State of Confusion: Biden’s Speech Was a Hot Political Mess

With one day now removed from President Biden’s scattered State of the Union Address on Tuesday, where are the political chips falling?

On paper, Biden’s in worse shape than he was prior to the midterms. His excuses about inflation and economic woes being the fault of his predecessor don’t ring true and the American people aren’t buying it.

Furthermore, at a time when the southern border remains a porous mess, allowing drugs and trafficking to run rampant, the President dedicated significant time in his speech to the topic of travel industry fees and made no mention of the Chinese spy balloon that was allowed to cross the country before being shot down off the coast of the South Carolina.

According to Gallup, while the President ranted on Tuesday night about the dangers of Hotels that charge resort fees but aren’t even resorts, most Americans are looking at the economy he created and finding themselves worse off than they were a decade ago:

Reflecting on their personal financial situations, 35% of Americans say they are better off now than they were a year ago, while 50% are worse off. Since Gallup first asked this question in 1976, it has been rare for half or more of Americans to say they are worse off. The only other times this occurred was during the Great Recession era in 2008 and 2009.

In both 2021 and 2022, Americans were evenly divided between saying they were better off versus worse off, including a 41% to 41% split in last year’s survey.

By contrast, before the pandemic in January 2020, Americans were almost three times as likely to say they were better off (59%) as worse off (20%). The 59% reading is one of the highest in Gallup’s trends, along with a 58% reading in 1999.

The trend here is the kicker. It wasn’t until Biden took over the White House and began instituting his rampant inflationary policies of rampant government spending that Americans really started to feel the pinch. Even during the worst days of Covid-19 with businesses shuttered, Americans were more resilient thanks to President Trump’s strong economy.

With that context, it’s no wonder President Biden spent his time talking about airline bag fees and ignoring the real problems swirling around him. Got an overdue library book? Call the President, he’s concerned with excessive fees right now but couldn’t care less about Chinese spy balloons infiltrating U.S. air space.

What about Biden’s claim that he created the largest economic recovery in history by adding 12 million jobs? It’s a line that sounds wonderful in a speech yet it’s abysmally untrue. Biden is undercut by his own government data that shows the vast majority of the jobs he’s referring to were not newly created but simply people returning to work after Covid:

Biden later again added that he had “created 800,000 manufacturing jobs” even before the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act, legislation the White House has said will create thousands more manufacturing jobs, was enacted last year.

However, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the economy under Biden has actually added 2.7 million overall jobs. The other roughly 9 million jobs had been lost during the COVID-19 pandemic when the economy was forced to shut down.

And rather than 800,000 manufacturing jobs, the economy has really created just 214,000 manufacturing jobs since Biden took office, BLS data showed.

While we’re on the topic of Biden’s concern for good-paying jobs, this is the same President that created a Covid vaccine mandate on government workers, contractors, and private businesses with more than 100 employees. As a result, thousands were forced out of their jobs over a refusal to accept a mandated experimental vaccine. There was no concern for them at the time and still no concern now from the President.

Biden is now heading down to Florida to repeat the debunked and tired lie about Republicans ending Social Security and Medicare. The problem here is that Biden himself undercut his own message during his SOTU speech when he agreed with Republicans that the programs shouldn’t be eliminated, watch to the end:

By the end of the exchange, after Republicans in the Chamber started pushing back, Biden acquiesced and admitted his talking point was wrong:

Biden: “Folks, as we all apparently agree, Social security and Medicare is off the books now”

Well, is it off the books or isn’t it? As the New York Times pointed out today, Biden just cut himself off at the knees on the issue and seems to be unable to sell his dire warnings about “MAGA Republicans” to voters:

Mr. Biden had always planned to use his visit to the University of Tampa to warn about what he says are Republican proposals to cut Medicare and Social Security. The White House sees the issue as a potent one for the president as he prepares to seek a second term.

But despite months of warning about “MAGA Republicans,” Mr. Biden had so far failed to make the threats seem real to voters. Numerous recent polls show Mr. Biden’s support lagging, even among Democrats, who overwhelmingly say they want someone else as their nominee in the 2024 presidential election.

The remarkable back-and-forth started when Mr. Biden accused some Republicans of threatening Social Security and Medicare — an assertion that they rejected, loudly.

“Liar!” screamed Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia.

When Republicans continued to deny they planned to cut the social programs, the president said he was happy Republicans were committing to leave the programs alone.

The real problem here is that both programs, Social Security and Medicare, are ballooning in cost every year and the only way to save them is to reform them somehow. That’s a political third rail no elected official wants to touch although some have at least tried to address the problem.

The truth is that the programs need fixing but you can’t even say that in Washington without being accused of wanting to take Grandma’s Social Security and force her to live on dog food.

Ask Democrats for a plan to fix government entitlement programs and the response is crickets or new proposals to raise taxes without stopping the hemorrhaging. In short, Democrats are empty on the issue of Social Security and Medicare as their answer is not to reform but rather to keep subsidizing bad policies.

The end result of Biden’s panned State of the Union is more akin to a state of confusion or disillusion.

It’s difficult to see how this speech and the topics he outlined will provide a solid platform upon which he plans to launch a re-election campaign.