“Why does Biden talk about Trump?” Sayed, a Lyft driver, asked me last week in Boston. “Why doesn't he talk about what is going on today? That people can't feed their families. That my children aren't learning anything in school because they have so many teachers out sick right now.”
On the first anniversary of Joe Biden’s entering office, there is an eerie feeling of political paralysis. As Omicron surges across the US, with nearly a million cases everyday and two thousand daily deaths – the administration is failing to, even rhetorically, connect with the hardships many people are experiencing.
Several weeks ago, for example, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, scoffed at the idea that the federal government should deliver at-home tests to people (a position on which the administration has since U-turned); while vice-president Kamala Harris told people to “Google” where to find a test when questioned on the shortages. Biden himself, meanwhile, has barely even been questioned by the press – holding fewer news conferences in his first year than any other president in the past 40 years.
