As the economy falters in the wake of rising inflation, chronic worker shortages, and a deepening supply chain crisis, the rhetoric from the Biden administration and its defenders has shifted from “we’ve got this” to “stop your whining.” Is this what Americans bargained for when they ditched Mr. Mean Tweets for Joe “Nexnelsrent” Biden?
A perfect example of this shift is an op-ed by a contributing columnist to the Washington Post – Micheline Maynard – who says that the real problem we face today isn’t skyrocketing prices, bottlenecks at the ports, and empty shelves. It is us spoiled brats.
“American consumers, their expectations pampered and catered to for decades, are not accustomed to inconvenience,” she writes. “Time for some new, more realistic expectations.”
Maynard’s op-ed, and the Washington Post, took plenty of flak for blaming the victim. But the truth is that it is increasingly the way the White House is talking as well.
At a press briefing on Tuesday, a reporter asked White House spokesperson Jen Psaki why, given that supply chain problems were “clear in March of 2020,” didn’t the administration act sooner. “It was crystal clear that things were not improving on the supply chain,” the New York Times reporter said, trying hard to choke out a tough question. “People couldn’t get dishwashers and furniture and treadmills delivered on time, not to mention all sorts of other things.”
Psaki interrupted the report to say, with a smirk, “The tragedy of the treadmill that’s delayed.”
Meanwhile, National Economic Council Deputy Director Bharat Ramamurti told Yahoo Finance that the recent inflation jump is actually a good thing. “The faster-than-expected increase in some of those prices is actually a good sign in the sense that it’s a sign that the economy is recovering faster than a lot of people expected.” (Except it isn’t. The economy is underperforming even as prices are spiking.)
Then there’s White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, who recently endorsed a tweet from leftist economist Jason Furman, who said that inflation and empty shelves were “high-class problems.”
And these folks have the nerve to say that Republicans are out of touch with everyday Americans?
But what else, at this point, can they do other than wag their finger at us over the multiplying crises they’ve created and for which they have no solutions?
How long before they have us chanting the line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar – “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves” – as a condition of employment?
Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows had it right when he tweeted:
Indeed, and just think of the many other applications for the language being used by the likes of Psaki, Klain, and Micheline Maynard.
- The fact that the border is being overrun isn’t the problem. The problem is that we need to “consciously lower our expectations” about border security.
- Skyrocketing murder rates caused by defunding police aren’t what should trouble us. It’s that we are “not accustomed to the inconvenience” of being shot at while walking down the street.
- China’s testing a hypersonic missile is only a concern because we “have been spoiled into thinking that we deserve not to be attacked.”
- Biden’s abandoning Americans and our supporters in Afghanistan shouldn’t be a concern, since those people had been “pampered and catered to.”
- Your wages aren’t keeping up with inflation? That’s just another “high-class problem.”
And, please, enough with the “persistent whine” about the Biden’s inept performance and declining mental abilities.
As Maynard reminds us, it’s “time for some new, more realistic expectations.”
— Written by the I&I Editorial Board
This is America. The only low expectations I have are for our politicians.
The Last Loser from the Democrats…you the well speaking black man…his motto was the depressing “new Normal” that he created. Then a great Patriot brought us out of the depressing and degenerate’s fog and was successful in making America Great Again. Then the coup, the week long election, internet tally changes and of course more mail in ballots then citizens all by the Democrat Party. Abolish that party and America will prosper.
Democrats know that the American people are unhappy, in fact, the party has intentionally fed anger and dismay by slicing and dicing the country for years along racial, gender, and cultural lines, fracturing an already disputatious population into hardened groups with little appetite for compromise. Now the party is sicing progressives against moderates to the delight of Republicans, who simply have to duck for cover as the Biden domestic agenda teeters.
With respect to the foreign scene, the kaleidoscope of events since Afghanistan was lost continues to turn, new pieces snapping into place with a post-withdrawal finality that belies President Biden’s cheery self-congratulations. We are confronted now with shaken allies just as terror organizations across continents, sensing our indisposition to face reality, find their spirits and plans for mayhem rejuvenated.
Weakness whets domestic and foreign appetites and the Biden administration is emblematic of weakness. His infomercials to the nation represent meandering and often disjointed blather, a crepuscular denouement for a president lost in the twilight of a long political career.