SOCIETY
18 Months In: Can America Meet the Future?
Searching for a rapid Covid test in New York City made me very nervous
When Joe Biden returned from his first international trip in June, he reassured America that he had reassured our allies that America was “back.” Having campaigned for Biden and voted for him, I wanted to believe — in my bones — that the Trump years were just a fever-dream of an anomaly and that with Joe and Kamala in the White House we had righted the ship. Of course, what followed this summer was our disastrous exit from Afghanistan. Set up for failure by the former guy, Biden’s extraction of our interests and people from Kabul was not, well, reassuring.
One could easily make the argument that there was such a clusterfuck of a mess left in the Oval Office, that anything short of mayhem, crashing markets, or nuclear or civil war is a miracle, especially after the events of January 6. But that would be letting the Biden administration off the hook. I believe in unity. I believe in patience. But I do not believe in going easy on leaders we trust to do the right thing — and to do it expeditiously. If democracy is to persist, it must function well, and in a timely manner, for the American people. There is ample evidence to suggest that it is not doing so.
