The White House and the Biden campaign made a devastating miscalculation — one that will be nearly impossible to fix. For more than a year, Joe Biden has been traveling the country, patting himself on the back, claiming that the economy is great, and taking full ownership of it. He gave speeches in front of banners emblazoned with "Bidenomics" branding and seemed convinced that telling people that things were great would make them believe it.
Somebody really should have been fired over that, because poll after poll shows that Americans aren't feeling the prosperity that Biden claims he's bestowed upon them, and they blame him for the financial pains they're feeling. As they should.
The reason for Trump's dominance in the general election polls, both in national and battleground match-ups, is that people can remember the economic prosperity of the Trump era and compare it to what's happening now.
There's simply no comparison. Inflation was low, wages were up, and gas was cheap. It was great. You may not care for Trump personally, but mean tweets beat being hungry or cold because you can't afford food and heat.
So with the specter of the Trump economy making Bidenomics look even worse, we're now seeing an effort by the liberal media to push a new big lie: the Trump economy wasn't as good as you remember it being.
"Supporters of former President Donald Trump cite his economic record as a reason to vote for him, but that's a bit puzzling," writes Emily Peck of Axios.
Flashback: Democrats Realizing Too Late That Biden’s Economic Messaging Is Backfiring
Why is it puzzling? You're going to love this: according to Peck, "Trump's economic record is only good if you leave off what happened from March 2020 to the end of his administration."
Peck notes that during the pandemic, the U.S. experienced a historic surge in unemployment, reaching a record 14.8%, which she notes is "a level not seen since the Great Depression."
Peck noted that by the end of Trump's presidency, the country had fewer jobs than when he assumed office, which was "the first time that's happened since Herbert Hoover was president."
Let's consider what she's telling us. According to Peck, we're supposed to pretend that the loss of jobs was irrespective of the pandemic and actually the result of bad economic policy, even though, as Peck conceded, "countries around the world faced similar struggles to the U.S. at the time."
Here's where things really go off the rails: while we're supposed to pretend that the pandemic is irrelevant to the Trump economy from March 2020 forward, Peck then absolves Joe Biden for the inflation crisis because "inflation was also the result of the pandemic's economic disruption."
What a convenient position to take. While the root causes of inflation are debatable, it's worth noting that inflation only started to go up after Joe Biden took office, and economists point to Biden's American Rescue Plan as being a major contributing factor. Adding to the problem is that the Biden administration told us repeatedly that inflation would be transitory — a clear indication that it didn't understand what was happening or how to fix it.
This is what the left intends to do. It can’t convince people that the Biden economy is good, so it's going to push a new big lie that the Trump economy wasn’t great.
Good luck with that.
