© Mike Theiler/Pool/Sipa USAPresident Biden, suffering from a bad case of Trump Derangement Syndrome, seeks to bring America back to the state it was under former President Barack Obama.
From the border with Mexico, where the new administration started opening the doors to at least 25,000 migrants seeking asylum, to the Mideast tinderbox, where it moved to rejoin the misbegotten Iran nuke deal, the new president appears fixated by the desire to turn back the clock to 2016.
Comment: One shouldn't worry too much about going back to the Iran nuke deal. It is quite likely that Biden will feign support for it - all the while maneuvering with Israel to launch a war with Iran.
It's as if Biden has been seized by a sentimental longing to try to make the world like it was when the Obama-Biden administration left office. Unfortunately, "The Way We Were" is a nice song but not much of a guide to the future.
Still, trying to recapture the past would be reasonable if those years had created prosperity at home and peace abroad. In fact, the world Donald Trump inherited was bristling with trouble and America's economy was moving forward at a snail's pace.
Despite revisionist efforts by the media and the left to erase the achievements of the president they hated, Trump had major policy successes that benefited all Americans. It's especially unnerving, then, that Biden is choosing to reverse the very policies that produced those benefits.
Trump Derangement Syndrome leads people to do weird things, but Biden's attempt to cancel Trump's biggest victories is among the weirdest.
The migrant admittances, through a border crossing in San Diego, came after Biden scrapped his predecessor's policy of having asylum-seekers wait in Mexico. The "Remain in Mexico" program was an effective solution to the endless stream of caravans of Central Americans that moved north to escape violence and find work in a booming US.
The Obama-Biden policy had been to admit the asylum applicants and turn them loose pending hearings. Naturally, many never showed up because they knew they could not qualify as refugees from persecution. But their ability to stay here illegally served as an incentive for others to follow.
Comment: This approach is further demonstrated by Biden's new Amnesty Bill which encourages the hiring of foreign graduates:
President Joe Biden's draft amnesty bill includes at least three legal changes that pressure and reward CEOs for importing foreign workers to take the white-collar careers needed by U.S. graduates, including the millions of young graduates who voted for Biden.
The college graduate language in Joe Biden's top-priority "U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021," bill "is going to force a debate on every college campus and focus the attention of American students about how they're being pushed out of the job market," said Kevin Lynn, founder of U.S. Tech Workers. He continued:This is going to create a backlash on the college campuses. No level of woke ideology is going to suppress the fact that students are going to wake up very quickly to the fact that they have put an awful lot of money into getting a degree, only to be pushed out of the workforce [by Democrats].The debate will also supercharge the growing revolt by American professionals who have seen their jobs, careers, and wealth transferred to foreign contract workers throughout the Fortune 500. Those professionals demand their right to a national labor market as they helped block the S.386 outsourcing bill in 2020 that was pushed by Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT).
The draft of the bill was released on January 20, and White House officials confirmed the top three Fortune 500 giveaways in a February 17 press conference.
The first of the changes in the amnesty would provide green cards to an unlimited inflow of foreign people who pay tuition to get technology-related PhDs from eager U.S. universities.
The second change would allow companies to provide an unlimited number of green cards to an unlimited number of non-immigrant contract workers in exchange for ten years of lower-wage work.
A third rule would allow employers to provide more than 140,000 green cards to non-immigrant contract workers via the existing Employment-Based Immigration process. The larger allocation would be more than double the current award to 75,000 workers per year. The number would allow CEOs to pay all of their imported H-1B and L-1 visa workers with green cards — and leave plenty left over to attract more foreign nurses, therapists, and doctors to the jobs needed by Americans.
The knock-on effects will be far larger. [...]
Instead of building on the program that reduced mass migrations, Biden returned to the broken system Trump had fixed. Biden also pledges not to build another foot of border wall and pause nearly all deportations for 100 days.
© REUTERS/Luis EcheverriaPresident Biden’s lenient immigration policies are already causing chaos in Central America, where caravans of migrants are packing their bags for an easier entry.
Something similar happened at the G-7 Security Conference Friday, where Biden abandoned Trump's America First policy and embraced the "Kumbaya" notion that everybody is better off when we outsource our interests to globalist institutions.
Comment: This is further borne out by the fact that Biden is rolling back programs Trump supported that would create more jobs in the US:
President Joe Biden signed an executive order this week revoking former President Donald Trump's order providing federal funds to apprenticeship programs created by industries, calling for more government-controlled alternatives.
