It's Not Just the Economy Anymore, Stupid

Apple plans to hire more than 20,000 new workers in the United States over the next five years. It’s going to pay its current employees a $2500 bonus this year. It’s also going to pay $38 billion to the U.S. Treasury on profits its currently holding overseas. All told, over the next few years Apple says it will contribute $350 billion to the U.S. economy. Other U.S. companies are also doling out bonuses and hiring workers and spending more money in America. Looks like the new tax law that was passed without a single Democratic vote, is taking root. In case you’re wondering, yes it’s the same new tax law that Nancy Pelosi said would bring on Armageddon; the same one she called “the worst bill in the history of the United States Congress.”

And we’re not at war with North Korea, we’re not in a recession, and consumer confidence is at a 17-year high.

If Hillary Clinton had been elected president and could boast this kind of peace and prosperity, the mainstream media would plaster the good news on page one every day of the week in type the size they reserve for Hiroshima and Nagasaki – and Republicans wouldn’t stand a chance in November.

But if it’s the economy, stupid, why do voters keep saying they want Democrats to take over Congress next time around? There can be only one reason

Donald Trump.

He is the most unlikeable president in modern political history. While savvy politicians work at expanding their base, President Trump seems more than content to simply play to his. His hard-core devotees give him what he craves: their applause, their admiration, their loyalty. Except … he won the election last year with 46 percent of the vote; now he’s about 10 points below that.

Leading the defection, are women – who just plain don’t like the guy. It’s not his policies they object to. They’re benefiting from the economy too. It’s his demeanor that turns them off.  You've heard the argument: He is who he is. Yes, and that’s the problem.

Democrats will object to just about everything the president and his party put forward this year. Resistance is their battle plan. And they’ll count on their allies in the media to make sure the GOP gets the blame for not getting anything done.

Ms. Pelosi and her counterpart in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, will continue to take shots at the president hoping he fires back with vindictive tweets. The crazier he comes across, no matter what his doctor says about his mental health, the better it is for the not-so-loyal opposition.

But here’s something working in Mr. Trump and his party’s favor: Just about every Democrat who wants the president’s job is so far to the left that they’re in danger of falling off the edge of the continuum. There’s Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris and Corey Booker and Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio … and a few more.

I’m not sure Americans want to cast a vote for a party that more and more looks like socialism USA. That’s why, I think, we’ll be hearing a lot more from Joe Biden after November.

Which brings us back to the main distraction. If Donald Trump would just knock off the needless trash talk and let the economy do his talking, his approval numbers would be a lot higher, the GOP would stand a better chance in 2018 and he’d stand a better chance, if he decides to run, in 2020.

Right now, all he can count on is his base. And that won’t be enough for him in 2020 – and it won’t be enough for his party later this year.

It’s not just the economy anymore, stupid. It’s also Donald Trump.