There is an overexposed Tik Tok video from December 12, 2022, about a McDonald’s Smoky BLT Double Quarter Pounder Hamburger with Cheese meal with large french fries and a drink. The chump who bought it paid $16, and it’s being offered as an illustration of why Americans are unhappy with the economy.
First of all, it’s 990 calories — the equivalent of 147 grams of rendered beef tallow. Only an obese, bearded dimwit in Post Falls, Idaho, would eat such garbage.
Second, anyone else can get it for $6.99. Adding the second patty kicks the price up to $8.79. Bloating it to a “meal” with fries and a drink adds another $4.
Third, you can’t get it anymore. It was a limited-time offer targeting fat Republicans with too much money.
So much for trotting out fast food prices as an example of Bidenomics.
Hello? The economy is booming.
I know that facts are boring, and they don’t work against emotional agitprop. But here’s a few anyway:
● The US economy is booming and is clearly growing.
● The Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied this week to 36,245 — the highest in 5 years.
● Wages had been losing ground to inflation for two years, but since May, wages have returned to outpacing inflation.
● Unemployment is at a historic low. The U.S. unemployment rate has been below 4 percent for 21 straight months, the longest stretch since the late 1960s.
● Gas prices have fallen or remained steady for 10 weeks. “You barely read about that anywhere, but you can rest assured if they were headed in the other direction, it’d be on a loop with videos of pump prices,” said CNN commentator Michael Smirconish.
● The gross domestic product is up 5.2 percent in the third quarter, even faster than previously estimated. If the GDP is rising, the economy is considered to be in solid shape, and the nation is moving forward.
● U.S. holiday shoppers spent a whopping $38 billion over Thanksgiving weekend. That’s a jump of 7. 8 percent over last year, outstripping the predicted 5. 4%.
Perception is not reality
But still, President Biden is not getting credit for it. As the Washington Post recently noted, that disconnect between a booming economy and how Americans feel about it appears to be widening,” Smirconish said. “Might it be that perception has overtaken reality?”
“It’s not just that we think things are worse than the data suggests. We’re also no longer confident in the American dream, where the dream is defined as getting ahead or doing better than your parents and grandparents’ generation,” he said.
It’s time for Americans to stop crying in their imported beer. No one is helped by Republicans whining about how poor they feel as they talk on their iPhone 15s while driving new cars. It’s time to face reality, not MAGA propaganda.
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Everyone needs to Read Michael B.’s comment again. It doesn’t matter how much lard that guy has in his bucket or how pointed his head, this all comes down to winning an election. People better wake up and pay attention. Eggs are currently under 2 bucks a dozen but voters remember that time a couple of years ago when they paid $5. With voters, negatives last while positives fade. The price of a Thanksgiving meal reduced 25% this year. THAT is the message that should have been pounded.
There will be no 2024 election. MAGA morons are already executing plans to outright declare themselves winners and enforce it using J6-like insurrectionists who, this time, will be fully armed. Biden will be forced to invoke the Insurrection Act. All hell will break loose and the US will be plunged into Civil War II.
While I am in the camp that believes Americans are paying more attention to propaganda ABOUT the economy more than to our ACTUAL economy, which is doing very well, the fact remains that many core prices in food and energy sectors especially, ARE higher than the were a few years ago. People perceptions are of the economy are valid and important, and we Democrats have to do a better job of talking about why the economy is stronger than some perceptions would suggest.
We need to talk about record wage growth, narrowing income disparity, record low unemployment and job growth, our improving global inflationary picture, and other key indicators of how strong this economy actually is. We do voters a disservice by just whining about how unfair it is to mischaracterize the economic picture – we need to assertively create a more accurate picture of the economy for voters.
Good idea to spin the economy. Maybe that will distract people from the crisis at the border, the debacle in Afghanistan, the stalemate in the Ukraine, trying to play both sides in Israel, the polls, and the mumbling and bumbling.
John Government Checks Taxpayer Fed Kavanagh tosses a word salad accusing others of distraction.
Was he going to reply to the topic? Share his plan for the economy?
Maybe he’s consulting with his out of state handlers on what his ideas on the economy will be and will share with us once they tell him what his thoughts are.
JFC John, if you’re going to troll, troll better, loser.
