What does Joe stand for?

 

Subject: What does Joe stand for ?

Does anyone have any idea what Joe Biden stands for. We know he was chosen as the Democratic Parties candidate to oppose Donald Trump for the presidency of the USA and we can assume he represents the general consensus of what the Democrats represent but which of the many laudable schemes the democrats would like to see put in place does he speak out for. 

He has been the man in the shadows for years always hanging onto the coattails of power but never actually handling the leavers to change direction. He is one of those Establishment grey hairs always standing on the stage pointing into the crowd as if he has just seen his brother sitting there, forever smiling, the epitome of the razzmatazz which purports to represent the political class in Washington, the polished showman who hasn't really got much to say.

Biden reminds me of Mike Pence, usually seen  standing immobile, stony faced, flanking Trump as he makes a good fist of caricaturing the facist Benito Mussolini. Pence is a foil for his boss, he makes 'no comment' common place. He is the 'stand in' if Trump were to topple over and at the very least would bring back some sort of sobriety to the job.

But back to Joe Biden. At 77 it says a lot about the apparent dearth of talent in the Democratic Party and also of the hold the 'money men' have over all the political parties in the America. His main challenger Bernie Sanders, the nearest thing to a socialist, was the main contender for the job and led the Democratic candidature after the votes were tallied in the first three states to vote, until someone had a word in his ear and he stood aside for Biden. Sanders a man with fresh ideas was too much of a maverick, too left wing in the eyes of the money. Elizabeth Warren ditto, seen as too feisty for the club who run the Democratic Party. There was a trio of able female performers who injected life into the nomination contest but they were also sidelined by the ghost of yesteryear Mr Biden. It's as if the Democrats want another four years of Trump and perhaps they do with people dropping like flys due to Covid 19 who wants to sort that out and sitting in their neo-colonial mansions in California or Massachusetts, the gravy chain is also too lucrative for political ideology to get in the way.

And so as the usual sound-bytes and millions of dollars are spent in the colossal hood -wink which purports to be 'the Democratic process in action' in America' we see two octogenarians carefully stepping, a little unsteadily, around the stage, flanked by their flag waving, unreasoning supporters, hoping to convince a shell shocked electorate, weighed down by the threat of Covid 19 and a people still riven by racism and gun ownership. The vote to win and occupy the most powerful position in the world is further mired in an anachronism, the Electoral Collage which reapportions what ever the voters want with 548 'official presidential electors, the movers and shakers who actually chose who the president will be. 

The US Constitution written in 1787 was an amalgam of checks and balances trying to even out the uneven make up of this fledgling nation who having emerged from the myopic vision of British rule were determined not to allow themselves to be strangled by the self interest of the wealthy few and set the bar high in a Constitution, far removed from the ancestral aristocracy which ruled in Europe. 

People's rights were sacrosanct, or at least they were if you had a white skin but the fear of letting go the control which had been hard won in the Independence struggle was to be guarded by older wise heads who would guide the nation in their election of president. The president himself was guided by the two houses, the House of Representatives who represented the interests of the national vote (the people) as a proportional vote based on the numbers living in a particular state and the Senate who elect Senators from  within the State who are independent of the Representatives and  who serve the interests of the state. Both Houses make up the Congress which is designed to offset the power of the President by holding the purse strings. 

The Constitution, a far reaching document for its day is still the bed rock on which the American system operates but the world view, seen in 1789 is a far cry from the one we have today and the choice of who makes choices which effect not only Americans but all of us is fought under a cloud of competency rather than ideological premise.