Joe Biden

[Helendee]

Genuinely interested in what people think of him and his presidency thus far. It’s a truth universally acknowledged that Trump was considered lower than a worm’s privates on Mumsnet but there seems to be little or no excitement about JB, is he really that meh?

Well that's a bit harsh!

The republican States have been chipping away for years though and are making progress.

Apart from blocking changes to law which they've always done if they can- but that's at state level.

Did Obama take it on? I'm not American so maybe he did and it didn't make the news here?

There's a problem as well with the increasing number of RC hosps. Has anyone tried to tackle that?

@NiceGerbil

Not caught up.

I've not seen democrat presidents changing much though with abortion.

I'm not an expert obv.

States are the mainstay of abortion restrictions but there are several ways US Presidents can increase access:

1. Judicial appointments. The thing that means states can only chip away at abortion access rather than enacting harsher bans that don't immediately get overturned is because of Roe v. Wade. And it is judicial appointments that put that ruling at risk. Democratic presidents have ensured their judicial appointments are likely to uphold Roe.

2. International gag rule. There is an executive order that swings back and forth with Republican and Democratic Presidents that stops Federal International Aid money being given to organizations that support abortion - even if the money is not used to provide abortion or disseminate information about it.

With Trump this was taken to another level by being brought into regulations of domestic health care providers that get Federal Funds to provide family planning services to less well off women. This has disenfranchised an estimated 16 million women from funded family planning services and meant that women are funneled towards services that have no information about abortion, should they want to pursue that without federal assistance.

3. FDA. Democratic presidents have routinely ensured that decisions on contraception and abortion care is driven more by data and less by a view of such medication as morally suspect than Republican Presidents. This has had an impact on, for example, access to medical abortion.

Isn't Mississippi looking to overturn Roe vs. Wade. Any president who is not all over that is a big fat looser to me.

@NumberTheory

Republican attacks on reproductive health don't just harm women who want abortions, they increase health care costs and risks for all women.

Both sides harm women on different fronts. They just have a different way of going about it.

"To right wing men, we are private property. To left wing men, we are public property. In either case, we are not considered to be humans: we are things."
Andrea Dworkin - Right Wing Women

Women in USA are really stuck between a stone and a hard place or so it seems to the outsiders. No statutory maternity leave, reproductive rights at the whim of the religious right, safeguarding of vulnerable female prisoners, homeless women removed by the left and all women denied the right to any single sex spaces, single sex medical provision , female only sports and the subsequent provision of opportunities for higher education through scholarships removed by the left.. Women truly are the oppressed majority in the USA. No longer the land of the Free but the Patriarchy or am I being unreasonable?

A stone?? I meant a Rock.

@CaptSkippy

That post was in direct response to the one above it by NannyAndJohn.

While I agree with Dworkin in terms of generalizing about individual men’s attitudes to women, I don’t think that is generally reflected in the policies the two parties enact.

@NumberTheory

While I agree with Dworkin in terms of generalizing about individual men’s attitudes to women, I don’t think that is generally reflected in the policies the two parties enact.

Could you elaborate on this a little further?

@CaptSkippy

I agree that there is a tendency with men on the left of the political spectrum to still see women as primarily sex objects and helpmeets and to welcome the loosening of social mores around sex, for instance, because it makes it easier for them to get laid/have their sexual needs met without having to commit themselves (to a woman or to children they may father, mainly). While men on the right tend to be concerned about women having that freedom because they prefer to have exclusive use of a women (e.g. not wanting women to sleep around).

The left tends to enact laws to allow women to act (more) as men act and many men on the left hope/expect that to mean women will want (for instance) sex on the same terms as men. But their policies don’t favour women sleeping around, they just don’t penalise women if they do. (Although, I’ve suddenly thought about the more recent move to a pro-sex work stance and I’m second guessing myself and thinking my assertion may need more nuance on the sex side).

On the helpmeet side, although many men on the left still have expectations that women will do the wife work (even when they aren’t wives) - caring for aging parents, bring up children, stack the dishwasher in the office kitchen, be the social glue, pay the price for men’s infertility as well as women’s, etc. the left’s policies tend to work to try to alleviate that burden from women, not ignore it or reinforce it.

[quote NumberTheory]@CaptSkippy

I agree that there is a tendency with men on the left of the political spectrum to still see women as primarily sex objects and helpmeets and to welcome the loosening of social mores around sex, for instance, because it makes it easier for them to get laid/have their sexual needs met without having to commit themselves (to a woman or to children they may father, mainly). While men on the right tend to be concerned about women having that freedom because they prefer to have exclusive use of a women (e.g. not wanting women to sleep around).

