Please Don’t Make Me Vote for Joe Biden

By BRENDAN HEGARTY ‘20

Joe Biden might be the best representation of the Democratic party after all. That is probably not a good thing. Joe Biden is a brand name politician who is boring enough to be deemed “electable” by the powers that be that gave Gore, Kerry, and Clinton electable title and the nomination before they lost to their respective Republican counterparts. Joe Biden gets plenty of his points by not being Trump. Interestingly, none of the other Democratic candidates are Trump either. Joe Biden makes people feel safe, but why?

Sure he seems more reasonable than Bernie Sanders, but does reasonability win elections? Donald Trump’s GOP threw reasonability out the window when they dismantled Hillary Clinton’s heavily favored campaign, and what is to say Biden won’t face the same fate? We do not know who people will feel more inclined to vote for come November. Both Sanders and Biden led Trump head-to-head in a January nationwide poll, but it is probably much too early to see any real indication.

We do know that Bernie Sanders excites people. He excites young people, usually a small voting group by percentage so much that his candidacy could awaken this normally dormant force. He speaks to Americans fed up with the status quo, and issues that began long before Trump and will continue long after. The United States needs someone who will address incredibly pressing issues such as wealth distribution, housing, college debt, climate change, and healthcare, which citizens face every day, head on. 

Medical expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States, and in a public health crisis like the one we find ourselves in, unnecessary expenditures are the last thing our country needs to support its people. According to The Hill, 22 different studies on a potential medicare for all system agree that it would save the United States money every year largely by cutting administration fees and prescription drug prices. If the government provided for health insurance, there would no longer be a need for negotiations in individual cases for the pricing of procedures and prescription drugs; every necessary expenditure would be at the same rate. Although some want to maintain the benefits of private insurers, I find it strange that we would want to encourage profiteering from keeping our citizens alive. According to the Washington Post, a medicare-for-all system would save almost 68,000 lives every year. At what point does money matter when that many lives are at stake?

Additionally, Bernie Sanders has a much more powerful take on climate change. He has the most firm plans in place to address the mounting issue in the country, chiefly supporting the Green New Deal.

A large complaint against the senator is that he does not have the funding in place to plan his sweeping changes. Sanders has plans like increasing taxes on the top 0.1% of Americans and cutting military costs that by his campaign’s math add up to the totals necessary to enact his plans. Most importantly, these two issues, along with wealth inequality and college debt will only grow worse over time, so the country must act before much higher costs rack up while irreparable damage is done.

The most important place that Joe gains his support is in his perception of politicians representing a return to normalcy. I don’t see the point of electing a centrist candidate if there is no center remaining to move to. Mitch McConnell and the Republican party have proven to be unwilling to even introduce more than 250 House-passed bills for any kind of Senate debate. Bernie Sanders has great and possibly “radical” ideas for how to fix the country, but they will not immediately pass upon his election. He still needs to work with lawmakers and the existing checks and balances to enact changes in this country. I believe we are better off electing someone committed to improving the country than someone committed to being elected president -- Joe Biden’s first bid for the presidency came 32 years ago. 

Sanders may not seem electable due to his title of a “Democratic Socialist,” but in a recent poll, more Democratic primary voters in Texas and California viewed Socialism favorably than Capitalism. On the other hand, seemingly electable Joe Biden has a foreign involvement scandal in Ukraine that could easily match Hillary’s Emails, has a voting record is much more questionable than Sanders’ in the context of the current Democratic Party, and consistently starts sentences that he cannot finish.

At the end of the day, Bernie Sanders is an outsider to the party, and he still was when he was leading the primaries. That outsider has somehow struck a chord with Americans that are fed up with the status quo; he stands as a candidate with an admirably consistent record and a true passion for fighting the good fight. Joe Biden has a history as a solid Democrat, but when that history includes voting for the Iraq war, supporting the Defense of Marriage Act, and claiming that Reagan and Bush did not commit enough money to the “war on drugs,” I truly wonder if that history is a selling point.

Liberal Americans have become quick to call the current GOP The Party of Trump. In the increasingly likely scenario that Joe Biden wins the election, the Deomcratic party will face a much worse fate. By electing safe-choice Biden at the cost of Sanders’ “Future to Believe In,” the Democratic Party will show its unwillingness to shape the country in a meaningful new way, cementing itself only as The Party of Not Trump.