With the country’s vaccine rollout succeeding where pandemic management failed, and Biden moving boldly on climate and immigration, his presidency is off to a promising start.
For the first time, political will and global public opinion seem focused on profound climate action. This decade will be a decisive one.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, left, is visible as President Joe Biden holds a virtual meeting with the Mexican president at the White House in March 2021.
(AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
There was palpable relief as Biden brought the US back to the table on global climate action, warning “we have to get this done”. Depressingly, Morrison showed little sign of hearing the message.
U.S. President Joe Biden, with presidential climate envoy John Kerry, opened the Leaders Summit on Climate on April 22, 2021, by announcing new U.S. targets.
AP Photo/Evan Vucci
Afghanistan sharpened Australia’s fighting capacity and capability. But we were still part of a spectacular failure of political and military leadership.
As President Joe Biden said on announcing the US troop withdrawal by September, ‘our reasons for remaining in Afghanistan have become increasingly unclear’.
The Natanz nuclear facility.
Abedin Taherkenareh/EPA
A new report from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute says the federal government has overlooked the national security threats of climate change.
Among the many issues that Joe Biden has to deal with, what place does he reserve for the alliance of democracies project that he mentioned during his presidential campaign?
Chip Somodevilla/AFP
The new US administration has talked about setting up an alliance of democracies. For the time being, the project seems vague. Yet such an alliance is necessary.
White evangelicals continued to back Trump in 2020 in significant numbers.
Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Right now, the nation is almost entirely dependent on other countries for minerals that are used in everything from wind turbines to strike fighters and satellites.
Both Russia and China are signalling they will only deal with the West where and when it suits them. They are also increasingly comfortable working together as close partners.
A president’s reputation is safer when he’s in the Oval Office rather than giving a press conference.
Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
The president wants Americans to be able to celebrate Independence Day with small gatherings. What will it take to get the virus under control by then? Three public health school deans explain.
Both Andrew Jackson, left, and Donald Trump presented themselves as men of the people.
Jackson, Library of Congress; Trump, Drew Angerer/Getty Images
A president’s persona is always a public act. In that way, Trump’s shtick – vulgar man of the people – was not exceptional. And every president has had to invent his version of the role.
An election worker during mail-in ballot counting at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia on Nov. 6, 2020.
Chris McGrath/Getty Images
A record number of people voted in the 2020 presidential election. Donald Trump lost, Joe Biden won. Now, GOP legislators across the country are trying to pass measures to limit voting.
U.S. President Joe Biden walks to the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on March 9, 2021.
(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Since his January inauguration, Joe Biden has demonstrated that he understands how the modern U.S. presidency works, both in terms of policy and the nation’s psyche.