A consequential presidency

To the editor:

On the heels of passing the CHIPS Act, Senate Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act.  Add to this the Infrastructure and Covid Relief Acts and it turns out that in less than two years Joe Biden has proven to be the most impactful president on improving the lives of average Americans since LBJ. The facts are clear.

First, in the Covid Act, the president provided $350 billion to depleted state coffers that saved tens of thousands of Civil Service jobs. In early 2021, cops, firemen, teachers, nurses and other public workers faced possible layoffs and/or contract give-backs. Later that year, Biden pushed for and signed into law the bipartisan Infrastructure Act that will improve roads and lives for decades. No president since Eisenhower can make that claim.  

Biden next did the impossible, when, two months ago, he signed gun restrictions into law, with GOP support. Finally, in a two-week time span, the president oversaw the passage of the CHIPS and Inflation Reduction Acts. The former will make America far more competitive in computer chip production and fund scientific research over the next five years. The latter represents the most important federal investment in ordinary Americans since the creation of Medicare in 1965.

The Inflation Reduction Act caps drug expenses for seniors at $2,000 a year and allows drug price negotiation. It funds Obamacare for the next three years and provides peace of mind for the 31 million Americans who get their healthcare from the program.  

It also provides the largest investment in combating climate change, $369 billion, at a time when the costs of doing nothing have become painfully obvious. It also pays for itself in a way that places tax burdens back where they should be by setting a minimum 15 percent corporate rate and a 1 percent transfer fee on corporate buy-backs of company shares.

To anyone who said and still believes that Biden is too old, ineffectual or worse, I say you are not paying attention.

Joseph Cannisi