The left tends to enact laws to allow women to act (more) as men act and many men on the left hope/expect that to mean women will want (for instance) sex on the same terms as men. But their policies don’t favour women sleeping around, they just don’t penalise women if they do. (Although, I’ve suddenly thought about the more recent move to a pro-sex work stance and I’m second guessing myself and thinking my assertion may need more nuance on the sex side).

On the helpmeet side, although many men on the left still have expectations that women will do the wife work (even when they aren’t wives) - caring for aging parents, bring up children, stack the dishwasher in the office kitchen, be the social glue, pay the price for men’s infertility as well as women’s, etc. the left’s policies tend to work to try to alleviate that burden from women, not ignore it or reinforce it.[/quote]
Thank you. This pretty much sums up my feelings as well. Either way you spin it, men are trying to exploit women. They want things from us, without giving much in return. I sometimes wonder if they can even feel genuine affection for us or if they fake it when they say "I love you".

Inflation is worrying a lot of Americans. The border is in crisis. Women’s sports has been cancelled. He has been criticised for leading by executive order. Hunter Biden seems pretty dodgy. He has said some dodgy things about black people. He seems incoherent confused and unsteady at times. I think there are genuine concerns not just from GOP but from dems as well.

@Classica

GOP politicians in general have no interest in rolling back Roe vs Wade.

they don't need to get rid of Roe v Wade when each GOP state can just gut abortion access from within. That should be obvious to even the most casual of observers. Introduction of foetal heartbeat bill etc. I believe there are six states now that only have one abortion clinic each.

Definitely not the case in Texas where the Governor is currently making it legal to not only ban medical abortion but also to sue anyone that helps a woman acquire one.

People complaining about Biden have absolutely no idea how bad things were under Trump and how much worse they would have become.

I'm as GC as anyone here, but as a feminist I cannot fault Biden regardless of the setback in the gender field.

People in the UK and Ireland who are used to child credits, children's allowance, etc, and the security of knowing there is a welfare safety net, cannot even begin to comprehend what life is like in a trickle down regime where the poor compete with each other for rotten jobs, three or four at a time, and there is no alternative. You have no idea how families struggle. You have no idea how desperate people feel.

Biden has restored hope that the US has an economy that can work for everyone, including women and children.

@mathanxiety

People complaining about Biden have absolutely no idea how bad things were under Trump and how much worse they would have become.

I'm as GC as anyone here, but as a feminist I cannot fault Biden regardless of the setback in the gender field.

People in the UK and Ireland who are used to child credits, children's allowance, etc, and the security of knowing there is a welfare safety net, cannot even begin to comprehend what life is like in a trickle down regime where the poor compete with each other for rotten jobs, three or four at a time, and there is no alternative. You have no idea how families struggle. You have no idea how desperate people feel.

Biden has restored hope that the US has an economy that can work for everyone, including women and children.

Have you lived in the states? I've lived in the USA and UK... Much much higher quality of live in USA than in UK. Don't feel sorry for americans, they are richer, with bigger homes, more of basically everything, and much higher quality of life.

Qualify of life* not live haha.

Not having an edit button is really annoying :P

I watched a YouTube video about poverty in Pennsylvania. Pretty harrowing stuff with children getting the bare basics. Families who wouldn’t eat if it wasn’t for church food banks.
Then I read the comments underneath and they pretty much all dismissed these people as it was their own fault for voting for Trump and that they were just a bunch of uneducated mountain inbreeds.
They couldn’t get their liberal minds around the fact that these people have been living on the breadline for years whilst being ignored by the party they voted for. So there voting change in 2016 was a direct response to years of being forgotten about until someone wanted their vote.

@Shelddd

Qualify of life* not live haha.

Not having an edit button is really annoying :P

I live in the US and can't wait to move back to the UK. Yes there are bigger homes, petrol is cheaper, but quality of life is not better for most.

Give an example of quality of life that's better in UK.. you're rhe first person I've ever seen suggest that.

@Shelddd

Have you lived in the states? I've lived in the USA and UK... Much much higher quality of live in USA than in UK. Don't feel sorry for americans, they are richer, with bigger homes, more of basically everything, and much higher quality of life.

I flit between the US and UK (US at the moment). I have a higher quality of life in the us, but it’s not the case for many. The US has more than 10 times the homeless population of the UK (total population is only 5 times bigger). It has a lower average life expectancy and higher maternal mortality. This is fueled by slightly higher income inequality and a smaller social safety net.

