CNN host Fareed Zakaria tried to claim (a) Bidenomics was mind-boggling genius, and also (b) white working-class voters hated it and rejected it in November. So forget those unwashed, uneducated white voters. Democrats should stop trying for those voters and stick to college-educated women and minorities.
The host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS bellowed in a January 17 op-ed for The Washington Post that Biden’s spendthrift economic catastrophe was actually “a resounding success.” But, alas, as Zakaria lectured in his ridiculous headline, “Biden failed to win the working class. Democrats might want to stop trying.”
Of course, Zakaria’s idea of Biden’s “success” was no different from the same tired list of factual obfuscations the media have been peddling lately, which obscure the damning context that ends up condemning Biden’s supposedly “working-class”-engineered policies for the economic wrecking machines they actually were. But, given the election results, snorted Zakaria, “Perhaps [Democrats] should lean into their new base and shape a policy agenda around them, rather than pining for the working class Whites whom they lost decades ago.”
Wow, talk about verbal diarrhea from an elitist snob looking down his nose at everybody else, which makes sense given that Zakaria is worth about $14 million.
In Zakaria’s world, Democrats should just quit trying to court the working class voters from a “bygone era” and instead focus on the “advantages” they already have in their bag. “[Democrats] have a solid base of college-educated professionals, women and minorities. Many of the swing voters who have helped them win the popular vote in seven of the past nine presidential elections are registered independents and suburbanites.”
Zakaria’s asinine theory for the dramatic shift of the blue collared base abandoning the Democrats over the years included — you guessed it: racism:
There is an alternative theory that I would propose. Ever since the Democratic Party embraced civil rights in the 1960s, it has been slowly losing the votes of the White working class, largely on issues related to race, identity and culture, [emphasis added].
No, you didn’t misread that.
As bad as Zakaria’s take was, it was compounded by his misleading spewage of White House talking points to bolster his argument that Bidenomics was the best thing since sliced bread. “Entering office as the pandemic still raged, he presided over the creation of almost 17 million jobs with inflation nearing the Fed’s 2 percent target. Productivity is up, wage inequality is down, small business formation is at record levels and wage growth is outpacing inflation,” Zakaria claimed.
FactCheck.org and Snopes — two leftist fact-checkers — didn’t even let Biden get away with inflating his record on jobs, as Zakaria did. In fact, FactCheck.org tossed a bucket of water on the “17 million” talking point just a day before Zakaria’s piece went live. “But much of that job growth under Biden was due to jobs regained after millions of American jobs were lost during the COVID-19 pandemic,” FactCheck.org noted.
Last year, when Biden and his acolytes were trotting out a “15 million” jobs created figure, Snopes slapped that down too. Anna Rascouët-Paz, the author of the fact-check, addressed the Biden propaganda on her personal Twitter account: “Did the US economy really add 15 million jobs under Biden? *squinty face* mmmm let's not push it.” No kidding.
Of course, Zakaria also didn’t mention anywhere that there was a “widespread labor shortage” as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce disclosed Dec. 13.
Second, the inflation situation is not as rosy as Zakaria made it appear, to say the very least. In fact, overall year-over-year inflation surged back to 2.9 percent in December from 2.7 percent in November. In addition, consumer prices are now 21 percent higher on average than when Biden first took office. Also, Zakaria’s statement on wage growth outpacing inflation is grossly misleading. Even The Associated Press conceded in its Jan. 14 propaganda piece promoting Bidenomics that “consumer prices rose a combined 20.8% during the course of Biden’s presidency, but people’s average weekly earnings rose just 17.4% over the same period.” Oops.
Lastly, Zakaria’s celebration of “small business formation” under Biden is also wildly off the mark. Just two days before Zakaria’s piece was published, Fox Business reported on a new study from digital lender Biz2Credit, which the outlet said showed how “[t]he backbone of the U.S. economy – the American small business – may be breaking beyond repair without some serious intervention.” Specifically, Fox Business reported, “Data from the study was pulled from more than 100,000 financing applications submitted to Biz2Credit between January 2022 and December 2024, and it shows a sharp decline in the earnings of small businesses toward the end of 2024, a trend the lender sees continuing into 2025.”
Your math isn’t mathing, Zakaria.