RaicesTexasDotOrg
As to the border, the real crisis is the crisis in governance caused by MAGA that makes it impossible to create rational policy to address the issues. border hysteria is just too damn useful to MAGA to allow anyone to fix the problems, which are utterly manageable if we could actually pass legislation.
As to Afghanistan, yes, it’s a mess. One which, again, MAGA has no interest in addressing and they are actively blocking to keep it an issue they can use against the President.
As to Ukraine, it is MAGA’s adoration of Putin that keeps our support for Ukraine from being fully effective. MAGA are the ONLY ones trying to stop our aid to those fighting for democracy, freedom, and Europe’s future.
Who is playing both sides in Israel? Biden is under fire from his own left for being TOO staunch an ally to Israel. The Biden Administration has simply – and entirely correctly – pointed out that killing innocent Palestinians only ensures strategic defeat in Gaza and the West Bank.
As to polls: I couldn’t give two shits for polls a year out from the election. Utterly irrelevant.
As to mumbling and bumbling, Trump is the king of mumbles, bumbles, and general word salad insanity – not to mention his clear statements that he will seek to end our constitutional order and democratic system if reelected. And he’s only three years younger than Biden and WAY more feeling and showing his age than is Dark Brandon, who is kicking ass and taking names as our President.
Well, Michael Bryan has replied to the off topic challenge by John Government Checks Kavanagh.
That means this is the last we’ll hear from JGCK on this subject.
Kavanagh can’t debate without his ALEC approved notes, so he just burps up whatever Hannity said last.
RaicesTexasDotOrg
“…trying to play both sides in Israel, the polls…”
I tend to agree with you on those two points, Johnny. I guess we’ll see if Biden’s handling of Israel/Gaza hurts him in the election, but he’s lost Muslim voters and many young voters. There are states that he won in 2020 with Muslim populations large enough to cause him to lose electoral votes next year. And young voters didn’t grow up feeling guilty about the Holocaust and pledging unconditional support for Israel, so it remains to be what effect that has next year.
There’s an elephant in the room to be sure. Reuters reports today, “More than 17,170 Palestinians have been killed and 46,000 wounded, according to the Gaza health ministry, since Oct. 7, when Israel began bombarding Gaza…” Biden most definitely supports Bibi’s war, but with pressure from the left he insists on “humanitarian aid.” Many of us on the left think that this “humanitarian” warfare (slaughter) is just insane rhetoric. And who pays for it? There’s no quick way to bankroll this war without increasing the national debt which is now over 33 trillion. Who pays? Future generations of Americans.
But the MAGA/GOP is dumb enough to run Trump and if Biden wins, that will be the reason.
Regarding polls, Democrats are all “polls shmolls”, but Biden’s approval rating has been going down consistently for well over two years. It’s foolhardy to dismiss that. But again, even people who despise Biden will still have to vote for him if Trump is the GOP nominee. Trump must be stopped.
“Pointy-headed lardbucket,” “fat,” and “obese bearded dimwit” are pretty vile and insensitive terms. I am sure some readers of this blog are overweight, bearded, and do not have perfectly shaped heads. I think you owe them an apology. Talk about rude. Where are this blog’s editors?
Thank you John Government Checks Kavanagh, you are correct, we all need to be more civil.
Now let’s talk about all those F**k Joe Biden signs/stickers/shirts/tattoos we see at your party’s little klan rallies.
Or any sentence from your party’s leader, the convicted rapist T4ump.
Sloppy Steve Bannon
Mini Mike Bloomberg
Coco Chow
Meatball Ron (I actually like this one)
Little Marco
Crazy Mika (he actually recycles crazy a lot)
Horseface
Dude, seriously, you keep commenting about hypocrisy while exposing your own over and over again.
How are you this self-unaware?
And FFS! It’s been months since you reported that HVAC repair folks are stealing our elections and yet you have done nothing!
Nothing!
RaicesTexasDotOrg
I saw this posted on CNN’s website and didn’t bother with it. Seemed like a bunch of whining. Thanks for saving the aggravation. I don’t think there’s an economist alive that thinks a McDonald’s meal is a serious measure of the economy or people’s attitudes towards it.
Americans are only happy when they’re unhappy. Complaining about an overpriced pile of junk food is the definition of “first world problem.” Get a grip people or you’re really gonna hate prison slop in concentration camps built by trump and his minions.