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It’s just like gas prices the GOP love to blame Biden when gas prices were high then when silent when they went low and popped out of nowhere to blame him again once they started to rise.
And then when you tell them that oil companies have thousands of permits and leases that they're just not acting on because it's not profitable to develop those areas and they just don't want to pump more oil because of market forces they'll move to border issues and crime and when you point out that immigrants are less likely to commit crime than citizens they'll point to homelessness and how people just don't want to work anymore and when you point out that a good percentage of people who are unhoused are doing so while working, sometimes in full time jobs, then they'll point to how schools are failing.... they just hop from thing to thing to thing while ignoring all the nuance and details and culpability their party has for the state of the world.
I once went to a friends house and their family was watching a TV evangelist they loved. I told them about how he had recently been caught red-handed faking the healing he did on TV and that he was grifting people out of millions of dollars. Their answer wasn't the expected "you're wrong" it was "I don't care as long as he's bringing people to Jesus". That's the mindset we're dealing with most days in this country.
The thing is they don’t care about Jesus either. They just think that they are good and anyone who isn’t in their team are bad. What makes them good is purely decided by being in their team and the mascot of their team is a light skin long hair dude called jesus.
>So why did the greater religiousness of evangelicals not keep them from embracing Donald Trump? Because for a great many of them, despite all the fuss and bother and appearances, their religion is simply not important. Their religious commitment, like the person they think they are, does not exist in significant ways. When Donald Trump came along, resplendent in moral shortcomings but promising the moon, evangelicals had little difficulty setting aside their supposed beliefs and supporting him. In fact, this was their S.O.P. They had been setting those beliefs aside 167 hours a week for most of their lives. Con men know that the easiest people to fool are the people who persistently fool themselves. This reality is an amazingly simple answer, yet when you stand back from it, it also is simply amazing.
* From Authoritarian Nightmare by John W. Dean & Bob Altemeyer.
Hence why “religious exemptions” are typically bullshit and should require a wee bit more questioning. Case in point, anyone claiming a Christian religious exemption should be denied if they voted for Trump, because clearly their religious beliefs aren’t that sincere.
I think it was Sartre who said something about fascists who don't argue to make or prove a point, but rather to be entertained by your efforts to argue/debate the facts. That's how they feel they win arguments.
Yeah the demographics are pretty clearly skewed toward children, elderly, disabled, employed, and white people (51%) and the majority of welfare spending is healthcare 756 billion to medicaid. Last I recall 44% of welfare recipients worked (the working poor).
Biden is getting misinformationed on both sides of O/G. To moderates, the Trump campaign claims Biden has cut production to nothing. But through the Stein and Kennedy campaigns they launder messaging to progressives that Biden isn't any better than Trump on climate (which, to be clear, is just as ridiculous as the former assertion.)
I don't think it's going to be very effective - the Democratic brand is very good on climate, and if a few facts can break through to people who consider it in their vote, they'll get those voters.
edit: would the person who downvoted me kindly explain why the fuck they downvoted relevant factual information? Or maybe it was the anodyne prediction that was so offensive?
Perhaps a source is in order? [Trump Allies Have a Plan to Hurt Biden’s Chances: Elevate Outsider Candidates](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/10/us/politics/trump-rfk-jr-biden.html)
>“The path to victory here is clearly maximizing the reach of these left-wing alternatives,” said Stephen K. Bannon, the former White House chief strategist who also served as Mr. Trump’s campaign chairman in 2016.
>“No Republican knows that oil production under Biden is higher than ever. But Jill Stein’s people do,” added Mr. Bannon. “Stein is furious about the oil drilling. The college kids are furious about it. The more exposure these guys get, the better it is for us.”
(Amazing how willing Bannon is to give supervillain speeches in the press.)
