*10/31/22 - I began writing this quite a long time ago but obviously was slow. Now, with the midterms nearly upon us, I figured I'd better get it out now. With that in mind, please forgive if it feels slightly unfinished and/or dated. For instance, I started this before the Roe V Wade decision, and I no longer think Afghanistan is on the minds of average Americans. Republicans didn't hammer it as much as I thought they would, but they did, indeed, use inflation and gas prices nonstop in the past months.*
4.13.22
No doubt this will come across as biased. I wrote at least two articles similar in scope on Trump, several years ago; Looking at whether public opinion is justified or not, based upon their actual actions and whether those actions could be justified with evidence at the time, etc.
I'm always brought back to Plato when thinking of this. "Are our leaders judged fairly"? Plato said he didn't like democracy because those who knew nothing of politics or how the nation actually functioned had equal say as experts and the intelligent.
*10/31/22 update - This rings especially true these past 3 or 4 days for me, as there is currently a Tik tok trend that has literal 14 year old girls uploading the same ~20 second clip of a song, them lip syncing over it, with a text overlay. The text gives 5 or 6 hot-takes, based on the "beliefs" of these children. These include things such as "Abortion is murder", "Abortion is okay if you didn't mean to", "There are only two genders", "boys can cry, 2", "Biden cheated", "both genders can be raped", "Jesus is real", and more nonsense. Literal 14 year olds (at most - maybe younger). For some reason, I've never seen anything but extremely young girls, yet I've constantly seen the trend in the last few days.
I'd like to point out the fact that conservatism in individuals is highly associated with authoritarianism tendencies (the psychological mindset - not the government type), and as such we would expect to see conservatives (especially young, as they are even more impressionable than the average) be most susceptible to bandwagon "do it because everyone else is doing it" fads like this.
However, I don't even think that's what this is. That theory would purport that these kids actually have convictions in these stances they are taking. Perhaps I'm just truly starting to feel my age but I have very little doubt that they know shit about these arguments. It's mere regurgitation from what their parents told them. But, come ~3 years from now, these people will be able to vote. And if they're from Kansas, their vote will have as much weight as mine in determining the leader of our nation. And likely, these people aren't even close to the least rational people voting in our country.
That's... fucking stupid.*
The point Plato raises is a good one, and is inescapable. However, I don't see any way to fix this problem. You could implement a basic governmental knowledge test to be eligible to vote, but who would write the questions, and more importantly, the answers? The potential for abuse from a hypothetical authoritarian regime who grabs power is just too high.
Thus, we are stuck simply bitching about how broken our system is. Enjoy.
A large percentage of Republicans still genuinely believe that Biden's election win was illegitimate. Many still believe climate change and/or Covid are hoaxes. Most still think supply-side works. But this ignorance is not claimed exclusively by the far right. What we're currently seeing is people - even liberal - blaming Biden (or, at least, liberals feeling like they need to avoid the subject) for things like inflation, gas prices, and Afghanistan. I'm predicting that these will be the main arguments of the right come midterms - "Look what Biden did to inflation! The GOP can fix it!".
Those 3 arguments, and immigration, but that's essentially a constant abrasive humming coming from the right. Nothing new or exclusive to Biden.
That being said: If the Republicans win the House, they will likely impeach Biden on the claim of "disastrous immigration policy" - dog shit as that would be. They're desperate to impeach Biden over anything - even nonsense - because it would lessen the sting that Trump got impeached twice.
It would make the entire concept of impeachment feel much less significant, and democrats could no longer hold that fact over the GOP's head.
We'll go ahead and make that another prediction: If Republicans win both House and Senate in the midterms, Biden will be out of office. Not sure how long it will take, but prior to the end of his term, I'd guess.
Essentially, that's what this post is: A prediction of what the conservative midterm arguments will be, and to see if these hypothetical arguments have any justification.
I can understand the Republican (and liberal, for that matter) constituency only looking at the very surface of issues in their adjudication of politics. It's infuriating that this is how we humans work, but I get it.
