Daily Beast: “We’re one month and change into the Biden presidency, and let’s just say it. He’s been staggeringly good. He has way surpassed my expectations. And it’s small wonder he has a 63 percent approval rating. Most people like what they see. What’s he done, in big-picture terms? Three things. First and foremost, he and his team are not letting themselves be bullied by the economic supply-siders and neoliberals who’ve spent the last few decades transferring $50 trillion in wealth from the middle class to the rich. Second, the Biden team understands that the standard Beltway definition of bipartisanship is useless with today’s Republican Party. The Biden people get that congressional Republicans don’t even really represent most rank-and-file Republicans anymore – hence these polls showing significant support even among Republicans for most aspects of the COVID relief bill. This administration shows every sign of not letting itself get suckered into the false promise of trying to win Republican votes that aren’t likely to materialize.”

“Third, they don’t have contempt for Democrats to their left, which is a great thing to see. History tells us pretty clearly in my view that progress is made in this country when activists on the left go out and agitate and change public opinion and liberals codify that change by writing laws. The Biden people clearly agree with this view. Along these lines, The New York Times reported an amazing anecdote two weeks ago that showed how different this administration is so far from its two Democratic predecessors. An activist named Melissa Byrne was pressuring the Biden team on student loan debt via Twitter and even big ads in the Wilmington newspaper. She expected that she was raising some hackles. Instead, according to the Times, Chief of Staff Ron Klain ‘told her to keep up the pressure, inviting her to more Zoom meetings with the transition team.’ That’s the social-media era version of FDR’s famous challenge to labor leaders of his time to ‘go out and make me do it,’ and it was so encouraging to read.”