdraft and other fees.
21. Eliminated Catch-22 in Pay Equality Laws: Signed Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in 2009, giving women who are paid less than men for the same work the right to sue their employers after they find out about the discrimination, even if that discrimination happened years ago. Under previous law, as interpreted by the Supreme Court in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., the statute of limitations on such suits ran out 180 days after the alleged discrimination occurred, even if the victims never knew about it.
22. Protected Two Liberal Seats on the U.S. Supreme Court: Nominated and obtained confirmation for Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic and third woman to serve, in 2009; and Elena Kagan, the fourth woman to serve, in 2010. They replaced David Souter and John Paul Stevens, respectively.
23. Improved Food Safety System: In 2011, signed FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, which boosts the Food and Drug Administration’s budget by $1.4 billion and expands its regulatory responsibilities to include increasing number of food inspections, issuing direct food recalls, and reviewing the current food safety practices of countries importing products into America.
24. Achieved New START Treaty: Signed with Russia (2010) and won ratification in Congress (2011) of treaty that limits each country to 1,550 strategic warheads (down from 2,200) and 700 launchers (down from more than 1,400), and reestablished and strengthened a monitoring and transparency program that had lapsed in 2009, through which each country can monitor the other.
25. Expanded National Service: Signed Serve America Act in 2009, which authorized a tripling of the size of AmeriCorps. Program grew 13 percent to 85,000 members across the country by 2012, when new House GOP majority refused to appropriate more funds for further expansion.
26. Expanded Wilderness and Watershed Protection: Signed Omnibus Public Lands Management Act (2009), which designated more than 2 million acres as wilderness, created thousands of miles of recreational and historic trails, and protected more than 1,000 miles of rivers.
27. Gave the FDA Power to Regulate Tobacco: Signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (2009). Nine years in the making and long resisted by the tobacco industry, the law mandates that tobacco manufacturers disclose all ingredients, obtain FDA approval for new tobacco products, and expand the size and prominence of cigarette warning labels, and bans the sale of misleadingly labeled “light” cigarette brands and tobacco sponsorship of entertainment events.
28. Pushed Federal Agencies to Be Green Leaders: Issued executive order in 2009 requiring all federal agencies to make plans to soften their environmental impacts by 2020. Goals include 30 percent reduction in fleet gasoline use, 26 percent boost in water efficiency, and sustainability requirements for 95 percent of all federal contracts. Because federal government is the country’s single biggest purchaser of goods and services, likely to have ripple effects throughout the economy for years to come.
29. Passed Fair Sentencing Act: Signed 2010 legislation that reduces sentencing disparity between crack versus powder cocaine possessionfrom100 to1 to 18 to1.
30. Trimmed and Reoriented Missile Defense: Cut the Reagan-era “Star Wars” missile defense budget, saving $1.4 billion in 2010, and canceled plans to station antiballistic missile systems in Poland and the Czech Republic in favor of sea-based defense plan focused on Iran and North Korea.
31. Began Post-Post-9/11 Military Build-down: After winning agreement from congressional Republicans and Democrats in summer 2011 budget deal to reduce projected defense spending by $450 billion, proposed new DoD budget this year with cuts of that size and a new national defense strategy that would shrink ground forces from 570,000 to 490,000 over the next ten years while increasing programs in intelligence gathering and cyberwarfare.
32. Let Space Shuttle Die and Killed Planned Moon Mission: Allowed the expensive ($1 billion per launch), badly designed, dangerous shuttle program to make its final launch on July 8, 2011. Cut off funding for even more bloated and problem-plagued Bush-era Constellation program to build moon base in favor of support for private-sector low-earth orbit ventures, research on new rocket technologies for long-distance manned flight missions, and unmanned space exploration, including the largest interplanetary rover ever launched, which will investigate Mars’s potential to support life.
33. Invested Heavily in Renewable Technology: As part of the 2009 stimulus, invested $90 billion, more than any previous administration, in research on smart grids, energy efficiency, electric cars, renewable electricity generation, cleaner coal, and biofuels.
34. Crafting Next-Generation School Tests: Devoted $330 million in stimulus money to pay two consortia of states and universities to create competing versions of new K-12 student performance tests based on latest psychometric research. New tests could transform the learning environment in vast majority of public school classrooms beginning in 2014.
35. Cracked Down on Bad For-Profit Colleges: In effort to fight predatory practices of some for-profit colleges, Department of Education issued “gainful employment” regulations in 2011 cutting off commercially focused schools from federal student aid funding if more than 35 percent of former students aren’t paying off their loans and/or if the average former student spends more than 12 percent of his or her total earnings servicing student loans.