Most of America, left, right, and center, seem to only see headlines, and no matter the content - no matter the justification to do so - they blame whomever is in control. No doubt, Republicans would also have this same gripe - at least, when they are in control.
Trump didn't cause Covid, and there were some liberals who absolutely treated him as though he essentially did. He undoubtedly made it worse, and he undoubtedly had plenty of adequate information from experts early on that could have seen him make better choices and avoid worsening the pandemic as he did. But he did not cause it. It would have still been an enormous problem with great loss of life had he reacted to it responsibly. He shouldn't be blamed for its existence or any necessary steps taken because of it. He likely has an enormous loss of jobs, huge dive in stocks, gargantuan increase of national debt "under his watch". Any of those things reasonably caused by Covid is not reasonable to blame on him, and I don't.
That being said, as you can see in my two essays I linked earlier: Even before Covid, Trump did nothing to help jobs (they merely continued their generally positive trend at the same rate as Obama), nothing to help stocks (they, likewise, continued upon the same trend line established by Obama), and he had already exploded the deficit before Covid.
He made our Covid recovery much worse, sure. Millions didn't get vaccinated or wear masks because of him, which ensured the virus spread further and faster than it should have been allowed to. But those general stats I mentioned earlier still would have happened due to Covid even had he reacted responsibly. Perhaps to a lesser degree, but I honestly don't think by much.
I despise Trump, but I don't blame him for the stock market, or any Covid-inspired debt, or loss of jobs due to Covid.
So, let's use that spirit of charitable interpretation and reasoned examination in looking at what are considered by many as Biden's failures:
Inflation
*9/22 update - This was written before Roe v Wade was struck - it's much more up in the air, now, though still probably slightly favoring the right.*
Democrats will almost certainly be gutted at the midterms, unless something vastly changes. The main blade which the GOP will likely use to sever Biden's hands and make him even more toothless and ineffective than he is now (referring to Manchin and Sinema), is inflation.
According to economists, there are a few main reasons for the inflation we have seen:
Obviously, first and foremost is Covid. This is the lions share of the inflation we're experiencing. Supply dried up as less and less workers were in factories, etc, producing their goods, and ports and trucks and all national and international logistics all slowed due to the pandemic. Lower supply = higher demand, which drives prices up and makes your money able to buy less than the same amount previously did.
We are finally beginning to recover, but notably are not yet fully recovered, from an economics standpoint. After the worst of Covid was over, people rushed to vacations they had put off. They took road trips - they went to visit family. They fervently went shopping and spent some of the money they had saved by being in quarantine mode for the past 2 years. This behavior, while economically good on one hand, puts severe strain on the supply chain. Everything is being bought up much quicker than even before Covid (including gas), which leads back to lower supply again.
Simply restarting an economy causes inflation. Everyone (understandably), feels they deserve to treat themselves to some nice things after the last two years. Demand rose significantly in a very short amount of time, and supply - which had only recently started to recover - dwindled, and logistics understandably struggled to keep up.
The second reason for the inflation, according to the experts, is climate change.
This, too, is a supply issue. The example I was given was microchips, where I believe it was 3 of the 4 major factories in the world, producing the vast majority of microchips worldwide, were shut down. Two of those shutdowns were caused by wildfires attributed to climate change. Thus, we were given a chip shortage - a wide ranging problem in our day and age, cutting the supply for many products already in high demand - driving up those prices even further.
*update - Biden actually just recently announced policy targeting this specific problem. You'd think conservatives would cheer him for this, but of course not.
There are many other factors as well - The Great Resignation (and maybe "quiet quitting", to an extent), which caused many businesses to be unable to find workers willing to work for the shit pay/hours/benefits that Republicans policies have granted them over the past decades. Thus, production is lowered. Compounding this, Covid (With the help of Trump, Fox News, Joe Rogan, et al, and their misinformation) took many people out of the workforce; Over a million Americans, for good. Supply was hit, further.
That is likely the reason why just about every nation is experiencing inflation. Some, less than America. Some, worse.
Not sure how the GOP manages to keep straight faces when they blame him for inflation, when considering the inflation in every other country spiked at the same time as America.
