Fox cable hosts are doing the job of the chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, Jared Bernstein, by admitting that the economy under President Biden is strong. Bernstein joins MSNBC’s Ali Velshi to discuss the latest “expectation-busting” jobs report.
This is the thing. We have objective measures of the economy and by those measures (the same ones we’d use to say a Republican is doing a great job) the economy is doing well.
I understand that by possibly other metrics we don’t consider important politically, or in people’s feelings it doesn’t feel like it’s going well, but if a Republican gets into office, they also will not care about those other metrics, and they will all magically feel fine about the economy overnight as soon as a Republican gets elected…before they even take control over the office.
The broader left becomes something of a useful tool for Republicans to use in election years. Republicans agree with leftist feelings about the economy, but once elected, magically those same metrics they insist are incomplete or don’t count are the only things they’ll tout again.
Leftists need to get an objective set of metrics together and then consistently grade all policymakers on them. I also think that it’s not solely (or even mostly) up to the president to determine economic policy. Presidents have an effect, for sure, but it’s largely stuff passed through the Congress that impacts the economy.
Well said. In essence, perfections becomes the enemy of good. Because leftists frankly tend to be more informed on the nuances of the economy — and especially what impacts the poor and middle-class — they have more specific demands. Which is fine, but we must always remember that Republicans will never care about those things; whereas we’re seeing legitimate progress and a reshaping of the Democratic platform in just the last 10 years.