 Well, believe it or not, we are now about a hundred days into Joe Biden's presidency give or take And I thought it would be useful to kind of pause from the news stories We talk about pretty frequently on the program and just reflect on the early stage like the first milestone of Joe Biden's presidency and There's already so much that this is gonna be difficult to kind of Go through it's not gonna be an exhaustive list of the pros and the cons But I do want to talk about some of the standout things that he's done We'll talk about the good the bad the mixed slash complicated things as well as the ugly But first and foremost starting with the good I think that the easiest most obvious conclusion at this point in time is that predictably Joe Biden is a much better president than Donald Trump I Think that most reasonable people Can deduce that that is the case now having said that the bar is like below the floor But I mean it still matters and it matters when it comes to issues like COVID-19 because I think it's obvious That Joe Biden has been much more capable and competent at handling the pandemic It's not a perfect response, but is it better than Donald Trump? Absolutely, and Joe Biden gets credit for setting out to do 100 million vaccinations and not only Achieving that goal but actually passing it if Donald Trump were president I don't know that I would be in a position to where I had already received my first vaccination In April I don't think that this would be possible because there are numerous reports that Donald Trump had zero Infrastructure built to actually distribute the vaccines. So who knows how long it would have taken to get vaccinated Under Donald Trump so Joe Biden gets credit for actually acting like an adult and doing the bare minimum But I still don't think his response has been perfect I think that his push to reopen schools is too hasty and I don't agree with that I think that you know him not waving essentially going back on his promise To immediately wave IP rights so that way smaller countries can create their own generic of the vaccinations That's bad, but again So far overall when you step back and you look at his response to COVID-19 It has been a lot better another thing that he gets credit for obviously is the Paris climate accord Again, it's hard to give him a lot of credit for this because it's the bare minimum But Donald Trump wouldn't even allow us to do the bare minimum and any small steps We took to trying to mitigate climate change Trump even undid that so just to not go backwards I think that that does matter when we're talking about a climate change. Is it enough? Mm-hmm not at all, but not going backwards is still preferable To going backwards not making progress is preferable to going backwards and again when the bar is so low You know, I could acknowledge these things now one more thing that I want to give him major credit for him is in his Infrastructure proposal there's actually a provision that could end the net neutrality debate Once and for all by offering funding to build up publicly owned municipal broadband alternatives so this would not just and Monopolies when it comes to the internet But it would be a game-changer and when it comes to net neutrality as I expected he Appointed Jessica Rosenwurzel to be the acting chair of the FCC and he's now putting funding into municipal broadband efforts Which is really needed So if he were able to pull this off all reserve judgment to see more details about this plan But if he were actually able to pull this off It would be a game-changer So this is something that net neutrality activists should be proud of but moving on to the more mixed things now in this category It's kind of the gray area category where ultimately he did something, but it was temporary or he could have done more or you know he He did something because He was forced to do something But in this mix category, I have to start off with the $1,400 checks Nobody should ever forget the fact that he promised $2,000 checks and he gave us $1,400 checks now. Thank you for the $1,400 not good enough though. You said 2,000 I think it is Unforgivable that you didn't follow through with that promise. I'm sorry, but I've got to keep it real now Also in the mixed to meh category is Withdrawing troops from Afghanistan. I will reserve judgment Because if he actually does this he gets credit for this and we're not talking about like reducing the troops down to an insignificant level I'm talking about getting out Period if he does this he gets credit thus far. He signaled his intent to do that I am very skeptical that he's actually going to follow through so we'll put this in the mixed category But we'll get to foreign policy a little bit more later now I think that David Dayan of the American prospect did a good job at kind of Talking through some of the more complicated things about Joe Biden's legacy thus far quote in response to the tragic Outbreak of COVID-19 in India Biden's team ignored calls for help for several days Finally national security adviser Jake Sullivan ended the export ban on raw materials for vaccines Then after weeks of prodding He decided to share with India and the world Dormant AstraZeneca vaccines that had been sitting in a warehouse in Baltimore Also, the administration set a deadline of March 15th for an emergency temporary workplace standard for COVID-19 Then shot past that date and at one point even put the rule on hold After pushing from Senate Democrats and labor unions finally yesterday the Department of Labor advanced the temporary standard through the regulatory Process, which means it's still not active until after the office of management and budget signs off the Biden's team's greatest legislative