Biden is unequivocally not to blame for the (vast majority) of inflation we have seen, but the GOP would have you believe otherwise. They go as far as to call it "Bidenflation", despite the fact that virtually all countries are in the same boat as America.
Greg Abbott has likely caused more inflation than Biden has, with his trade nonsense on the Mexican border.
That doesn't, however, mean there aren't things Biden should be doing to mitigate it.
He had some major victories in this area with his actions for various ports, responsible for over half of America's imports. Those implementations worked beautifully.
But there might be other things he could try. I'm not sure. Ideas certainly aren't forthcoming from the GOP - they just want to bitch.
Trump, as well, has directly caused more inflation than Biden. One of the things Biden could now be doing (and probably should) is to end the remaining tariffs on Chinese goods imposed by Trump's unprovoked trade war with the nation.
I'm not a fan of China's government, but that, alone, is not good reason for policy. The trade war never made sense. If Biden were to end the tariffs which Trump imposed on Chinese goods, it is estimated that inflation would be reduced by ~1.5%. When we're currently sitting at [9/22] ~8.1% inflation, that is significant.
It obviously wouldn't erase the danger of inflation, but that is something he could do that he hasn't yet done. I'm not sure why he hasn't.
Bailout/Stimulus:
An oft-cited cause of "Biden's inflation" - really the only one which has any real merit - is the stimulus package.
There is sufficient reason to believe that this helped along inflation by a small percentage. The best estimate I can find puts it at 2%.
However, it must, of course, be noted that the Trump administration also gave trillions in stimulus/bailout money. $2 trillion for the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act and the $900 billion pandemic relief bill - both in 2020. Supported by the GOP and signed by Trump - nearly $3 trillion, and yet they pull a muscle in their index finger every time they point to Biden's $1.9 trillion stimulus, alone.
GOP leaders obviously recognize this double standard but they know that the majority of mostly apathetic voters in this nation, who only read headlines, won't recognize it.
However, the argument is that Biden should not have done this because it contributed to inflation a small degree. True. But what would have been the consequences of not doing it? Greatly increased suffering to the poorest Americans.
To clarify: The 1.5% I mentioned from the trade war is significant. Biden's 2% is obviously more so. I am, however, more forgiving of the 2% as the American populace actually benefited from that 2%, whereas we saw literally nothing but hurt from the trade war, as American businesses who had to pay more for Chinese goods. A bit lesser known was Trump's smaller 'trade war' with Canada, which actually affected my place of employment. Our newspaper, I believe, had to change suppliers of our huge rolls of paper as continuing to import from Canada became too much, thanks to that.
It was a net loss, under Trump, but a gain under Biden.
I feel that is a reasonable reading of the events.
You may not think that 2% worth it. I do. Regardless, it is opinion, on both our parts.
Can you honestly say you blame someone for coming to that opinion? Especially a leader whose job it is to look out for the well being of our citizens? He, undeniably, helped the most vulnerable at a small cost to the rest of us, and you hurl invective at him for this behavior? Are you truly that sociopathic?
In the context of this essay: Yes. Biden did indeed "cause" this portion of inflation, if you want to call it that as though he was irresponsible to do so, and it likely contributed much less to inflation than Trump's China trade war + tax cuts + his own bailout/stimulus and the GOP doesn't say shit about those, but fine.
I don't mean to engage in whataboutism, with the above - only to get the GOP to be consistent in their logic. Biden's $1.9 trillion stimulus with a ~2% contribution to inflation, + his tax cuts, vs Trump's trade war estimated at 1.5% inflation + his combined $3 trillion stimulus/bailouts + trillion-plus dollar tax cuts which likely contributed much more than .5% to overtake the only inflation which Biden is actually responsible for. If you're mad about Biden's contribution to inflation and not the likely much greater contribution to inflation by Trump and his party (Abbott, etc), then you are clearly arguing for your biases and not reason, and thus should not be trusted.
That being said, I do think the American Recovery Act was too broad and too bloated. I'll absolutely give them that. I wouldn't be able to say where that line should be, though. I'm not that arrogant.
