Editors at Issues and Insights ask a basic question about President Biden’s approach to his job.
[A]sk yourself, what would Biden be doing differently if his goal was to purposely send the country into a tailspin?
He set off a 40-decade-high inflation spiral with his $2 trillion “rescue” plan. He exacerbated supply-chain problems by paying people not to work. He threw open the borders to millions of illegal immigrants. He needlessly kept COVID mandates and restrictions in place. He worsened shortages of baby formula and spiking gasoline prices. He encouraged foreign adversaries with his disastrous Afghanistan retreat.
In every instance, Biden has said he and his top officials were “caught off guard.” In other words, his is pleading incompetence. The public has picked up on this, which is why most Americans now believe that “incompetent” is the word that best describes this president.
But incompetence doesn’t do Biden justice. In every case, Biden knew, or should have known, what would happen if he pushed his policies. Yet he did so anyway.
On inflation, even liberal economists were warning that Biden’s reckless $2 trillion “rescue” plan – which he signed after the economy had already roared back to life – would set off a ‘70s-style inflationary spiral.
“I think this is the least responsible macroeconomic policy we’ve had in the last 40 years,” is how Larry Summers described Biden’s spending plan before it became law. “There’s the real risk that macroeconomic policy will be very much destabilizing things.”
Biden ignored the guy who’d served as chief economist during the Obama-Biden administration and whom Biden has called “my good friend Larry Summers.”
So, is the inflationary spiral an example of Biden’s incompetence, or did he deliberately press ahead with his “rescue” plan knowing it would fuel price increases, perhaps in hopes that “fighting” inflation would justify still more government interventions?