accomplishment the expanded and advanced child tax credit in the American rescue plan Only lasts for one year Democrats pressured Biden to make that permanent But he rejected that citing the high cost and instead will reportedly only extend it to 2025 in tomorrow's announcement Representative Richard Neil chair of the House Ways and Means Committee has deviated from that script today is Reducing a family care bill that makes the CTC permanent Also, the Biden team needed only to sign a piece of paper to increase the refugee cap and allow tens of thousands of migrants Deplorable conditions to settle in the United States Biden promised to do it and briefed Congress then changed his mind Reportedly it was his decision and left the refugees stuck on the tarmac after tremendous pushback from all corners of the party Biden relented but only to say that he would set a new refugee cap by May 15th. So these are things that It's a little bit complicated, you know, because he on one hand he did something that was good But if it's not going to be permanent as it relates to the child tax credit Then I mean you get partial credit, but you should have gone further, you know, if you finally Relented on something because you got pushed back. I mean, that's good, but it's complicated, right? So that's why we kind of have this in between category, but moving on to the bad You know, this is a lot less difficult to gauge whether or not He is a at fault or deserves credit He's just downright bad and of course I'm talking about his foreign policy, which has been predictably atrocious and In an article for Jack been by Daniel Bessemer He thoroughly explains how there's been zero change since he took office The most important thing to know about the Biden administration's foreign policy so far is that it is structurally identical to the foreign policies of every US president since World War two it is simply put a foreign policy Organized around the principle of world domination Biden's underlings will ensure that the US dollar remains the world's global reserve currency that the US armed forces retain access to the nation's Approximately 750 overseas bases and that the government continues to spend a grotesque amount on the military The US left meanwhile is in a strange position The Bernie Sanders campaign and the success of left politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib have demonstrated that there's a real hunger for criticism Of the status quo Simultaneously, however Sanders defeat and the relative weakness of AOC Omar and Tlaib suggest that socialists need to step back and think through our general approach to the US state and power itself Foreign policy must be central to this effort even if Sanders had won the presidency It would have been difficult to manipulate the levers of power for anti-imperial ends not least because we socialists don't fully Understand how the actually existing American imperial state operates the state formation is unique in world history It is not only genuinely global But it also diffuses power and authority through an opaque network of public institutions multinational corporations Consultancies and think tanks Figuring out how to shape and work within the incredibly complex matrix will require significant intellectual work It is a project to which left presently out of power though with a hopefully bright future should dedicate itself Which brings us to Biden's first 100 days So far the new president has promised to remove all troops from Afghanistan by the 20th anniversary of the September 11th 2001 attacks failed to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal Returned the US to the Paris climate agreement on climate change begun to rebuild relationships with allies in Europe and Asia and Adopted an aggressive posture towards Russia and China all told Biden has embraced a restorationist approach to US foreign policy organized around three goals ending the US intervention in Afghanistan Re-establishing domestic and international faith in US leadership the common euphemism for hegemony and Manufacturing consent for US dominance both at home and abroad by raising the specter of great power competition and a new Cold War So given what we know about the military industrial complex and as the article explains it essentially it is this Amorphous entity that operates semi autonomously almost You know, it's not necessarily surprising that Biden is so terrible on foreign policy But having said that though Even with all of the pressure from the military industrial complex He has chosen unilaterally to make terrible decisions him not joining the JCPOA Otherwise known as the Iran nuclear agreement is unforgivable He's backtracking on a promise and sure it's early. We'll have to wait and see but this should have been an Immediate priority something that's easy to accomplish you check it off and that's a promise fulfilled But he hasn't done that and additionally while we're on the subject of foreign policy Let's just you know Gradually move over into the ugly category because I think we can file him choosing to bomb Syria Under the ugly not only it was that illegal under US law. It was illegal under international law Unacceptable and unforgivable something that is going to be a stain on his record But on top of that while we're talking about the ugly There's absolutely no excuses when it comes to his approach related to immigration after promising to halt all deportations Within the first 100 days of his administration. He has supported more than 300,000 immigrants now to be overly charitable He did sign in executive order halting deportations for his first 100 days in office However, a federal judge who used a Trump Justice Department era policy to shoot