In 2017, Trump signed Executive Order 13801, Industry-Recognized Apprenticeship Programs (IRAPs). The policy allowed "trade and industry groups, companies, non-profit organizations, unions, and joint labor-management organizations" to create their own apprenticeship programs that would help workers obtain the skills that the economy needed but that universities are not providing, or are providing at a cost that is unaffordable for many Americans.
"Registered Apprenticeships," approved by the government, have been part of U.S. labor policy for decades. Under the Obama administration, these received more funding. But critics argued that the government-controlled model, run by the Department of Labor and with the involvement of labor unions, held back the growth of apprenticeships. The Trump order allowed industries (and unions) to develop their own programs, within regulations but independent of government control.
The Washington Post — hardly friendly to the Trump administration — reported that his new policy had bipartisan support:Trump signed an executive order that seeks to reorient and expand ApprenticeshipUSA, a grant program that was previously championed by the Obama administration and has been supported by Democrats and Republicans alike.But left-wing groups, and some congressional Democrats, objected to Trump's order. The Center for American Progress complained that Trump was creating "a parallel track that lacks adequate worker protections" that could allow for "the proliferation of low-quality programs."
The administration's aim, White House officials say, is to give more flexibility to third parties — including businesses, trade associations and labor unions — to design programs that will offer skills training to those who are seeking jobs for which they are not yet qualified.
Under current rules, the Labor Department is too heavy-handed in crafting the programs, they argue.
Democrats eventually frustrated Trump's new system, as Bloomberg News noted this week: "Democrats in Congress blocked funding and the implementing regulations weren't finalized until last year." [...]
"America is back, the transatlantic alliance is back, and we are not looking backward," Biden said. He declared that the partnership with Europe is "the cornerstone of all we hope to accomplish in the 21st century."
Although he didn't mention Trump, Biden went out of his way to distort recent history. "I know the past few years have strained and tested our transatlantic relationship, but the United States is determined — determined — to re-engage with Europe, to consult with you, to earn back our position of trust and leadership," he said.
In truth, America's major fight with Europe, especially Germany, was over the failure of NATO members to meet their agreed-upon commitment to spend at least 2 percent of their GDP for defense. For years, American presidents, including Barack Obama, had made the same complaint and were ignored.
Trump of course cannot be ignored. He loudly questioned the value of the alliance and railed against the fact that America was paying far more than a fair share for the common defense. He also was not amused that NATO spent more than $1.4 billion for a new Brussels headquarters.
Bingo, he succeeded. Most of the deadbeats increased their defense spending, to the tune of more than an additional $100 billion a year, while agreeing to a reduction in US contributions. They remain unhappy but why should Biden care?
And why is he such a generous sap with American taxpayers' money?
His plan to rejoin the Iran nuke deal that Trump scuttled is perhaps the looniest idea of all because of the shock waves it sends around the Middle East. The deal didn't even address, let alone stop, Iran's military aggression and terror proxies, which the Obama-Biden administration admitted. It also conceded that some of the billions Washington included ended up financing terror.
Comment: Obviously the author has bought into the whole demonization of Iran shtick that Washington, Israel and other countries have been using to justify subjugation of the Persian nation.
Recall also that the lack of faith in the deal led Saudi Arabia and others to talk of getting their own nukes. Just recently, more evidence confirmed that Iran had a nuclear-weapons program despite its constant denial.
After Trump withdrew from the pact, reimposed sanctions and droned Iran terror leader Qasem Soleimani, an odd thing happened. As Democrats, including Biden, were running around like Chicken Littles warning of new wars, four Muslim countries signed historic peace and diplomatic accords with Israel, part of which involve joint security — against Iran.
So again questions arise: Why would Biden trust the untrustworthy Iranians and undo the enormous progress Trump achieved? Does he hate Trump more than he loves peace?
Before you answer, remember what former Defense Secretary Robert Gates said about Biden: "I think he has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national-security issue over the past four decades."
Finally, Friday was the day America formally rejoined the Paris climate accord that Trump abandoned.
Soon the White House will push more job-killing restrictions on industry and consumer emissions, all while China and India keep increasing theirs.
But fear not, the intrepid John Kerry is on the case. The private-jet warrior for eliminating greenhouse gases used the occasion to restart the countdown to catastrophe.
"Well, the scientists told us three years ago we had 12 years to avert the worst consequences of climate crisis," he told CBS. "We are now three years gone, so we have nine years left."
To underscore that this time is different, Kerry insisted, "There is no room for BS anymore. There's no faking it on this one."
Funny he should put it that way. If you eliminate fakery and BS, Biden's policies don't have much going for them.
In the world of Marxist ideology.
Goodwin has been living in a bubble.