Has The State Of The Union Ever Been Worse?

Joe Biden will ramble through his second State of the Union speech tonight and will tell us that all is well. But just like the blundering president, this nation is ailing.

Three years ago, before our miserable “leaders” made the worst public policy decision in history and told us to hide in our basements, nearly half of Americans thought their country, while politically divided, was moving in the right direction. Inflation was low, as were energy prices, and employment was high. The economy had been growing steadily until it was interrupted by panicked policymakers (most of them Democrats). The country was at peace, and the only people who were talking about war with Russia or China were those who suffered most from Trump Derangement Syndrome. A Gallup poll taken early in 2020 found that nearly nine out of 10 Americans felt good about their personal lives. The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom ranked the U.S. at 17th in 2020, (eight places higher than in 2022).

Americans have noticed that life has since changed. Our I&I/TIPP Poll taken last week shows that more than three in five (61%) says they are not better off than they were two years ago. Only a third, most of them, predictably, Democrats, say they are better off.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll completed last week produced similar results: 41% say they are worse off financially since Biden took office. The scale of discontent is not as large as it is in our poll, but the ABC News/Washington Post poll shows that the dissatisfaction has grown sharply under Biden: At the same time in the Trump presidency, two years in, only 13% said they were worse off than when he was inaugurated.

Back to 2022: The portion of those who say they’re better off under Biden has fallen to 16%, the lowest figure the poll has recorded since the recession of the late 2000s.

The Washington Post, which has become more a high school student newspaper at the service of the popular kids rather than the pillar of real journalism it was once, says the ABC poll shows Americans are “not feeling the impact” of the Biden agenda, which is absolute nonsense. They are feeling it and the sensation is like that of a red-hot poker being jammed into their eyes.

In answer to our own question, yes, the state of the union has been worse. There was a bitter war between the states that ripped the nation apart in the 1860s, Franklin Roosevelt’s handling of the Great Depression was egregious, and there were moments in the 1960s when it appeared the country had lost its way. The 2020s so far are more like the late 1970s, when Jimmy Carter, having no idea how to leverage America’s immense advantages, used the office of the presidency to try to soften a national crash.

Except in the case of Biden, the decline is by design. He’s not trying to minimize the damage of a wreck he could avoid. He’s accelerating as we head for the ditch.

Why voters chose Biden over Trump might forever be a mystery. Yes, the Democrats did all they could to fix the election for Biden, working within a cabal that changed election rules and laws in ways that hurt Trump, manipulated media coverage so that it was more favorable to Biden, and controlled the gates of information. 

But even with that advantage, voters should have easily seen the difference between the candidates: one who might appear crass but believes in the American people; the other wants to subjugate them to the authority of the ruling class that has helped cover up his lies, failures and corruption – the one who will tell us tonight to trust him because he’s been doing such a good job.

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board