All presidents come to office facing problems. Washington had no model to follow, so everything he did was precedent-setting. He could have easily been president for life, but our country was fortunate to have an honest man who believed in republican principles.
The president with the hardest task was Lincoln. Winning only about 38% of the popular vote, he faced a civil war before he was even inaugurated. The opponents were not some idiots in “militias” who believed in conspiracy theories, but entire states with an army that numbered in the millions.
FDR came to office with a quarter of the country out of work. Remember this was before Social Security or federally-insured banks or unemployment compensation. The week before he took office thousands of banks shut down and the far right and far left were both attacking democracy.
That brings us to Biden. The country is polarized. We have race problems, unemployment problems, and a climate crisis. 400,000 people have died in the last year from Covid. One-third of the population thinks the election was illegitimate.
What the Biden administration has going for it is competence, good intentions, and a president who is a normal rational human being. I think we will be ok.
I was just thinking about this the other day. I'd like to point out that both Clinton and Obama had to clean up the messes of Republican presidents while facing down (mostly unearned) Republican hostility. And here we go again with another Democrat expected to clean up the mess left behind.
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