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Will any of his voters turn on him when he doesn't lower inflation or prices? [1]

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Date: 2025-01-07

Since 2000 here's what happened. President George W Bush inherits a good economy with three consecutive budget surpluses and an unemployment rate of 4.2%, but ruins it by accelerating financial deregulation. In the last three months of 2008, he lost 2.25 million jobs, shrank the GDP by 9.4%, and increased the unemployment rate to 7.8% and it continued to climb. The economy doesn't magically turn around simply because a new president is sworn in. So, the unemployment rate continues to climb, reaching 10.6% by February of 2010. However, under the leadership of President Obama, The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009 was passed and it turned the economy around. Under President Obama the economy added 16.1 million jobs, the deficit was cut from $1 Trillion to $600 Billion, the unemployment rate fell from 10.6% to 4.7%, and created private sector jobs for 75 consecutive months.

While running for election, Donald Trump lies about the economy and calls the country American Carnage when President Obama had turned the economy around from Bush's Great Recession. So Donald Trump INHERITS a great economy that, again, had created jobs for 75 consecutive months and that had reduced the unemployment rate from 10.6% to 4.7%. However, Donald Trump RUINS the economy by BOTCHING the COVID response and he LOSES TEN MILLION JOBS IN 2020 and increased the unemployment rate to 6.3%. When Donald Trump leaves office we are losing 3 THOUSAND PEOPLE A DAY TO COVID, attempted a coup and incited an armed insurrection. Donald Trump fulfilled his prophecy by turning this great country into American Carnage.

President Biden inherits a country that laid in ruins after Donald Trump ruined it. The pandemic reduced supply while demand remained unchanged and that caused inflation and inflation was present everywhere. Inflation has been falling since July of 2022. Heather Cox Richardson quoted Peter Baker in the New York Times

"No US troops are fighting in foreign wars, murders have plummeted, deaths from drug overdoses have dropped sharply, undocumented immigration is below where it was when Trump left office, stocks have just had their best two years since the last century. The economy is growing, inflation has fallen to close to its normal range, unemployment is at near historic lows, and energy production is at historic highs. The economy has added 700,000 manufacturing jobs among the 16 million total created since 2000. Baker quoted chief economist of Moody's Analytics Mark Zandi who said, 'President Trump is INHERITING an economy that is about as good as it ever gets.' "

But because he is running for reelection in order to avoid legal consequences for the serious felonies he committed, he LIED about the economy and the country and described it as a Hellscape and trashed it. Donald Trump supporters fell for these lies. So, Donald Trump gets to, again, INHERIT an excellent economy.

And suddenly the Donald Trump supporters who had said that the economy was the worst in the history of the country now say in the University of Michigan survey that the economy is awesome again before Donald Trump has even taken office.

A bunch of facts were widely reported which suddenly Donald Trump supporters now admit.

1. The pandemic caused inflation.

2. Pandemic driven inflation was present everywhere.

3. The government is limited in what it can do to combat inflation.

4. Inflation has been falling for more than 2 years.

5. The economy is in very good shape.

Now that the election is over, Donald Trump supporters are now hearing and reading, some of them anyway, that across the board tariffs and mass deportations will increase prices and drive inflation up.

But they wouldn't admit the above plain truths before the election. After all, the only thing that they could (dishonestly) use to argue for voting for Donald Trump was inflation. Everything else told people to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris. The fact that they, Donald Trump supporters, were lied to by their right wing sources on these issues doesn't bother them. Others knew this but had no moral or ethical objection to lying to help Donald Trump win the presidential election.

The 180° turn around to admit plain truths, truths which told people that inflation was not a good argument for voting for Donald Trump, isn't as surprising as I wish it was.

Now, it is widely acknowledged that

1. The pandemic caused inflation.

2. Pandemic driven inflation is present everywhere.

3. Inflation has been coming down for more than two years.

4. The government is limited in what it can do to reduce inflation.

5. Prices are not going back down to the 2020 pre-pandemic levels.

6. The economy is in very good shape.

And Donald Trump supporters are learning that across the board tariffs and mass deportations will increase prices and drive inflation up.

There are so many high school graduates and fundamentalist extremists in this country and they all expressed their anger at the incumbent administration because of a natural, worldwide, disaster. It's like voting against the incumbent administration because it rained. It's that stupid. And it happened all over the world. The Financial Times reported that every single governing party in every developed democracy that had an election lost voter share. This has never happened before. So, it's not because Donald Trump suddenly became popular or people preferred him and his policies. It's just that the fundamentalist extremists and the high school graduates got made at the incumbent administration because it rained. His first two elections in which he won 46.8% of the national popular vote in 2020 and 46.1% of the national popular vote in 2016 reflect how much most voters dislike him. However, too many of these ignorant uneducated people got mad at the incumbent administration because it rained. So, here we are.

Either Donald Trump goes forward with his across the board tariffs and mass deportations and DRAMATICALLY INCREASES PRICES AND INFLATION or he admits that he didn't have any policies to lower inflation and that he was simply lying.

Either way, ardent Donald Trump supporters will continue to support him no matter what. Will the delusional high school graduates who actually believed that Donald Trump would lower inflation turn on him even if he admits that he can't lower inflation or if he makes it worse?

We'll see, but here we are.

In case anybody doesn't understand the difference between inflation and prices. Inflation is the rate at which prices, year over year, increase. If inflation was 9.1% as it was in July of 2022 and it has fallen to 2.6% by November of 2024, then inflation has fallen, prices have not. If inflation is a positive Real number, then prices are increasing even if the rate at which they are increasing has fallen. Prices falling would be deflation. Prices are increasing whenever inflation is a positive real number. So, inflation can fall, but that does not mean prices are falling.

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