It’s like Trump is *trying* to revive Biden's reputation

Paul Krugman made a good point about the timing of the president's war. It came after it was clear that inflation was on the rise again and that job growth had come to a crawl. With all of Donald Trump’s bungling, inflation and unemployment are likely going to get worse.

Krugman also set that pattern in history. He said inflation was rising and employment was falling before the Yom Kippur War in 1973. The conventional wisdom is that the fighting between Israel and Syria and Egypt triggered the oil shocks, which in turn, caused what’s called stagflation (high inflation and high employment as well as stagnant growth). But “the 1973 oil shock hit so hard [because] inflation was already rising fast,” the economist said.

Krugman said that while it may be true that stagflation hasn’t yet materialized, things are “looking a bit, well, stagflationish.” The implication is that whatever’s coming is going to be bad, because future economic conditions are likely going to make present ones worse. 

I want to point out a related pattern.

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Before Trump launched his war, Americans were already coming around to the idea that Joe Biden did a better job with the economy. If conditions remain as bad as they have been over the last year, or if they get worse, which is likely, that trend is probably going to grow. Perhaps, that would create a space in which Americans realize Bidenomics was working. Ideally, that would lay the groundwork for the next Democratic presidential candidate.

I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but the revision of public memory was nonetheless already underway. Three polls taken before Trump attacked Iran – and before Iran retaliated by throttling the global supply of oil – found that Biden did a better job as president, according to an Axios report published on February 12. (The war started on February 28.) 

“Trump has squandered virtually every advantage that won him the presidency,” Axios reported. He "has nine months to turn the ship around before a potential midterm wipeout.”

• A Harvard/Harris survey found that “51 percent of registered voters say Trump is doing a worse job than Biden, compared with 49 percent who say he's doing better.” 
• An Economist/YouGov poll found that “46 percent of US adults say Trump is doing a worse job than Biden, compared with 40 percent who say he's doing better.”
• The most shocking, and perhaps most consequential, came from Rasmussen, the Trumpiest poll of them all. Axios said it found that “46 percent of US adults say Trump is doing a worse job than Biden, compared with 40 percent who say he's doing better.”

While Trump-friendly, the Rasmussen poll is shocking for another reason. Republicans habitually lie. This pattern can be seen in YouGov’s tracking survey going back to 2009. 

When a Democrat is president, GOP voters say he’s wrecking the economy, even when it’s booming. When a Republican is president, GOP voters say he parted the Red Sea toward the promised land. Yet Rasmussen found that only 40 percent believe Trump is doing better than Biden. It captured an echo of the misery being felt and accidently came close to the truth. 

In fairness, ordinary Americans can hardly be expected to be macroeconomic experts. That said, however, it’s plainly true that Trump inherited a sizzling economy and undermined it with policies that can reasonably be called stupid. Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a center-left think tank, documented the steps taken to go from a “Biden Boom” to a “Trump Slump.” These are his takeaways (reproduced here verbatim).

• Biden oversaw historically low unemployment, strong job growth, and rising real wages, especially for low-paid and Black workers. 
• Trump’s first year shows slower job creation, rising unemployment, and weaker labor market indicators. 
• GDP growth remained solid under Biden, while early Trump-era growth has been erratic, including a quarterly contraction. 
• Inflation was falling under Biden, but tariffs and policy shifts under Trump contributed to renewed price pressures. 
• Factory construction surged under Biden due to infrastructure, CHIPS, and clean energy legislation but slowed sharply under Trump. 
• Biden handed Trump the strongest economy in decades; early Trump policies have shown signs of weakening it.

Again, it’s not like people who respond to pollsters' questions know all this. What they know is what they see at the grocery store and gas station. Given the nature of human nature, however, the worse things get today, the more likely they are to revise yesterday’s memories. 

This could do a couple of things. One is make it harder for Trump to blame Biden for his problems. Two is make the public more receptive to future Democrats who are ready to advance the means and goals of Bidenomics – to grow the economy from the bottom up and the middle out, with the government explicitly taking the side of workers and consumers.

Four days before the war began, at the State of the Union address, the president accused Biden and the Democrats of creating "the increased prices that all of our citizens had to endure. You caused that problem. You caused that problem. … Their statements were a dirty, rotten lie. Their policies created the high prices. Our policies are rapidly ending them.”

But Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said virtually all inflation over the central bank’s target is now due to Trump's tariffs. And tariffs have caused “very, very low — nonexistent, really — growth in the labor force, which of course we've never had in our history" (my stress).

Meanwhile, some market analysts say that if oil prices remain high, a recession lies ahead. Others are warning of “depression.” Others say a recession won’t happen until oil hits $138 a barrel and stays there. (That would put a gallon of regular gas in the range of $4-$5.)

Biden focused on expanding wealth from the bottom up and middle out in order to create a more equitable, prosperous and stable economic order. That focus stands in contrast to Trump’s: extracting wealth – through illegal taxes, illegal deportations and illegal war – in order to create an unstable, top-heavy economic order that threatens to topple over.

Again, I think this is theoretical for most people. Theoretical, however, could get very real, very soon. CNN reported today on a classified Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that found that the Iranians could close the Strait of Hormuz for as many as six months. 

Worse, the White House “insisted that the assessment — particularly the longer end timeframe, which some consider a worst-case scenario — was not being seriously considered." Worse still: “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had not seen it, and Trump has not been briefed on it, nor was he using it to inform his policy decisions” (my italics).

So the people who underestimated the Iranians so much that their war has gone on for much longer than they thought it would are once again going to underestimate them, with the practical consequence being their war going for much longer than they thought it would.

It might be enough to revive Biden’s name.