Hello everyone. Welcome back to Policies, Problems and Progress with Alex Hopper. I am your host, Alex Hopper. And I tell you what folks, I apologize for being gone so long, but I have had a heck of a time getting back to the microphone. Since the last time you heard from me, I have had three major surgeries, two of which I had to be put under for, one of which was to reattach six pieces of bone back to my tibial plateau in my knee. I missed seven weeks of class.
I had to do everything I could to catch up in college. I had to move in the middle of all of it because my roommates made a hostile living situation where I wasn't able to feed or water myself. Just all sorts of fun things going on. And then the holidays came on. So I've been busier than I care to be, but I am very happy to be back. Speaking of which, happy new year everyone.
Welcome to 2024. Now those of you who are able to divide know that four is divisible by four, just as 2016, 2020, 2024, and 2028 are. So you know what that means. Presidential election year. And for someone who is political, there is nothing more stressful and more exhausting than dealing with an election year. This year, you're going to see all sorts of things going on, shady and loud in the media, things being blown out of proportion to try to motivate you one way or the other.
Not to mention all the candidates who are going to either be groveling at your feet and sucking at your toes to get your vote or standing eight miles above you, calling you worthless and demanding your allegiance. There is no in between. It is that kind of year. And so that's what we're going to talk about in this episode. Sort of getting ready to deal with what comes this year and what to expect and the important dates for you and possibly your state if you happen to be in a swing state.
If you aren't in a swing state, I mean, it's controversial, but your vote really doesn't matter. That's unfortunately just how it goes. If you notice about where politicians decide to go and campaign in, you kind of get left out because you are taken for granted, but take that as you will. So the first thing that just came to a close that is on everybody's mind is the first thing that you see in election year is the Iowa caucus. Just drawn to a close, Donald Trump has projected to be the winner.
There is zero surprise there, despite the effort put in by opposition such as DeSantis and Haley. There was really no question about him winning that. Going forward, it's projected that he'll most likely be the pick for the primary as well as possibly the actual election. But this is due to a lot of liberal cities starting to share sentiments that are on the conservative dock.
And with that being mentioned, we move into the issues of 2024, what people will be voting on, possibly what will change them to switch parties in some states and what people are ingrained to keep supporting in their own parties. My top four are abortion, for policy, immigration and crime. Not my top four as in what's going to make me choose, but what is the projection I think for what is going to drive people's selections this year.
Covering the first one, abortion, we just had the Broe v Wade overturned and abortion has gone out to the states with a lot of outcry from left leaning groups to make a federal mandate to allow abortion, while the Supreme Court has ruled that there is not an existing one. Many states took the opportunity to outlaw abortion altogether and other states have taken the opportunity to outlaw abortion, say for a few special cases such as rape and incest.
However, left leaning states have taken the opportunity to make laws in allowing abortion and making sure that it is ingrained in their state's constitution. One way or another, whichever way a person leans on this is very much going to be deciding how they vote this time around. Next up is foreign policy.
Now this has been a controversial subject that I have talked about on this show before, but with recent wars in the Ukraine and Israel and the US's support for them both financially and politically, foreign policy is going to be a large part of the 2024 election. Now this isn't something that can be pinned to one side or the other, or can even be pinned to both sides. Both sides have people who support Ukraine and Israel and both sides have people who support neither.
And then one side will have people who support Israel but not Ukraine and then the other side will have people who support Ukraine but not Israel. And then there is the group that is very passionate about Palestine, although I've not seen anybody carrying flags supporting Russia on the Capitol Hill.
It is a very complicated issue and is really yet to be seen how it will affect these elections they were going into, but you can clearly see each politician's stance on these issues and how it could influence these people who do or do not agree with them.
Immigration is a very large one that we've been facing recently with the border basically falling out and Governor Abbott from Texas has been making sure that the northern states feel the same rush and surge that they have been feeling by busing and flying immigrants to these northern states. A lot of people who live in these cities have now began to change their mind and become hostile to these immigrants that are coming from the southern border.
These immigrants have been placed in cities where they're not able to take care of them due to just not having enough money. Schools have been shut down to allow homeless immigrants to sleep there as well as hotels completely taking up and social services having to be shut down in cities and states like New York and New York, New York, New York, that will never not be goofy, but also Chicago facing these issues as well.
We're now due to a lack of social services being provided such as EBT and food stamps. People who are relying on these services are now spitting and harassing and even attacking immigrants in the places where they're being housed. Now their views are starting to change on this while most of the states that are along the southern border have not changed their views.
They still hold the same views that it is unattainable to have this many people come over the border and still hold a positive and stable economy. Many have even drawn comparisons to the treatment of homeless veterans as well as homeless citizens of the United States and how these immigrants have been put up in five star hotels or even just better living situations than many, many homeless shelters throughout the US.
This has turned many people against the Biden administration as any action taken by the states to secure their borders with Mexico have been met with federal resistance and as well as a large amount of silence from the White House on any sort of plan or idea on how to deal with these things that are coming into effect in the cities.
Even prominent Democratic figures are now turning against the Biden administration such as Mayor Johnson of Chicago saying it's the entire country that is now at stake due to the silence coming from the White House and the ignoring of the issue.
And the fourth and final issue of course is crime, something that I went into depth on the police issue in this country and you can go and watch that video on this channel where a lot of places are facing record highs for crime as well as police being neutered in responses as well as police being over empowered in responses and shown to be negligent in their responses where crime has become this thing where we're not able to fight it properly
because we are having a fight between distrust and trust in our police force and between funding and unfunding it. Not to mention the federal judges that are appointed have been doing a very poor job at managing the crimes and sentences in this country and a lot of people are going to be swinging based off of being victims. People who may have voted for Biden before and his administration may now be seeing or feeling differently due to their victimization from these lack of ruling on crimes.
The next thing you're going to be hearing about this year is approval ratings. Now more specifically, the Biden administration's approval ratings reaching a 40% approval rating and a 53% disapproval rating, which is a new record for the Biden administration with motivating factors such as a doubt of his medical state and mental ability to just how the economy has been performing underneath his administration's rule during these years.
Many are comparing this to how Trump is now mounting so far above his opponents in the primary while Biden is losing approval. This has even led to speculation that the Democratic Party might put up someone else while Biden still wants to be incumbent. And so folks, for the most part, that's what we have to look forward to this year.
This is a shorter than average episode, but that's just because there's not as much to talk about, but it is a short cover of what we should look forward to this year and I will cover these things more in depth later as they come more relevant in the coming months. Thank you all for listening. This has been Policy, Problems and Progress with Alex Hopper. Have a happy new year, y'all. I look forward to the shit show that is going to be this year. Good night.
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