Joe Biden: The Liberal Democrat

Now that we are in the last 5 full days of the Joseph R. Biden presidency and administration and as President Biden is about to give his farewell address as President of the United States tonight, I thought this would be a good time to talk about the man's politics and philosophy. Last week, I wrote about Jimmy Carter's character as President, instead of his political philosophy. But this week, I'm going to talk about Joe Biden's hardcore politics: what he believes, his political philosophy and why. 

The so-called mainstream media (that some people call legacy media) like to say that Joe Biden is a moderate or centrist Democrat. Anyone to the right of lets say a Never-Trumper Republican, like to describe President Biden as Bernie Sanders ideological twin brother. But this is an example of where two sides can be wrong about the same thing and person. 

You have to remember, or even know (I guess you have to know something before you can remember it) that Joe Biden was born just after the start of World War 11: November 20, 1942. He came of age in the 1960s, growing up for the most part in the 1950s, where probably most of his early childhood memories started, graduated high school in the early 1960s. He's what we would call an early Baby Boomer, which was someone who was born during World War II, instead of just after it, and grew up during the early days of the Cold War. 

So when you are lets say Baby Boomer, growing up in a small, blue-collar town like Scranton, Pennsylvania, (which is right between Philadelphia and New York) and you are growing up during the start of the civil rights movement, as well as the Cold War, and you are going to college in the 1960s, that has to have an effect on one's politics. Perhaps especially since they're studying to become a lawyer, which is what Joe Biden was before he became a politician. 

So you have Joe Biden's background, who comes from a Irish-Catholic, blue-collar, Pennsylvania, Democratic family, where his father worked really hard just to take his care of his wife and kids, and John F. Kennedy becomes President of the United States right when you are finishing high school, that has to affect your politics and what you believe. And Joe Biden was interested in politics very early in life. 

You can'r really call Joe Biden a Cold War Liberal Democrat today. But only because the Cold War has been over for over 30 years now. But the John F. Kennedy's, the Henry Jackson's, the Ed Muskie's, I would put Jimmy Carter in this ideological camp as well... this is the type of Democrat that Joe Biden is ideologically. Someone who is very hawkish not just against communism, but authoritarianism in general, including Anglo-Saxon-American nationalism, and Islamism as well. He doesn't oppose these authoritarian philosophies because he's not a Liberal and he's really just a moderate or even a Conservative. He opposes these authoritarian philosophies because he is a Liberal. I would describe Joe Biden as a Henry Jackson Liberal Democrat, ideologically.

Source:The White House- Joseph R. Biden (Democrat, Delaware) 46th President of the United States of America.

To give you more of an idea about what Cold War Liberalism is: 

"Cold War liberal is a term that was used in the United States during the Cold War, which began after the end of World War II.[1] The term was used to describe liberal politicians and labor union leaders who supported democracy and equality. They supported the growth of labor unions, the civil rights movement, and the war on poverty and simultaneously opposing totalitarianism commonly seen under Communist rule at the time. Cold War liberals supported efforts of containment, such as diplomat George F. Kennan and U.S. president Harry S. Truman during the post-World War II era, towards Soviet Communism." 

From Wikipedia

Liberal Hawk would be a great way to describe Joe Biden's foreign and national security philosophy: 

"The term liberal hawk refers to a politically liberal person (generally, in the American sense of the term) who supports a hawkish, interventionist foreign policy.

Past U.S. presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson have been described as liberal hawks for their roles in bringing about America's status as the world's premier military power. The Clinton Doctrine can also be considered as consistent with this vision. Today the term is most frequently used to describe liberals who supported or still support the decision to invade Iraq in 2003, which was authorized by the United States Congress and ordered by president George W. Bush. The invasion was controversial among all political sides. In December 2002, American liberals were conflicted over whether or not going to war in Iraq was the correct decision; some felt that they should support the war, in accordance with their philosophy of liberal internationalism, i.e. support of military intervention.[1]

One document cited as promoting a liberal hawkish point of view is Progressive Internationalism: A Democratic National Security Strategy, published by the Progressive Policy Institute in October 2003.[2] Another document related to the stance is a letter to President Bush sent by Social Democrats USA in February 2003, which urged the military overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime." 

From Wikipedia

And you are interested in straight up, hardcore liberalism, where Joe Biden also fits in very well ideologically: Britannica has an excellent definition of liberalism: 

"Liberalism, political doctrine that takes protecting and enhancing the freedom of the individual to be the central problem of politics. Liberals typically believe that government is necessary to protect individuals from being harmed by others, but they also recognize that government itself can pose a threat to liberty. As the American Revolutionary pamphleteer Thomas Paine expressed it in Common Sense (1776), government is at best “a necessary evil.” Laws, judges, and police are needed to secure the individual’s life and liberty, but their coercive power may also be turned against the individual. The problem, then, is to devise a system that gives government the power necessary to protect individual liberty but also prevents those who govern from abusing that power... 

From Britanica

At least before Joe Biden became President of the United States, the so-called mainstream media had him down as a centrist Democrat. Not a soft Democrat like a Joe Manchin, or someone like that. But way to the right of the Bernie Sanders's of the worlds and other leftist Democrats in Congress. Anyone who to the right of the Never-Trumper Republicans, again they see him as Senator Sanders twin brother, ideologically. 

The left-wing of the Democratic Party, before Biden became President, saw him as a moderate Republican ideologically, because of his hawkish views on foreign policy, national security, and criminal justice. 

But this is what happens in a country that's so illiterate and ignorant when it comes to political philosophy, where liberal and progressive is automatically seen as everything that is politically left. Because of how words like socialist are automatically viewed as insults or curse words, where almost no one in their right mind wants to be associated with Socialists, even if they are Socialists. 

But if political labels are going to matter, they have to be used correctly. Otherwise Libertarians could get called Communists and vice-versa, because political labels no longer matter. But the fact is Joe Biden grew up and came to age as a Cold War, Henry Jacksonian Democrat, who loved John F. Kennedy, who was also a Cold War Liberal Democrat. And that's who Mr. Biden has always been ideologically. If political labels still mean anything in America, Mr. Biden is a Liberal Democrat who believes in and defends American liberal democracy whenever he can. 

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