down that executive order Changed things right so Biden he could have adapted. He could have subverted that ruling He could have postponed all of the deportations to meet this promise at a minimum But he didn't do that Instead he went in the opposite direction and guess what kids are still in cages folks are still getting deported and kids are still being Caged and it gets worse than that 500 kids are being crammed into cages meant for 32 people and guess what? COVID is spreading rapidly the positivity rate at at least one facility in Texas is 14% that is insane that is deadly and as Jake Johnson of common dreams explains Rights group United We Dream warned Tuesday that unless he takes immediate steps to improve his administration's treatment of immigrants President Joe Biden is at serious risk of repeating the destructive failures of former president Barack Obama Who deported roughly three million people during his eight years in office despite Biden's characterization of Obama's mass deportations as a mistake and pledge to usher in a more humane immigration system United We Dream estimates that the administration has deported just over 300,000 people since January largely using a Trump era policy called title 42 in a statement on Monday Cynthia Garcia of United We Dream Stressed that title 42 was designed under one of the most anti-immigrant administrations in modern history President Biden and the Department of Homeland Security must be reminded that they're in action to protect vulnerable immigrant communities Seeking refuge in the United States is not only putting lives on the line It upholds a white nationalist immigration system that seeks to expel and keep black and brown immigrants out at any cost Said Garcia who voiced dismay at the Biden administration's deportation of vulnerable Haitians and others According to a report released late last month by the Haitian Bridge Alliance and other advocacy groups The Biden administration used title 42 to deport more Haitians during its first weeks in power Then the Trump administration did in all of fiscal year 2020 now for those of you who don't know what title 42 is This is what Trump used to basically have the pandemic be the justification did a port lots and lots of people So having said that just stepping back and taking a look at Joe Biden's administration thus far at the 100-day point give or take again I would say that there's been some good. There's been a lot of really bad and ugly things But ultimately nothing has fundamentally changed and this is what I expected and also this is what he promised But obviously this is by no means an exhaustive list This is just a lot of things that stood out to me having said that though I did take the Twitter to ask people what they believed were the best and worst things of Joe Biden's administration and here are their responses Michael Salomon says that he did enjoy him tripping But to be serious, you know his pending promise break from expanding Medicare might be worse Definitely Oscar says the stimulus was the best even if it was watered down and the worst is increased spending on Military and police during a pandemic. Absolutely. Zachary is impressed by the vaccine rollout But the ones that spring to his mind when it comes to the negatives, of course Immigration that's what we talked about. It is a continuation of Trump's policies and that is correct Treating the pandemic as a serious issue. That's important to Aaron And also the worst thing is largely running things on autopilot and standing by on important issues instead of using the power of The bully pulpit totally agree with that here another person says COVID-19 and then also the worst thing is firing staffers for disclosing marijuana use This is something that I totally forgot about because so much has happened Since he was inaugurated this, you know, there's a lot this person. I agree with them. The worst is immigration 100% It's awful another person says handling of the COVID-19 and there's quite a bit of responses So I'll just kind of scroll through them and if you want to pause the video or check out this Twitter thread Then you can you know see for yourself But a lot of folks kind of say the same thing the best thing is the vaccine rollout, which I agree with his handling of COVID-19 And the stimulus to an extent even if it was watered down and a lot of folks talking about his terrible foreign policy and also his stances towards immigration Deferring student loans. This is actually something that is really important But he won't say whether or not he'll cancel student debt. Yeah And this impacted me personally because deferring my student loans that that helps me But whether or not he's gonna cancel student debt. Who knows Best vaccine rollout worse not doing this to Joe Manchin. Love this Yeah, so there's a lot of really great Really great responses here and you know kind of a variety of answers here But overall, you know, it's a it's a mixed bag, right? Joe Biden is better than Donald Trump, but that doesn't mean that he's good by any stretch of the imagination I mean this person says getting rid of the Muslim ban. Absolutely that matters But the worst everything on foreign policy and yeah, I mean this is someone Who is just kind of keeping the status quo as it is So, you know, I'm not gonna go through all this is a lot and not anticipate this many responses But you know there you have it That's that's kind of the takeaway This isn't necessarily a comprehensive list of every single thing he's done. That's good and bad It's just the main things that stand out But you know sound off in the comments. Let me know what you think and I'll be there to heart some of your comments And now I'll pin the best one that I see