Taxes:
And while we're on the subject, Trump also gave trillions in tax cuts - most of which went to the ultra-wealthy. Demand is high and supply low. Giving people tax cuts undoubtedly increases demand, which invariably increased inflation. I've not seen an estimate for this particular policy, but I think it reasonable to conclude it was a fairly significant factor, as well.
To be fair, this was pre-Covid and before inflation started to spike. It was dumb policy, but not because Trump could reasonably expect it to affect inflation.
That being said: Biden also decreased taxes - notably the lower brackets, at least. "Peasants", as Trump would likely call them. It's hard to criticize cutting taxes for those making less than $50,000 a year, but any other cuts in taxes at this time is more-or-less indefensible, in my view. And cuts grow exponentially more difficult to excuse the higher the tax bracket.
While Biden's wasn't egregious, married couples making $150,000 a year - the upper limit of most Biden benefits - are rich. They don't need the cuts, and it merely contributed to inflation. I suppose it matters, to a degree, where you live, but come off it.
I can say I approve of Biden cutting taxes for the poor, but any more than that was a mistake, I think. That being said, if I remember correctly, it was trash senators like Manchin who forced the higher brackets - not necessarily Biden.
Russia's War On Ukraine:
The GOP's next reason for inflation and especially the cost of gasoline, has been the Russia-Ukraine conflict. This one is absolutely absurd and childish to me, but they claim that the Biden administration has "fomented" this conflict.
Their savior-in-chief denied Ukraine the military aid which was promised to them and attempted a quid-pro-quo deal to try and artificially make his political opponents look bad. Yet Biden "fomented" Ukraine, they say.
Not only that, Biden is "making things worse" with sanctions against Russia. So much for the supposed patriot quality of fighting for freedom. Would they have us do nothing? Would they have us ignore a country being invaded unjustly like this?
We're not sending our god damned troops. We're refusing to buy oil from a despot in charge of those committing war crimes.
Bemusing.
But yes, I would agree that gasoline has obviously increased in price specifically due to Biden (and Congress, including much of the GOP's) sanctions against Russia. Food is also trending upwards due to the war and likely sanctions.
But first: Even if you struggle being a human being and acknowledging that there are very good and justified reasons for these price increases, we don't have reason to believe that this was a large portion of the [overall] inflation we are seeing. Contributed: Absolutely. Major factor: Arguably, no.
Second: I don't think it fair to call this a "Biden policy". He did, himself, implement some of it, but it seems disingenuous to call it a "Biden policy" unless you are also claiming that a GOP president wouldn't have done the same. As previously stated, much or even most of the GOP supported these sanctions.
Cozying up to Russia at a time like this - when they are so clearly the villains, as if straight out of a Disney movie - would likely be political suicide for someone as high profile as president. Remember when Trump tried to do exactly that, when it was found that Russia did, indeed, interfere in our 2016 election to help him get elected? He tried to stop Congress from implementing sanctions?
That may have been the most push-back he received his entire tenure as president from his own supporters - up until the insurrection, anyway. He was 'overruled', the GOP helped the sanctions pass, and even his base did not back him up. They shied away from that particular argument. From them, that is significant.
That being said: Obviously the GOP is more likely to support 'villains'. They have over a hundred house members and I believe something like 35 or 40 voted against essentially all sanctions? Marjorie Taylor Greene spoke at conferences soon after the war began in which they gave an ovation "to Russia". Let's hope that my 'political suicide' claim is true and that soggy sack of dog shit woman is voted out.
"If you look at a graph of inflation over time, the inflation starts right after Biden takes office! Clearly it's his fault!"
The belief that a President can have that fast of an effect on the economy based on their policy is almost endearing. How quaint. 2 months after instituting policy getting sworn in and inflation rises by ~2 or 3%? I see a bit of cognitive dissonance with Republicans, there, as that would indicate a much more efficient government than they constantly espouse.
That's not how the government works.
But more to the point, I've already dispelled this nonsense.
