I can't stand Joe Biden but I agree with the priorities outlined here, even though I don't believe this plan goes nearly far enough.
Too bad this is little more than messaging. It's dead on arrival thanks to the idiot-run circus that is the House of Representatives.
Well, it's dead on arrival since Biden, like all recent presidents, uses their budget as a political statement instead of any serious effort to find a workable proposal.
That's just how the US system was designed to work, with the peoples' representatives deciding where the country wants to go, not the unilateral dictates of a president.
There's a long, long history saying otherwise.
Well to start with, simply legally, Congress is absolutely not bound to anything the president might put in his budget. Congress is absolutely free to completely ignore the president's budget proposal as they begin working on their appropriations. That is a stark reality.
But getting into the politics of it, there's a long history of presidents proposing budgets that their own parties generally ignore and often enough outright reject as the congressional membership look to garner favor with their own constituencies regardless of national benefit.
A representative seeks to get reelected by their voters regardless of what the president might think about some campaign promise the representative might be making.
We see this every cycle in modern times regardless of the division of party between the different branches and the different houses.
Both legally and practically the president might as well use his budget proposal as a campaign stunt, so every single one does.
@volkris
To some extent, sure. I haven't really closely studied budgets in/for years past. My point was that when the same party has control of both the legislature and the executive, it's more likely that the priorities of the party as a whole will get traction. I'd be interested to see a breakdown of the data. I don't think that an ostensibly friendly congress ignores executive budget priorities on the whole. At least not to the extent you suggest.
In theory, it's more likely.
But in practice, not so much.
After all, this is exactly how the federal government is set up, to push back against partisan instincts by setting the executive and legislative branches against each other, giving them opposing incentives.
Partisan alliances fracture when the executive and legislative branch figures have opposite goals, as by their positions they do.
@volkris
I disagree. When the president's party has a firmer grip on the majority in the legislature, executive budget priorities are more likely to be brought to fruition. I'd like to read the whole thing; I haven't had time yet.
The GOP will reject all of it out of hand, even the good, simply because it's Biden's budget. Pack of obstructionist clowns. Even the ostensibly saner ones. $5 says it doesn't even get a floor reading.
I'm so fed up with the way this country does country-ing.