Did anyone expect Joe Biden to screw things up so badly so quickly? I admit that I thought it would take longer for things to get as bad as now.
I take no pleasure in this. Our country is hurting and paying a huge price for the Biden presidency, and it’s hard to imagine how such a dumpster fire was achieved in record time. But it seems like we traded mean tweets for gross incompetence, and believe me, given a choice, I think most of us would rather have the mean tweets back.
Seriously, it feels like everything that Joe Biden touches becomes an epic disaster. Below, I have compiled the top five.
5. Gas Prices
Under Trump, the United States produced over 13 million barrels of oil a day, and now we’re only producing 11.2 million. How did that happen? We all know the answer. Biden killed the Keystone XL pipeline during his first days in office and issued a moratorium on new oil and gas drilling leases. Apparently not understanding the concept of supply and demand, Biden seemed to be dumbfounded when gas prices increased. Since the election, gas prices are up over $1 a gallon because of his policies. Rather than acknowledge that his policies caused it, Joe Biden is blaming OPEC because he apparently thinks that begging OPEC to increase supply abroad will solve the problem he created.
“How can OPEC Plus be the reason for high energy prices when U.S. energy concerns are not producing as much oil as they did before the pandemic?” asked Phil Flynn of Fox Business. “To blame OPEC is very hypocritical of the administration because this is the same administration that has canceled the Keystone Pipeline, put drilling moratoriums on federal lands, and has discouraged investment in oil and gas production and pipelines at home.”
4. Inflation
Last month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that the Core Consumer Price Index (CPI) far outpaced economists’ predictions. “This ominous inflation warning sign,” my former PJM colleague Tyler O’Neil noted last month, “suggests that President Joe Biden’s profligate government spending may usher in a new 1970s-style stagflation.” Instead of addressing the problem, Joe Biden “has called for Congress to spend trillions more in social programs that his tax plans cannot hope to fund. Essentially printing money decreases trust in the U.S. dollar and sparks inflation.”
Biden has been in denial about the threat of inflation, choosing instead to link increasing prices to “the economy roaring back” and not his policies. “Some folks have raised worries that this could be a sign of persistent inflation. But that’s not our view,” he said last month. “Our experts believe and the data shows that most of the price increases we’ve seen are — were expected and expected to be temporary.”
Except that the economy isn’t exactly roaring back as we had hoped it would, and that’s not the cause of the inflation we’re experiencing. Biden’s energy policies driving up the cost of oil and his reckless spending are what’s really doing the damage. And most Americans understand this, according to recent polling. A new poll found that nearly 80 percent of Americans blame the Biden administration’s economic policies for our record-high inflation.
3. COVID Vaccinations
The country is also bracing for new COVID restrictions because of the Delta variant, as the Biden administration is struggling to get more Americans vaccinated. They’ve tried to blame Trump supporters for the lack of vaccinations, but in reality, it was a Biden administration screw-up of epic proportions that caused vaccination rates to plummet. This started well. After Biden inherited two vaccines approved for emergency use by the FDA and a vaccination distribution plan thanks to President Trump’s Operation Warp Speed, vaccines actually met the targets set by the Trump administration. And then, after a mere six cases of severe blood clotting out of nearly 7 million doses administered of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, the Biden administration decided to pause distribution of the vaccine. The pause was lifted after ten days, but the vaccine’s reputation was permanently damaged, and faith in all three of the vaccines plummeted, along with vaccination rates.
Joe Biden had wanted 70 percent of American adults to be vaccinated by July 4, 2021, and because he decided to pause the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, that goal wasn’t met. In the wake of this epic debacle, the Biden administration has tried various strategies to boost vaccinations with little success, and they’re even now considering vaccine mandates.
2. Afghanistan
In all likelihood, Biden losing Afghanistan will be the foreign policy disaster that defines his presidential legacy. After choosing to withdraw from Afghanistan despite conditions on the ground, the Taliban has seized control of the capital. So Biden is now sending troops to Kabul to get Americans out of the country. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has reportedly fled the country as the Taliban moves into Kabul. As a result, we’ve literally watched the country fall before our eyes, as everything Joe Biden predicted would not happen has happened. Sadly, the power vacuum left by our absence is likely to have devastating consequences for the West, as the Taliban and al Qaeda will thrive once again and likely plan new terror attacks against the West.
Rather than take the blame for this disaster, Joe Biden pathetically blamed Trump. But, this is all on Biden. “For decades, Joe Biden has touted himself as a foreign policy genius,” wrote Kenneth R. Timmerman in the New York Post. “As a United States senator, he never had to make a decision or bear responsibility for running off at the mouth. As vice-president, he was given backwaters such as Ukraine that he reportedly turned into a family piggy bank. But now he is president. He owns the utter disaster that Afghanistan has become.”
1. The Border
While Biden’s Afghanistan disaster will be considered his biggest foreign policy blunder, the border crisis he created will likely be seen as his biggest domestic policy disaster. Illegal border crossings plummeted during the Trump administration—an undeniable result of Trump’s zero-tolerance policy for illegal immigrants. The border wall also proved to be successful in blocking illegal crossings.
After inheriting a secure southern border from President Trump, Joe Biden quickly let the border get out of control. By the time Biden was inaugurated, a 7,000-migrant caravan from Honduras was already on its way to the United States. Migrant facilities are overcrowded, immigrant children are being kept in deplorable conditions, and there have been reports of sexual abuse.
“We proudly handed the Biden Administration the most secure border in history. All they had to do was keep this smooth-running system on autopilot,” Trump said in a statement back in March. “Instead, in the span of a just few weeks, the Biden Administration has turned a national triumph into a national disaster. They are in way over their heads and taking on water fast.”
Adding to the crisis, COVID-positive migrants have been allowed in the country. According to a recent report, at least 7,000 illegal immigrants with COVID were released into the United States in McAllen, Texas, alone. The Biden administration’s public position has been that there is no border crisis, but in audio leaked last week, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas openly admitted that the border crisis is “unsustainable.”