Basically every other country is currently experiencing inflation, and the spike in inflation affected all these countries also when Joe Biden happened to be sworn in. I know we Americans like to think we control the world, but we don't. Fiscal policy from the American president is unlikely to affect the inflation rate of other countries - especially overseas, and without tariffs involved.
So, how would a conservative explain that? How could Biden possibly be the ultimate cause of the inflation we have when so many other countries have inflation that started at the same time and to a similar degree?
I don't think I'm supposed to ask that question. It's as though they'd think I'm playing unfair, as we all know it's bullshit - but the game is to convince the morons who don't understand anything beyond headlines.
Afghanistan
I don't blame Biden for the terrible Afghanistan withdrawal - for the most part. Biden did, indeed, follow the previous administration's plan for the pullout. He delayed Trump's plan of May 1 slightly until August 31, but Biden is not the one who made the deal with the Taliban. But I also don't blame Trump, necessarily.
It was necessary to leave Afghanistan. I approve of the withdrawal in principle, at least. It should have been done even before Trump's tenure. Trump was a bit cowardly, in my opinion - being sure the date of the pullout would (otherwise arbitrarily, from my view) either be during his 2nd term or someone else's problem - but I digress.
I approve of Trump, on this issue - at least, the willingness to set a date to pull our troops out. He receives a rare positive mark, from me, for that.
My understanding is that the Afghan army and leadership had assured the US military that they were confident in their abilities to hold their territory, and did not anticipate large-scale problems. US military leaders subsequently assured Biden and presumably Trump of their own confidence in the stability of the nation.
Perhaps Afghan leaders overlooked glaring problems? Perhaps the US military did the same? Or perhaps the outcome of the pullout was truly unforeseeable.
The only blatant mistake that I know of before the country actually fell was that Trump made the deal with the Taliban, itself. It has long been U.S. policy to not negotiate with terrorists. That line is often said in the type of hyper-masculine ultra violent movies which conservatives get aroused to, and yet their hero did exactly that, here.
But beyond the mere optics of negotiating with terrorists, one has to assume that this deal Trump made with the Taliban surely galvanized them. What we, of course, should have expected them to actually hear with this deal was, "We will leave on this date, and then you can do whatever you want, here." aka: "Once we leave, you can have it".
It wasn't, exactly, an endorsement of a Taliban takeover, but it was certainly an tepid invitation to try just that. The deal should have been made with the Afghan government.
I was floored that this deal didn't get more media coverage - as outlandish and unacceptable as it was simply on principle. It is hindsight-bias on my part to assume the Taliban wouldn't have taken over the country had Trump made this deal with the government rather than a terrorist organization, but I think it absolutely plausible.
But let's get back to what actually happened:
Whatever the case, the people most qualified in the world had given Biden assurances that the Trump plan of withdrawal was tactically sound. Expecting Biden to question that when he lacked military expertise of his own is simply childish.
Not only did Biden's team come to that conclusion, but implicitly the previous Trump administration had, as well.
Perhaps the most surprising thing to me is that I saw almost nobody - even liberal outlets - questioning why the main cause of the disaster had happened: Where was the Afghan army?
Afghanistan fell because it's military did nothing. If I remember correctly, it was ~200k U.S.-trained Afghan men who never organized an actual defense. According to the experts I have seen, the general consensus seems to be that the Afghan army could have easily held the country - IF the army had organized a defense.
There were reports of a few brave souls who were part of the army involved in skirmishes in villages early on - quickly dispatched by ISIS soldiers - but no organized defense. No offensives. Just constant retreat.
There were reports of probable corruption and ISIS sympathizers within the command structure, which would certainly explain the failure to mobilize a defense, though I don't know if that has been substantiated. But surely this is what happened, right? If there's another plausible explanation, I don't know it.
And yet, Biden approval plummeted after Afghanistan, as though he could reasonably be blamed for that outcome.
The only thing I ever heard in regards to Biden in Afghanistan that would have been a foolish mistake was that the US government gave the Taliban a list of people whom they wanted to get to the US - largely Afghan people who had helped the US military against the Taliban.
