Speaking in Howell, Michigan on Tuesday, President Joe Biden hoped to build some public support for his domestic legislative agenda by getting outside of D.C. where members of his own party — not to mention Republicans — have been unable to come to an agreement over how to proceed with Biden's $1.2 trillion infrastructure and $3.5 trillion budget bills.
Biden, having been unable to close the deal among members of his own party despite hours of meetings at the White House in recent weeks and a visit to Capitol Hill, decried the "hyperbole" in Washington, D.C. before launching into a whole lot of hyperbole with a heaping side of gaslighting.
"These bills are not about left versus right or moderate versus progressive," Biden claimed. "To oppose these investments," Biden continued, "is to be complicit in America's decline."
How subtle.
On his first point, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Progressive Caucus Chairwoman Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) — or Senators Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) — might beg to differ on the president's claim that his legislative agenda is not about about "moderate versus progressive."
Either he's entirely checked out of reality on Capitol Hill or Biden thinks no one noticed that Democrat senators are being harassed by kayakers or chased into bathrooms and recorded. And does he really think Pelosi's 11th-hour failure to secure support for an infrastructure vote last week wasn't due to progressive caucus members holding out for a more palatable deal? If the Capitol Hill battle over Biden's infrastructure and budget bills aren't a case of moderate versus progressive, such a match doesn't exist.
As Townhall's own Guy Benson points out, the notion of Joe Biden passing blame for American decline is... galling.
Unilaterally withdrawing from Afghanistan — angering American allies who'd fought alongside the U.S. for two decades and resulting in thousands of Americans and Afghan allies left behind to face terrorists after relying on the Taliban for security — sounds a bit like American decline. After all, when was the last time an American president was censured by British Parliament?
With five decades spent in Washington — as a senator, vice president, and now president — America's relative position is something he's had a hand in for nearly half a century. The country's standing in the world is something he's had more of an impact on than those members such as Sinema or Jayapal whose combined time in DC is barely more than a decade.
Biden also repeated the now-stale and repeatedly debunked claims that his spending bills come at zero cost, won't increase the national debt, and will reduce the tax burden for many Americans. The president can say these things as many times in as many places as he wishes, but it won't change the fact that they're false.
Biden again making the argument his plan (A) doesn't cost anything; (B) won't add a dollar to the debt; (C) cuts taxes for a majority of Americans. These claims have been fact-checked and deemed misleading and mythical, yet his speechwriters keep inserting it into the prompter.
— Joe Concha (@JoeConchaTV) October 5, 2021
Despite Biden's all-in-this-together talk about his domestic legislative agenda, it's clear that those in his own party on Capitol Hill don't feel the same way. His hyperbolic accusation that those opposing his trillion dollar bills are contributing to the decline of America likely won't help and is another line that runs opposite his campaign pledge to be a uniting force for the country.