36. Improved School Nutrition: In coordination with Michelle Obama, signed Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act in 2010 mandating $4.5 billion spending boost and higher nutritional and health standards for school lunches. New rules based on the law, released in January, double the amount of fruits and vegetables and require only whole grains in food served to students.
37. Expanded Hate Crimes Protections: Signed Hate Crimes Prevention Act (2009), which expands existing hate crime protections to include crimes based on a victim’s sexual orientation, gender, or disability, in addition to race, color, religion, or national origin.
38. Avoided Scandal: As of November 2011, served longer than any president in decades without a scandal, as measured by the appearance of the word “scandal” (or lack thereof) on the front page of the Washington Post.
39. Brokered Agreement for Speedy Compensation to Victims of Gulf Oil Spill: Though lacking statutory power to compel British Petroleum to act, used moral authority of his office to convince oil company to agree in 2010 to a $20 billion fund to compensate victims of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico; $6.5 billion already paid out without lawsuits. By comparison, it took nearly two decades for plaintiffs in the Exxon Valdez Alaska oil spill case to receive $1.3 billion.
40. Created Recovery.gov: Web site run by independent board of inspectors general looking for fraud and abuse in stimulus spending, provides public with detailed information on every contract funded by $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Thanks partly to this transparency, board has uncovered very little fraud, and Web site has become national model
41. Pushed Broadband Coverage: Proposed and obtained in 2011 Federal Communications Commission approval for a shift of $8 billion in subsidies away from landlines and toward broadband Internet for lower-income rural families.
42. Expanded Health Coverage for Children: Signed 2009 Children’s Health Insurance Authorization Act, which allows the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) to cover health care for 4 million more children, paid for by a tax increase on tobacco products.
43. Recognized the Dangers of Carbon Dioxide: In 2009, EPA declared carbon dioxide a pollutant, allowing the agency to regulate its production.
44. Expanded Stem Cell Research: In 2009, eliminated the Bush-era restrictions on embryonic stem cell research, which shows promise in treating spinal injuries, among many other areas.
45. Provided Payment to Wronged Minority Farmers: In 2009, signed Claims Resolution Act, which provided $4.6 billion in funding for a legal settlement with black and Native American farmers who the government cheated out of loans and natural resource royalties in years past.
46. Helped South Sudan Declare Independence: Helped South Sudan Declare Independence: Appointed two envoys to Sudan and personally attended a special UN meeting on the area. Through U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice, helped negotiate a peaceful split in 2011.
47. Killed the F-22: In 2009, ended further purchases of Lockheed Martin single-seat, twin-engine, fighter aircraft, which cost $358 million apiece. Though the military had 187 built, the plane has never flown a single combat mission. Eliminating it saved $4 billion.
Yes, Joe will tell you all the stories of his work.
Don't get me started... !
Mission Control? Yup, what better job for a space cadet ?
I have posted the accomplishments with the hope folk will be able to share their reaction to one or more without having to resort to going to the DUmp.
The comments on this thread are singularly undistinguished and in line with general DU group think. There are a few random comments which could be long term moles or just disgruntled Bernie people. Since they sort of fit with my scheme of things I will post them.
Qutzupalotl (10,834 posts)
15. Great list, but one quibble:
Regarding the raid on bin Laden, it is true Biden advised the president extensively. However, Biden felt the daring raid was too risky, and advised against it. My sense is that Biden objected to conducting the capture without notifying Pakistan. Obama suspected Pakistan of secretly and knowingly harboring bin Laden, and did not want to give them a heads up. This was a rare instance where Obama disagreed with his VP. The raid was indeed risky and could have ended in disaster, so I don’t fault Joe here. I only point this out to say that advising against the raid is not the same as killing bin Laden.
Qutzupalotl (10,834 posts)
21. Joe was very gracious
and gave all the credit to Obama, which makes him a statesman in my book. I like politicians who can admit when they were wrong, because they all are at some point. One of the fatal flaws of this president is he just doubles down rather than admit any mistake out of fear of showing “weakness.”
This next comment is priceless in its simple unstated truth. (Of course millennial will be like Carter,"Who was dat?" And, "What did Obama's Grandpa Joe have to do with it?")
mn9driver (1,942 posts)
22. Biden was probably flashing back on the Iran hostage rescue disaster.
He was in the Senate when that happened and besides the tragic loss of life, he witnessed its destructive effect on Carter’s Presidency.
I believe I have seen this list somewhere before but on to the hunt.
After hearing a bit of
Secret Empires on my MP3, I have decided to showcase this one
15. Began Asia “Pivot”. Yes, he did and his kid made millions on it. Legal? Maybe yes. Ethical? If you are a long term Swamp Thing of the Democratic party. Absolutely. How will it play on Peoria? Or Scranton for that fact. I suspect not well.