From Politico:
"There have been occasions when our military has contacted their military counterparts in the Taliban and said this, for example, this bus is coming through with X number of people on it, made up of the following group of people. We want you to let that bus or that group through," he said. "So, yes there have been occasions like that. To the best of my knowledge, in those cases, the bulk of that has occurred and they have been let through.
"I can't tell you with any certitude that there's actually been a list of names," he added. "There may have been. But I know of no circumstance. It doesn't mean that it doesn't exist, that here's the names of 12 people, they're coming, let them through. It could very well have happened."
Now, this is really the same problem as inflation; To a lesser degree, maybe, but it is an example of leadership being blamed for things they actually didn't have an effect on.
What conservatives would have you believe is that Biden, himself, asked for these lists to be produced to the Taliban, but there is no evidence of that. Nor is this something that Biden should have consciously thought to preemptively stop the military from doing.
Nor, we can assume, did these lists contain the details of why these specific Afghan's and allies were wanted for safe passage to the U.S., as conservatives would love for you to believe.
Of course, we can't have absolute faith in Biden's words - maybe he's making it sound better than it really was - but I don't see a more plausible explanation of the events. To the best of my knowledge, Biden didn't order the lists, and I've found no indication that these lists have led to trauma for the people/families included on them.
The optics, however, are still undeniably bad, but I don't think this one is justified to beat Biden over the head with.
Next, you have the airport explosion which killed many people, including Americans.
This event is certainly the most heinous, in the minds of Americans, and the one that conservatives wish to put a spotlight on more than any other, but they really can't as effectively as they'd like.
Given that I genuinely think Biden was 1) correct to [follow Trump's plan to] pull out of Afghanistan, 2) correct to trust his military advisors and their opinions of the Afghan Army, 3) had no reason to assume the country would fall as fast as it did, if it fell at all, I certainly don't blame him for the bad situation at the airfield.
Given the lack of information the U.S. military and/or Biden had at the time, what could they have done better? Not stationed troops to guard entrances to the airstrip so they weren't overrun? In such a case American's wouldn't have been in the blast zone when the suicide bombs went off, but then again, crowds would have presumably broken into the airstrip, at which point the bombers would have followed the crowds into more densely U.S. populated areas. More Americans would have died, as well as much more U.S. equipment. Maybe even the planes taking people to safety.
Honestly, if feels trite even trying to defend this specific event. Of course it wasn't Biden's fault or the military's fault. Suicide bombers went into crowds of people and blew themselves/others up. There was no reasonable recourse. That's the entire point of suicide bombs. If you can't find them before they are ready and in position, you're fucked. And we had no reasonable way to find them in that situation. Or, for that matter, to assume they were there.
Despite the fact that Trump, nor George Washington, nor anyone else would have conceivably done better, Biden is hitched with this gut-punch of public opinion. All that the masses saw was bad headlines when Biden was in charge. Fairly judging whether the negative opinions the pundits were spewing were justified or not was too large an investment - intellectually, emotionally, and temporally.
The populace is mostly apathetic. They want to feel included and have opinions - They just don't want to have to expend the mental overhead to think about what those opinions should actually be. It's snap judgements all the way down.
Given my already stated opinions on the reasonable expectations and knowledge that Biden possessed at the time, I also don't blame him for the billions of dollars of military equipment which was left behind - now in the hands of the Taliban. That, I lay squarely at the feet of the military.
That was their property - but more aptly, the property of the United States which they were responsible for - and they ostensibly had no plan to secure it by the designated date of withdrawal. My understanding is that their base would have remained with some personnel even after the official withdrawal, and they could have secured it at their own pace. But to not even plan to be out on the date which your leaders had promised you will be out is unacceptable. If a small contingent had reason to stay behind, you at least make sure there is not much else left - an amount that said contingent could handle on its own fairly easily.
Perhaps my ignorance of military logistics is skewing my opinion of this, or maybe it's even hindsight bias, but I can't think of an explanation which would excuse the military from taking exclusive responsibility for this one.
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