#my tags were only a response to the reactionary 'Biden sucks' sentiment of a comment with zero critical thinking or foresight

[eldritchamy]

This isn't an argument I want to have, and I really shouldn't bother responding at all, but here are my original tags:

#setting the precedent that that supreme court decision is VALID would be a bad move tbh #it will be abused in the first HOUR of a republican presidency yes #but I get the decision not to let history accept it as normal #a republican isn't president yet and we HAVE to make sure we don't have a right wing government in 2025 #that decision can still be undone before a president abuses it

See the second tag. Yes, it will be abused almost immediately on day 1 regardless of what Biden does.

Does that mean Biden should abuse it now?

As of right now, the intentional ambiguity and open endedness means it's not really set in stone what that Supreme Court ruling makes possible. If Biden were to push the boundaries on it and set something that dangerous in stone (i.e. that a President can set policy without Congress, a direct violation of the Constitution's separation of powers, which would throw the country into a "Constitutional Crisis" before the election even happens), that only makes it easier for a future president to GET AWAY WITH however they try to abuse it later.

You can make the argument that the risk of doing nothing outweighs the risk of losing the election and having it be abused later. That's an opinion you're entitled to have. A similar argument was made at the end of Obama's second term: that he should invoke emergency powers to stall the election/results in response to the counterintelligence investigation of Trump's campaign team and the risk of foreign influence of both electoral results and the president-elect's decisionmaking.

But that's not really the game the Democrats play by, and arguing otherwise is unrealistic, reactionary, and short sighted. You can argue that they SHOULD if you want, but there are good reasons why they don't, and it's important to understand what those reasons are.

Whether Trump TRIES to abuse it is not in question. It was tailor made FOR him specifically to abuse by justices he put on the court.

If Biden abused that same ruling NOW to force policy through, he'd be doing so in open violation of the Constitution, from the only branch of government currently controlled by the Democrats, during a volatile and highly contested ELECTION YEAR. The Republicans would almost certainly drop everything to force an impeachment trial before November. And the judicial branch wouldn't be on his side right now either. Extremely negative coverage of it would be wall to wall on every cable news outlet for the rest of the year, right up until the moment the headline is "Biden loses reelection bid".

Forcing a policy through like that would be met with immediate backlash, even from his own party, at a time when he absolutely cannot afford to have that kind of hit to his public image. The Democratic party wouldn't do things that way, and if they did they'd risk alienating a large part of their base AND SWING VOTERS at a really bad time.

It would also get a lot harder for us to get people to notice how absolutely terrifying the 2025 Project is.

So basically? He'd be shooting himself in the foot and he wouldn't even get away with it. He'd only be making it easier for a Republican (with a favorable congress and SCOTUS) to get away with it later. The next Republican president will ABSOLUTELY abuse the ruling no matter what Biden does.

But the first president who tries to abuse that ruling will definitely get challenged on it.

Do you want that challenge to happen NOW?

The reasons for him to do it are bad, and the reasons for him not to do it are bad. The whole situation is fucked because we have a rogue SCOTUS packed with Trump loyalists who lied under oath trying to pave the way for open, unchecked authoritarianism.

The game the Biden administration is playing right now is to set himself apart as COMPLETELY UNLIKE his opponent. In both practice and policy. It's an electoral strategy.

And impotent-for-now policy proposals like this are part of that strategy. This is his appeal to the likely voters about what would come out of the Democratic policy agenda if he has a usable congress in 2025. And those policy proposals for the most part look very good. It would be the most left leaning agenda this country has ever had. This is an appeal through action. It won't pass, but BIDEN PUT IT ON THE TABLE.

The Republicans have to be the ones to reject a policy that would wildly benefit a huge number of people throughout the country. He's laying out a case for the different agendas that the electorate will be choosing between. He's "putting on a show" of what his next term (with a favorable congress) would look like.

There are reasons things are done this way. You don't have to like those reasons. You're entirely correct that the right doesn't give a shit about those reasons and will rip precedent apart within hours of regaining control of the Oval Office.

But Biden and the Democrats are playing a long game: that the ruling was an aberration and will be overturned. Using it is setting a precedent that normalizes the aberration and lets someone else get away with it later. And you don't prevent authoritarianism by embracing it in your own hands.

The toolbox is there. The Democrats want it to stay locked.

Trump DOING IT is not the sticking point. It's how easy it would be for him to GET AWAY WITH IT. The Democrats are hoping it doesn't come to that at all, because a second Biden term with a blue congress and serious SCOTUS reforms (which he's already proposed) would be able to overturn the ruling before ANYONE gets to abuse it.

You don't have to like their game plan, but that very much is their plan. They're banking on a win, and they're not going to make things easier for Convicted Felon And Known Aspiring Dictator Trump in the event that they lose.

Try to look at proposals like this as proof that the parties are absolutely not the same, and not as things Biden should violate the constitution to force through, only to lose them all in January anyway. There IS political strategy happening here, and there is logic BEHIND that strategy.

Mr Biden's proposal - which requires congressional approval - would cut off tax credits for landlords who try to raise rent by more than 5%.

The policy would apply to landlords who own more than 50 units, comprising about 20 million rental units across the country, according to the Biden administration.[...]

The proposal does include an exception for new construction and buildings undergoing substantive renovations. As the US faces low housing stock, this carve out is aimed at encouraging new rental property construction to increase the number of apartments and homes available.[...]

Nationwide, rent prices have risen by 21% since January 2021, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis.[...]

Mr Biden's plan to lower housing costs come as recent polls show he is trailing his rival, former President Donald Trump, in the 2024 presidential race.[...]

As a part of his housing announcement, Mr Biden said he would also direct federal agencies to assess whether public land could be repurposed to build affordable housing options.

16 Jul 24