It appears that notwithstanding all the lies, spin, and obfuscation, Biden’s economic policies are driving away what’s long been the backbone of the Democrat party: the blue-collar workers.
As November approaches, the Dems are panicked by the state of the economy. It is the most important issue among swing-state voters, and the numbers for Biden are a mess:
Biden has tried lying about it, claiming that the inflation hammering the economy was raging under Trump, only for Biden to have tamed it. But even ABC was not willing to go along with that blatant falsehood.
Others, like noted fabulist Paul Krugman, have claimed that inflation is illusory, at least if you squint at the numbers hard enough.
Not too many people seem fooled:
What really matters for the election is that this economic bomb is exploding in a key demo. The Guardian is on it. First, it identifies the problem: “To the dismay of Democrats, blue-collar voters have lined up increasingly behind Donald Trump...”
Sacré bleu-collar!!!! Can anything be done?
Well, yes, thank Gaia. There are highly trained Political Experts on the left able to diagnose this problem and provide a remedy:
[P]olitical experts say Joe Biden can still turn things around with that large and pivotal group by campaigning hard on ‘kitchen table’ economic issues.”
With just six months to go until the election, recent polls show that Trump has stronger support among blue-collar Americans than he did in 2020. But several political analysts told the Guardian that Biden can bring back enough of those voters to win if he hammers home the message that he is helping Americans on pocketbook issues – for instance, by canceling student debt...
WHOA!!! Can you repeat that last part, please?
...he is helping Americans on pocketbook issues – for instance, by canceling student debt
Hmmmm...
So far, I am really liking Trump’s chances against these MENSA candidates. Can these political experts suggest anything else to sway the unwashed blue-collar masses?
According to Celinda Lake, a pollster for the Democratic National Committee, Biden needs to talk more often and more effectively about how his policies mean “real benefits” for working families and how he’s battling on their behalf against “villains” like greedy pharmaceutical companies.
“We need to have a dramatic framing that we’re going to take on villains to make the economy work for you and your family,” said Lake, who did polling for Biden’s 2020 campaign. “The villains can be a lot of things – corporations that don’t pay any taxes or drug companies that make record profits while they gouge you on prices.”
In other words, yell, “Squirrel!” Maybe these Walmart shoppers holding onto their guns and Bibles won’t notice that their lives are being ruined by Bidenomics. That said, a study of human nature suggests otherwise. In 1850, Charles Dickens wrote in David Copperfield:
“My other piece of advice, Copperfield,” said Mr. Micawber, “you know. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and — and in short you are for-ever floored. As I am!”
True, blue-collar workers probably aren’t versed in the intricacies of gender-queer theory or critical race theory. Heck, they don’t even understand the “print more money” theory of economics articulated by Jared Bernstein, the Chairman of Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers does. But when it comes to household economics, that is something they all understand. And when their expenses exceed their income because they now must pay for the college loans of a gender studies major...well, they understand that, too.
It is probably safe to say that another group of progressive experts is currently involved in examining the problem from a different perspective:
Let’s go, Brandon!
Wolf Howling is an attorney and retired military officer who blogs at Bookworm Room.