Roundtable: Grading President Biden's first year in office

Grade President Joe Biden on his first year and explain your grade.

Biden shouldn't give up on domestic agenda

President Biden has had a tough first year. His administration has made some missteps with the Afghanistan withdrawal and the handling of the omicron variant, but both cases were always going to be difficult and he has done what needed to be done. He got the badly needed infrastructure bill passed. His failures have two main causes. First, unremitting obstruction from Congressional Republicans and an increasingly partisan Supreme Court, coupled with unceasing vilification in conservative social media that has taken its toll in how the public perceives him. Second, a deep-seated reluctance by both the Democratic leadership and Biden himself to commit 100% to passing the legislation that got them elected in the first place. Sens. Manchin and Sinema are only the visible faces of a larger concerted corporate lobbying effort to water everything down to a level that doesn’t threaten the status quo. Biden’s latest press conference suggests he recognizes the need to up his game to stave off a major defeat in the midterms. I hope so. Foreign policy challenges could tempt him to give up on the domestic agenda, but that would give Republicans back control of Congress and end any progress on climate change or voting rights. Grade so far: Incomplete. — David Amor

Biden blunders often and shifts blame

Let’s evaluate some of the things the president has said this year.

“Inflation is transitory.” False

“We are sending back the vast majority of families (crossing the border).” False

“No one said (keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan) to me.” False

“We are going to stay (in Afghanistan) until we get them (Americans) all out.” False

“I’m going to shut down the virus, not the country.” False

Americans will see gas prices drop ”before long.” False

The spike in illegal border crossings “happens every single, solitary year.” False

“We will get the border under control.” False

At his press conference, Biden said he had accomplished more than any other president. That’s only if you count lying. Joe makes constant blunders and blames them on someone else. He has shockingly bad judgment. He uses divisive and incendiary rhetoric. His grade is the first letter in the response to all those untrue statements- F. — Harry Bulkely

Many accomplishments, but room for improvement

The choice in 2020 was four more years of lying, incompetence, corruption and a continued embrace of open racist demagoguery. Americans elected a new leader with the most votes cast in a presidential election. President Biden is a vast improvement from the previous officeholder. He was able to get the somewhat bipartisan infrastructure bill passed, reduced child poverty to its lowest rate on record, 63 percent of Americans are now vaccinated from COVID, a record 6.4 million jobs were created, and he ended America's longest war.

Despite these accomplishments, there've been missteps. Possibly, President Biden's greatest misstep has been his stubbornness accepting the Republican party he once served alongside in Congress is long gone. The GOP leadership has declared their only intention is to see him fail. He has also not lived up to some of his promises to the Black community. COVID is still rampant, albeit continued misinformation from those aligned with the former officeholder. There's room for some course correction, but he deserves a B-minus thus far. — John Hunigan

Biden's first year a massive failure

COVID-19: His promise to “defeat COVID” is a disaster. The administration doesn’t seem to know what they’re doing, except contradicting themselves. Grade: Failure.

Afghanistan: It would take a fertile imagination indeed to think of a more humiliating, spineless and disorganized withdrawal. Grade: Failure.

Economy: The stock market is on a roller coaster ride, showing lack of direction. Simultaneously, shipping is impaired and shelves in many stores are empty. Grade: Failure.

Inflation: When the administration couldn’t pull off the denial of the reality of inflation on a grand scale they tried saying variously that it was a good thing or that it was only temporary. Grade: Failure.

Energy Independence: After a period of energy independence and even exporting, this administration is begging the Saudis to increase production so that we can buy it at their price. Grade: Failure.

Southern border/Immigration: Record illegal border crossings and immigrant-child abuse: Grade: Failure.

Overall Grade: Massive failure! — Charlie Gruner

Afghanistan exit a debacle, but jobs rebounding

President Biden is being evaluated in a society which suffers from the discouraging realities of ongoing inflation, continuing covid deaths (1500 a day), overstressed hospitals and the general malaise of winter at our longitude. On the plus side are the strong recovery of jobs lost to the pandemic and passage of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan which funded vaccines, schools, small businesses and anti-poverty programs. He launched a vaccine distribution program hailed for its speed and wide availability for those who chose to vaccinate. However one feels about our long presence in Afghanistan, the exit was a debacle and the abandonment of those who had helped us there was incompetent and shameful.

I would guess that his approval ratings will rise in the spring as the investments of the bi-partisan $1 trillion infrastructure bill investment in roads, bridges, water pipes and rural broadband begin to be seen. At the end of what is his first quarter I’d give him a C+, his grade for the full term remains to be seen. — Laurie Muelder

We now have inflation, crime and border crisis

I give him a D, and that’s only because he hasn’t gotten us into a war. Yet.

He campaigned on two themes: first, that he wasn’t Donald Trump, second, that he was a political moderate. When he began reversing everything Trump was trying to do, he soon appeared weak internationally; and nationally we now have inflation, crime and a border crisis. He lacks Trump’s vitality and energy and is physically declining before our eyes.

He is no moderate. When he portrays Republicans as enemies of democracy, that pretty much rules out getting a lot of cooperation. He doesn’t have the votes in Congress for the progressive agenda he wants, so he talks about pushing it through by presidential mandates. We are more divided than before.

As for war, after the Afghanistan debacle, Putin and Xi see him as weak, while Iran and North Korea see their chances improving. — William Urban

The Community Roundtable runs each Sunday and is made up of local writers. Community writers answer one question each week in 150 words or fewer.

This article originally appeared on Galesburg Register-Mail: Roundtable: Grading President Biden's first year in office