But I don’t think that’s much to do with the Trump/Biden difference. It’s been like that for decades under both Republican and Democrat presidents. I think the Trump Biden difference is more to do with a cultural respect in a whole host of different ways.

@Shelddd

Give an example of quality of life that's better in UK.. you're rhe first person I've ever seen suggest that.

Time off work is my biggest one. There is no legal minimum amount of annual leave here, the average I’ve surveyed in my family/friends jobs is 5-12 days a year. Most companies call it 'paid time off' and it has to cover sick as well as holiday. Work/life balance is much more skewed towards work in the US.

Health insurance is incredibly expensive. Mine is covered by work but it would cost me $800 a month to add DH to it. He pays for his own. Even with insurance you have a copay and a deductible (like an excess) of usually a minimum of $500 before insurance will cover you.

Food shopping is much more expensive than in the UK and the US's acceptable food standards are much lower than that of the UK. It definitely shows in the quality. Food is much more processed here.

It's almost impossible to live without a car in most places. We live in the suburbs of a large (1 million+ population) city and even then the closest public transport would get you to our house is about 15 miles away. I didn't have a car at all in the UK because I lived in a city had access to public transport.

At-will employment in many states means that an employer can terminate your employment for any or no reason with no notice.

Property taxes can get very expensive if you own a home. Our taxes are more than half of our overall housing payment. They're not like council tax, so where we live (and in many other places) things like rubbish collection are an additional bill.

Constant fear of gun violence is a big one for me. I’ve lived here for years and still feel anxious seeing people open carry.

There are other big social issues that bother me, personally, here, such as how overt and rationalised racism and homophobia can be, the anti-abortion lobby, the fossil fuels lobby, the way politics works here etc. But some of those that bother me don't bother others.

Mathanxiety actually does live in the US.

Sheldd, you're entitled to your opinion about best quality of life. I don't mind.

Just speaking for myself, who grew up in an almost fabled American city & now live in a nowhere area of England....

Things that would make my quality of life better living in USA
Family, great landscapes, better weather, less nanny-state, laid backness, direct ways of speaking, general friendliness, flexibility in education (secondary or tertiary), great health food stores

Things that would make my quality of life poorer in USA
Car-dependency
higher housing & food costs (where I grew up, anyway)
if my kids consumed even half the illegal drugs I did in 1970s-80s, by age 14
lack of vacation time
expenses of tertiary education
insecure health care, insurance
Crystal meth (my relatives are addicts, there was lab on the corner in my parents' very desirable neighbourhood)
Police Helicopters buzzing overhead most nights
asking about guns at home for every playdate invite
kids having active shooter drills in school
dodging food ingredients I don't like
too-earnest Americans, they can be so intense (!!)

My foster sister (still lives in USA) has NF2. She has to fight tooth & nail for every medical procedure. She can't get married or would lose medicaid. Her prospects would be so much better in Britain.

Obviously I don't mind my 'lower' salary or smaller house in UK. We are financially secure, long mortgage free -- not sure if any of my USA cousins are.

@lljkk Oh, the earnestness! I find it so difficult. I'm cynical even for a Brit and I live in a southern state, you may draw your own conclusions!

There is a wonderful diversity of landscapes here. Weather...well, I think I prefer it in Britain because it's hotter than hell's front porch here for four months of the year. I miss having really distinct seasons. People here can be friendly, but our neighbours have discovered we're left-leaning and DH is married to an immigrant so we're now largely ignored!

@dreamingbohemian

He's a bit boring but speaking as an American it's nice to have a boring president again.

I can imagine. I'm just happy not having to check Twitter as to the newest meltdown.

[quote IncorrigibleTitmouse]@lljkk Oh, the earnestness! I find it so difficult. I'm cynical even for a Brit and I live in a southern state, you may draw your own conclusions!

There is a wonderful diversity of landscapes here. Weather...well, I think I prefer it in Britain because it's hotter than hell's front porch here for four months of the year. I miss having really distinct seasons. People here can be friendly, but our neighbours have discovered we're left-leaning and DH is married to an immigrant so we're now largely ignored! [/quote]
Ah it's funny how different the states are from each other. You'd totally fit in where I live - I think we've had this conversation before actually.

My state is full of cynical, sarcastic Yankees, the seasons could not get more distinct, and people love us for being left-leaning. If anything I'd say we're more sought-after as friends because we're from abroad.