Our cover this week examines the claim that, as president, Joe Biden would succumb to the left’s plans—dramatically expanding the role of government and crippling American business. That was central to the attack levelled by Donald Trump this week, in a bad-tempered, ill-disciplined debate between the two men. And fear of just such a leftward lurch under Mr Biden is circulating among some American business leaders. Our analysis of Mr Biden’s policies and of his ability to get things done in office leads us to conclude that the charge is well wide of the mark. Mr Biden has rejected the Utopian ideas of the left of his party. His tax and spending proposals are reasonable—an order of magnitude smaller than those of, say, Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren. They imply only a slightly bigger state and attempt to deal with genuine problems facing America, including shoddy infrastructure, climate change and the travails of small business. If anything, the flaw in Mr Biden’s plans is that in some areas they are not far-reaching enough.