Biden Economic Plan: Incompetence Or Malignancy?

Well, yes. I know. As the folks over at Instapundit put it: embrace the healing power of “and.”

Scott Shepard

Of course they’re incompetent. The fellah from Dela is entirely non compos. Kamala Harris appears to have proven herself unqualified for a job that has no responsibilities. She is, as the old saying had it, not quite as useful as a bucket of warm … spit. When the Secretary of Transportation, a failed mayor of a small midwestern college town who is somehow billed as the Democrats’ Great Hope for 2024, babbled about racist underpasses in response to the greatest transportation crisis the American people have faced perhaps since General Washington was scrounging for boats to evacuate the Continental Army off of Long Island, and then across the Delaware, and then back across the Delaware, and then back across the Delaware, in 1776 and the opening days of 1777.

Mayor Pete holds himself out as a military man. It’s a good thing he wasn’t Washington’s transport quartermaster.

Incidentally, given the average age of the left’s congressional leadership, it’s entirely likely that some of them may have served with Washington. Well, no, obviously not. There were Europeans to cow-tow to. But it’s possible that an early-middle-aged Bernie Sanders stayed at home, tending his three houses, and carped about how, at Valley Forge, the officers sometimes got two fire cakes a day while the enlisted men got only one. But no, he had no interest in donating any of his own supplies.

So, yeah, whether old or young, incompetent to the core. But even the incompetent sometimes make decisions that work out reasonably well. If everything works out in the same horrifying direction, it’s a good bet that the incompetence is backed by concerted malevolence.

Which brings us to further consideration of the Biden Administration’s economic plan.

Consider this detail: On February 7 it is going to become harder and more expensive – and almost certainly take longer – to get a CDL (big-rig trucker) license. The legislation that made this change was passed during the Obama Administration – without the knowledge of impending covinsanity, of course. But Mayor Pete almost certainly has the power to delay or waive this new costly government mandate given the transportation-system breakdown. Wouldn’t that be a better idea than declaring bridges racist while fostering the falsehood that electric autos eliminate the need to pay for fuel?

Keep in mind, of course, that even if his authority to delay or waive the rule is tenuous, that hasn’t stopped this administration about anything before. When the rent moratorium was struck down, this administration stuck with it. When a moratorium was placed on the vaccine mandate pending it likely being struck down, this administration ordered large companies to stick to it. But something that would genuinely help supply-chain problems? Nah.

That, though, is just the tip of the iceberg. Energy inflation is exacerbating supply-chain problems, crippling poor and middle-class families, threatening a cold winter, and helping to fuel (ahem) energy crises worldwide. The obvious solution is to open up the pipeline and to guarantee explorers and drillers – by statute – that an open energy-production policy in the U.S. will be maintained for a minimum of, say, 10 years. Our shift to natural gas has radically decreased United States carbon output. Our energy independence radically improved our standing in the world, while weakening our enemies and adversaries. If the administration moved behind such a plan, it would pass through Congress immediately and lower energy prices almost immediately because OPEC+ would cut prices to at least slow down America’s return to powerhouse (I can’t help myself) energy production.

Then there’s the disgraceful hypocrisy about covid and the borders. Under new (probably illegal, given the track-record) federal mandates, everyone – including vaccinated Americans – who comes to or returns to the United States will have to quarantine for a week. Except – you guessed it – the illegals at the border. The ridiculous bureaucrat who has recently declared himself the indisputable voice of Science (a claim so self-refuting that it threatens to break human thought) declared, on behalf of Science, that “that’s different.” Just as it was different when he was blessing fiery “protests” from the left as safe while damning conservative political rallies as deadly.

Consider too that the two Biden Administration spending bills are about expanding government, not fixing anything. As letter writers to the Wall Street Journal rightly pointed out, only about one percent of the “infrastructure bill” goes to real (roads, bridges, &c.) infrastructure. Meanwhile, the “$1.8 billion” (hah!) Build Back Brandon/American Socialism bill is a disaster, but there’s a deceit inside the disaster: while it’s billed as a big tax increase for the rich, repeal of the SALT deduction cap turns it into a tax cut for vast swathes of the rich even while making life much more expensive for the rest of us.

The purely incompetent can’t be this programmatically malevolent. So the latter must be working toward something. And what is that something? To crush the self-sufficient and independently minded middle class. It’s long been understood that a free people must have a strong and thriving middle class. If energy prices are driven through the roof, then our lives will be constrained, and we’ll be more reliant on government transport. But perhaps most importantly, “energy assistance” programs can be set up to help the poor (making them even more biddable), and the rich will be fine, but the middle class will be crushed. Likewise, the supply-chain problems make us more willing to accept shoddy in everything – more used to settling. Giving illegal entrants to our country more rights and privileges (and cash: remember the $450,000 checks to the families of illegals), robs us of our dignity and the notion that proud Americans have immutable rights in our own country.

What are they up to? They’re trying to break us.

Scott Shepard is a fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research and Director of its Free Enterprise Project. This was first published at Townhall Finance.