This just-published piece underscores exactly why the 'Putin price hike' soundbyte -- and various other White House deflective spin efforts -- are unserious and failing. It is undeniably true that there are a range of factors playing into the current inflation crisis, some of which fall beyond the control or fault of any president or administration. But Team Biden's attempts to disclaim responsibility, and avoid policy-driven blame, aren't going to work.
Here is the New York Times op/ed written by top Obama administration economic advisor Steven Rattner, explaining why he's concerned about a looming recession ahead of the 2024 election cycle -- and assigning blame in areas that explode Democratic talking points:
The debate over whether the recent surge in inflation is transitory or permanent has been settled. Now the question is whether the Federal Reserve can tame increasing inflationary turbulence and bring the economy to a soft touchdown. Mounting evidence suggests a hard landing — in other words, a recession. We need our economic policymakers to move quickly before the likely damage, already in progress, escalates...To reduce inflation — and this is the part that’s rarely said aloud — we must reduce demand. That means forcing Americans to spend less. Which in turn leads to fewer jobs and slower wage growth, historically to the point where we tip into recession. That’s not desirable, but it is the price we pay for poor economic policies delivered by the White House, by Congress and by the Federal Reserve. Those poor policies include far too much budgetary stimulus as we addressed Covid challenges. The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan passed in the early days of the Biden administration will go down in history as an extraordinary policy mistake. And the Fed — an esteemed, independent steward of our monetary policy — similarly overestimated the amount of support the economy needed and pumped trillions of dollars into the system...As a result, we have gotten way behind the curve on inflation.
Read the full commentary here for the rest of Rattner's argument. That excerpt is pretty extraordinary unto itself. He calls the 'transitory' debate "settled," just not in the way White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki suggested this week. He also pointed a finger at policy mistakes as a driving force behind the current, sustained bout of inflation. Republicans warned that after trillions in emergency COVID spending, pumping an additional $2 trillion into the system (much of it on unrelated and ancillary projects) would be reckless and wasteful. Democrats ignored them, ramming through the massive package on a party-line vote last year. Rattner calls this an "extraordinary" and historic mistake. Meanwhile, Democratic leaders insultingly claim that the trillions spent on 'COVID relief' somehow aren't sufficient to fulfill basic needs such as testing, vaccines and treatments. A damning self-indictment. Failure upon failure. Biden is welcome to try this sort of nonsense if he'd like. It's not going to sell:
Biden: "70% of the increase in inflation was the consequence of Putin's price hike" pic.twitter.com/6xMEJVU3BY
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) April 14, 2022
C'mon man:
Made this handy graph to explain why you're such a liar @JesseLee46!
— Andrew Follett (@AndrewCFollett) April 12, 2022
Glad to provide this simple educational service. pic.twitter.com/1kp9J2Yapx
I'll leave you with this mea culpa from a progressive writer who admits he wrongly dismissed inflation worries last year, as well as a reminder of the scope of the pain:
Inflation is more than a story of gas prices...
— Heather Long (@byHeatherLong) April 12, 2022
Groceries +10% --> biggest spike since 1981
Meat/poultry/fish +13.8% ->biggest since 1979
New cars 12.6%->biggest ever
Electricity +11.1% -> biggest since '06
Home furnishing 10.8% ->biggest ever
Rent 5.1% ->largest since 1991