by J.T. Young
President Joe Biden is not the Democrats’ biggest problem; they are. The greatest misperception in the 2024 presidential race is that Biden is causing Democrats’ poor performance. On the contrary, Biden is an effect. The real cause is that Democrats are wildly out of touch with America.
Biden’s bad polling numbers are well known. According to Real Clear Politics’ Dec. 18 average of national polling, Biden’s job approval rating is 40.8–56.0 percent; he trails former President Donald Trump in a head-to-head rematch 43.7 to 47.2 percent, and his favorability rating is 39.4–56.0 percent.
Into this broad deficit, Gallup recently released a poll on specific issues that was even worse. Much worse. Biden’s approval rating was 37–59. This tied his personal low, which was first registered this April and then again in October — making two consecutive polls at his low. Gallup stated that Biden had not been over 44 percent in over a year (August 2022) and that his average this year is just 40 percent. Biden’s latest rating on the economy is just 1 percentage point higher than his lowest point last year, while his latest rating on foreign affairs was his lowest by 6 percentage points.
As bad as this is — and it is bad — it is not the worst news for Democrats. Gallup also polled respondents on five performance areas and broke down the responses by partisan identification — including independents. Independents are important because they represent a neutral benchmark of the American electorate. Independents also are roughly a quarter of the electorate: 26 percent in 2020, according to exit polling.
The divergence between Democrat and Independent ratings on the five issues is stunning.
On Biden’s handling of the Ukraine conflict, 78 percent of Democrats approved of his performance; only 31 percent of independents did. On health care, 77 percent of Democrats approved; only 35 percent of independents did. On the economy, 72 percent of Democrats approved; only 24 percent of independents did. On foreign affairs, 68 percent of Democrats approved; only 28 percent of independents did. And on Biden’s handling of the Middle East, Israel, and Palestine, 60 percent of Democrats approved, while only 25 percent of independents did.
This degree of separation between Democrats and independents is so big that it is not just one of points but one of orders of magnitude. How could Democrats be seeing such positive performances, and how could their view be so far from the rest of America’s?
Equally perplexing is that Gallup recorded Democrats giving Biden a significantly higher overall approval rating — 83 percent — than they did on any one of the five issues they polled individually. This means that Democrats must be viewing Biden even higher on other policy areas. What could these other policies possibly be? Immigration? Spending?
What are Democrats seeing in Biden that the rest of America is utterly missing? The answer is that Democrats are seeing themselves. They support Biden’s performance because he is performing their policies, doing so just as overwhelming majorities of Democrats want these policies performed.
As these conflicting poll results show, Democrats are not simply out of touch with America; they are out of sight of the rest of America. But they are very much in touch with themselves — and apparently Biden is very much in touch with them … and few others.
People are never more susceptible to being more wrong than when they believe themselves most correct. This is the Democrat Party now. They are blithely and blindly walking into a self-created morass as they walk away from the rest of America. They assume that they are right and the rest of the country wrong. This is an enormously dangerous political posture to assume in a democracy.
Biden’s disappearance or defeat will not solve Democrats’ disconnection from America. Democrats chose Biden, and they still choose him; they did so, and they do so, because they want — they demand and support — the policies he is following.
Getting rid of Biden will not solve Democrats’ problem because he is not the cause of their problems. He is an effect of their problems: the policies they have thrust on him and demand of him, the same policies that they will demand and thrust on whomever they choose to lead them.
This is not to say that Biden is competent. Clearly, America judges that Biden is not. But it raises a bigger question: Can anyone be competent in the pursuit of the inane? Apparently, Democrats believe Biden can and is. The longer they hold to that belief, the further they will drift from America, and the lower they will take Biden with them.
– – –
J.T. Young served in the Department of Treasury and the Office of Management and Budget from 2001 to 2004 and as a Congressional staff member from 1987 to 2000.
Photo “Joe Biden” by President Joe Biden.
