Biden’s low-energy speech pushes costly agenda but doesn’t change the conversation  

Biden’s point at the traditional media luncheon, before he went off the record, was that he was responding to the Covid emergency on the fly. But if that explains the $2-trillion law he passed with only Democratic votes, the next two bills—totaling over $4 trillion—clearly reflect a sweeping liberal agenda and Democratic wish list. And the new president’s job, in a House chamber with a sparse, socially distant crowd, was to sell it. And, in his low-key fashion, he tried.

Biden’s point at the traditional media luncheon, before he went off the record, was that he was responding to the Covid emergency on the fly. But if that explains the $2-trillion law he passed with only Democratic votes, the next two bills—totaling over $4 trillion—clearly reflect a sweeping liberal agenda and Democratic wish list. And the new president’s job, in a House chamber with a sparse, socially distant crowd, was to sell it. And, in his low-key fashion, he tried. Biden hit the broad themes early, calling the assault on that building less than four months ago "the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War." He said "America’s house was on fire" just 100 days earlier, and urged the country to "go get vaccinated."