Donald Trump's speech to both Houses of Congress on Tuesday night may have wowed his MAGA supporters and Republican attendees, but not all conservatives are quite on board.
According to longtime National Review columnist Jim Geraghty, the president may have got ahead of himself in boasting about the first few months with the economy not only struggling but facing a possible recession with a faltering stock market.
In his column the journalist pointed to the president proclaiming, "Six weeks ago, I stood beneath the dome of this Capitol and proclaimed the dawn of the golden age of America. From that moment on, it has been nothing but swift and unrelenting action to usher in the greatest and most successful era in the history of our country."
This prompted Geraghty to opine that "the president really wants you and everyone else to believe that the economy is roaring."
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No so, he pointed out.
"Eh, the post-Election Day stock market gains disappeared in sudden a puff of smoke on Tuesday, because the markets do not like tariffs or uncertainty, and the only thing that Trump is certain to deliver is an enthusiasm for tariffs that are apparently always on the verge of being canceled or postponed at the last minute," the columnist pointed out.
Continuing in that vein, he added that the age-old question of whether the president should be taken "seriously, but not literally" is once again in play and then sarcastically joked, "President Trump works in mysterious ways."
That conundrum, he pointed out, does nothing to calm Wall Street or assure business owners who need to plan for possible rough seas ahead.
"Do you remember the Trump or Republican campaign message on inflation last year being, 'If I have to pay a little bit more for something, I’m all for it'? No, I don’t, either," he wrote. "If Joe Biden and Kamala Harris ever served up a justification like this, the (justified!) purple-faced neck-vein-bulging outrage reaction from Republicans would remind astronomers of a sun going supernova."
According to the columnist, Trump is getting a pass where a pass is not warranted and then warned fellow conservatives, "But it’s Trump, so everything’s hunky-dory. Hey, it’s not like inflation and higher prices were a big deal in the fate of the Biden administration, right?"
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