President Biden attempted to read remarks on the subject of inflation yesterday. The White House has posted the transcript here. I have posted the video below. The video begins with the fourth sentence, but you didn’t miss anything in the first three sentences. You could say that about the rest of his remarks as well. Michael Goodwin devotes his New York Post column to Biden’s remarks.
Everything about Biden’s remarks was feeble, including Biden himself. He struggled to read and articulate his remarks. He acknowledged that “families all across America are hurting because of inflation,” but he deflected blame. It is the fault of others, including the Republican party, the epidemic, and Putin.
However, Biden has a plan. The set provided by his daycare handlers set the themes on the left (“Lowering Costs,” “Tackling Inflation”) and on the right (“Tackling Inflation,” “Lowering Costs”). Biden’s handlers believe that repetition — repetition with variation — is the key to persuasion. They do not believe that it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
The themes to Biden’s left should read “It’s Not My Fault” and “Don’t Blame Me.” The themes to Biden’s right should read “Don’t Blame Me” and “It’s Not My Fault.”
The White House has separately posted The Biden-Harris Inflation Plan: Lowering Costs and Lowering the Deficit. In case you were in doubt: “President Biden has a plan to tackle inflation – by lowering costs that families face and lowering the federal deficit by asking the large corporations and the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share.” Whatever the question, raising taxes and spending money is the answer.
And not just spending money. Spending money for nothing (this is from the cheat sheet as well). They advocate:
Building Real Energy Independence: Advancing the strongest ever fuel economy standards for cars and trucks to enable drivers to go farther on every gallon, while increasing options for families to make the switch to electric cars via historic investment in charging infrastructure and collaboration with autoworkers and automakers to set America on course to ensure one of every two cars sold in 2030 burns no fossil fuels.
“Real energy independence” is to be distinguished from the United States producing all the energy it needs, as we did before Biden took office.
It is something like an expense of spirit in a waste of shame to treat Biden’s remarks with anything but derision. In the category of “that’s easy for him to say,” I offer the clip below.
BIDEN: "The number one threat is the strength, and that strength that we built is inflation." pic.twitter.com/Sj2TaCOJZY
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 10, 2022
In search of the light side of Biden’s remarks, I offer four of the corrections noted in the White House transcript:
• “My plan is to lower employer [sic] — lower everyday costs…”
• “Senator Rick Scott of Wisconsin [Florida], a member of the Senate Republican leadership, laid it all out in a plan. It’s the Ultra-MAGA Agenda.”
• “Fifty-five percent of the largest corporations paid net zero in federal taxes in 2020 on $40 million [billion] profits.”
• “And if you [it] weren’t extreme enough…”
It’s almost funny.
UPDATE: Since I posted this early this morning Byron York has reviewed the gory details in his Examiner column “Biden’s inflation fantasy.”
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