The two most notable things Democrats came up with after President Donald Trump's astonishing State of the Union address was the governor of Michigan spouting hooey as part of the Democratic response and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ripping a paper version of his speech in half. It all fit a pattern of Democrats needlessly overstating Trump's voluminous faults, dodging his achievements and finally finding it necessary to play games to get him.
Consider, for instance, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer saying that wages have stagnated all over the country during the Trump term when the truth is what the economist Steve Moore has said: Average household incomes of the middle class have gone up $5,003 under three years of Trump as compared to $1,200 under seven years of Obama. Wages have been rising especially for many at the bottom, consumer confidence is up and, of course, profits are up and the stock market is rising. Oh, that's just for the rich, it is said, even though 55% of Americans benefit from stock increases.
Trump discussed such issues, as well as how the economic advances have been especially helpful to the disabled, women, workers without high school degrees and African Americans. He spoke of his program growing new businesses in black neighborhoods, legislation giving more financial support to black colleges and universities and reform of federal prisons. It is not just black Americans who benefit from the prison program, of course, but people of all races, just as all of us also benefit from a strengthened military and the fact that we are now mostly energy independent.
The Trump narrative adds up to a whole lot, something remarkable in so many directions, but especially the economy. What are the Democrats supposed to do about this? He has already done through capitalism much of what they want to do with more big government, and they aren't about to fix what he has done wrong. The national debt? Trump is doing next to nothing about it but the Democrats' absurd spending ideas would make it unbelievably worse. Their proposed tax hikes would not even pay for their new programs.
Progressives hate the man and it is understandable given his vindictiveness, his sloppily expressed notions so easy to misread, his lack of coherence, his narcissism and his own suspected bigotry. On top of all that, the Democrats want power and what goes with it. They have given us three years of democratic destructiveness in an effort to get rid of him.
For all of this, Trump was surprisingly eloquent in his call for unity at the end of his speech, in saying that, if the men and women of Congress could somehow stand above their "differences" and take advantage of their "inheritance," they could "conquer the unknown." He talked about setting sights on the "brightest star" and "walking forward together," simultaneously rekindling "the bonds of love and loyalty and memory that link us together as citizens, as neighbors, as patriots."
Trump missed shaking hands with Pelosi when he walked on the stage, either intentionally or unintentionally, and she then introduced him, leaving out traditional words of high respect for the office. As he spoke, she sat behind him making faces like a spoiled fifth-grader, and then, like a teenage vandal, she began ripping his written speech apart as he walked off the stage and millions watched on TV. The act had symbolic meaning, of course. The Democrats are ripping our democracy and possibilities of unity apart to have their way even as Trump's favorability ratings go up.
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