“From President Joe Biden’s point of view, Americans ought to be thrilled with the recent trends in inflation,” writes Eric Boehm at Reason, who quotes the president: “Wages keep going up and inflation keeps coming down.”
True enough, but, Mr. Boehm goes on, “pointing at the charts and regurgitating economic figures doesn’t seem to be as convincing as the president might hope.”
You’ve seen the left-of-center memes mocking Americans for thinking the economy is bad when it is, instead, g-gr-great!
But prices for food and gasoline, after the big bulge caused by all those COVID checks and subsidies, did not go back down to previous levels. And rising wages after the “Great Suppression” of the lockdowns seem at best a verypartial return to better times.
Boehm offers some context. “It makes sense that the recent run of inflation would leave a psychological scar. After all, the peak inflation rate of 9.1 percent in June 2022 was not only the highest annualized rate seen in more than four decades, it was also more than twice as high as the average inflation rate in any year since 1991. . . .” And inflation has not stopped. “In March, the annual inflation rate was 3.5 percent. Yes, that’s 60 percent lower than the peak rate in June 2022, but that’s still higher than the average annual rate in every single year between 1991 and 2021, except for 2008.”
And then there’s the higher interest rates, which, Boehm plausibly asserts, compounds our perceptions that “inflation is a major problem.”
This is a huge issue for Biden. Boehm cites the political lore: “If you’re explaining, you’re losing,” and notes that, “unfortunately for Biden, his task in the run-up to November’s presidential election is explaining to people that they shouldn’t feel like inflation is still a problem.”
Who you gonna believe: Your cash register receipts or a feeble, corrupt, multi-millionaire lifelong politician?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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4 replies on “Inflation & the Infirm Incumbent”
Too many people will believe the feeble, corrupt politician who is bent on taking away our freedom, in all areas of our lives.
I have been wondering lately if the real Joe Biden is even still alive. Reports are out that there are around 18 people who “wear the mask”. And with AI deepfakes all over the place, it does make one wonder.
Still falling behind but not as fast.
Let’s go branding.
What the general public wants is the purchasing power that, in 2019, they vaguely anticipated having five years later. In simpler terms, they want to be made whole, not-withstanding that most of them acquiesced or participated as the politicians dug this hole.
Biden himself is so out-of-touch as to be oblivious to how much damage his Administration has done to the nation. His handlers have him forge ahead, knowing that he would lose large parts of his base if he reversed himself and that the Republicans would treat any reversal as an admission of guilt. Those of Biden’s supporters who are not simply fools rôle-play.
Unless Jill Biden can somehow thwart Joe’s removal, he will be replaced as the Democratic candidate before the General Election, by a candidate represented to be a visionary, who will channel den Geist of America, and lead us to a happy, sustainable future. A terrifying share of the public will embrace this mythologizing.
If Jill keeps Joe from being displaced, then his handlers must simply count on popular aversion to Trump and upon Republican ineptitude to overcome voter unhappiness.