Biden Won. Can We Finally Stop Relentlessly Ignoring Worthwhile Criticisms of Him?

Supporters of President Donald Trump continue to reject reality and protest the results of the presidential election. But MAGA heads don’t have a monopoly on blind political hero-worship. Unfortunately, this phenomenon extends to Very Online Democrats, most of whom spend their time sharing Kamala Harris memes and virtually salivating over Chasten Buttigieg.

We must stop this infantilizing nonsense.

Throughout the election, criticism of Joe Biden was largely dismissed as a disingenuous distraction. The sole goal was to vote Trump out of office. Once that happened, we could worry about everything else, they said—from Biden’s right-of-center voting record to his penchant for incoherent rambling.

But the mainstream media coverage of Biden still largely remains of the fawning variety. MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt captured the zeitgeist nicely, when she lavished praise upon Biden for refusing to say whether he’s communicated with Mitch McConnell. “I’m just struck by the reality that we’ll now have a president who, as a rule, doesn’t lie, even when it might be easier,” she tweeted.

Recently, there was frenzied coverage of Biden bringing dogs back to the White House. “A longtime presence in the federal government, Biden took the famous line literally: If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog,” the Washington Post blared.

In the run-up to the election, Twitter and Facebook blocked incriminating stories about Hunter Biden from the New York Post, which contained information suggestive of money-laundering and tax issues in multiple countries, including China. The emails were roundly dismissed as “Russian disinformation.”

Last week, Hunter Biden announced the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Delaware was announcing his “tax affairs.” CNN says the investigation centers around his business dealings in China.

I am not trying to create a false equivalency between Trump’s grotesque corruption and one investigation into Biden’s son. But in roughly five weeks, Trump will be out of office. He can’t keep hanging over every single debate, even though he wants to. There is a world beyond him.

We’ve been unable to see that for five years, and it’s destroyed our capacity for critical thinking. For example, many of Biden’s top advisors—including his nominees for Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, and Director of National Intelligence—have deep ties to the same defense contract and consulting companies.

That sounds pretty swampy, does it not?

One of the central pieces of Biden’s coronavirus plan is a highly touted mask mandate. But the gesture seems to be more pandemic theatre than anything else. As of last summer, over 230 million Americans were already living under public mask mandates. They haven’t done much to slow the spread.

As gay men, we used to be cynical about our institutions. Larry Kramer called Dr. Anthony Fauci a “murderer” on the cover of the San Francisco Examiner. Now, Fauci is a godlike figure, and our “Guardian of the Year,” according to Time.

So what happened to us? We started making lots of money. Gay men now earn at least 10 percent more on average than straight men.

We’ve found ways to succeed within the corporate hierarchy. Now that we’re in power, there isn’t much of a desire to change things. We have turned our backs on the marginalized. Six-figure marketing jobs—and reshares on social media—have corrupted our souls.

Biden has been a creature of Washington for nearly the last half-century. His politically milquetoast cabinet selections—from Obama-era national security officials to Pete Buttigieg for Transportation Secretary—indicate he plans to govern from the center. Four years of neoliberal corporatism baked in identity politics.

We need to push Biden to be better. Pretending he’s immune to criticism makes us no different