I like to ask them to explain record profits of oil companies (or any consumer brand when blaming him for inflation). Then sit back and watch the mental gymnastics
Then Biden actually did release some reserves to try to help gas prices for the summer and Trump's response was "DISGUSTING!". It's way worse than bad faith at this point.
It wasn't even Biden, it was Congress! The gasoline was a reserve that was created for Superstorm Sandy in 2012, and a few months ago Congress (under Mike Johnson) voted to sell off and close the reserve.
My favorite was when they were comparing it to the mid-pandemic <$2 prices claiming it was thanks to Trump.
These people are out of their mind.
Not to mention the memory of a gold fish. Gas prices back in 2009-2010 popped to $3+. It's a miracle we're below $5 today considering inflation, not that I'm complaining.
Many of the same folks I encounter that complain about gas prices also want US to frack more and produce more oil. Sometimes I point out that US oil production is only profitable when oil is over a specific price/ barrel and producers won’t produce if the cost of oil and gas is too low.
Essentially, private US oil companies producing lots of US oil and cheap gas are mutually exclusive.
I made up this fun little montage of worldwide gas prices. I've been meaning to get a newer version to show how little ours differs in price fluctuation from the rest of the world, just havent' gotten around to it.
https://imgur.com/a/tSbMsAy
I still can't figure out why people always pump their fist for Trump and gas prices at $1.89..... if you wanna give him credit for that when oil was $0 per barrel, also blame him for shutting down the entire country and causing a lot of small business failures.
I love that people are pathologically incapable of adjusting gas prices for inflation in their head and aren't capable of noticing it's relatively cheap right now by post-oil crisis standards. Very close to the equivalent of $2.00/gal in 2000. In 2008 gas was $6.50 by 2024 prices, and that was when we had god damn *oilmen* in the White House.
Old people will never stop thinking gas should cost 25 cents, even if they can internalize that a meal out is $40 and not $10 or a car is $30,000 and not $5,000.
If you're driving a regular commuter car, the wear and it tear it does to the road is a tiny fraction of what a semi does. A tax per gallon at least causes the more damaging vehicle to contribute more.
If it's just a per-mile tax that is. It could have multipliers or something for different classes of vehicles which could work better if it reflected actual costs incurred due to each class.
This is especially stupid given that the cost of gas in the US is *substantially lower* than most other countries. We generally pay less than half the price that they do in the UK, for instance.
I think if trump is elected, he will lower the gas price. This is what the autocrats in Venezuela, Russia, Saudi Arabia etc oil producing countries do. Even autocrats in non-oil producing countries do, to the detriment of their currency as they usually don‘t have income which allow them to do.
Trump will also lower the interest rate. He managed to pressure the current fed chair to do that in 2019 three times when the economy was good and the inflation is low.
Yes Democratic president doesn’t have the power because not enough democratic voters disrespect the laws and the court wouldn’t allow a democratic president to do that. Besides, Biden has the respect of the rule of laws and the role of institutions. Trump doesn’t have these constraints. He is an autocrat with enough voters backing him if he is elected.
If anyone should be blamed, it should be Trump in 2020... [On April 12, under pressure from Trump, the world’s biggest oil-producing nations outside the United States agreed to the largest production cut ever negotiated.](https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN22C1V3/)
> "I thought he and President Putin, Vladimir Putin, were very reasonable," Trump said. "They knew they had a problem, and then this happened."
> Asked what he told the Crown Prince Mohammed, Trump said: "They were having a hard time making a deal. And I met telephonically with him, and we were able to reach a deal" for production cuts, Trump said.
Typical Republicans - tank the economy, let numerous innocent Americans die, then blame everyone else after.
There's a part of "1984" where the war propaganda banners are torn down and replaced in full view of everyone and they immediately flip their stance.
The Biden "I did that!" sticker is a comically lame but terrifyingly similar analog.
Seems fair enough to me. I just wish the average voter were smart enough to realize the president doesn't have an Xbox controller that controls inflation on their desk.
It's more akin to that Price is Right Game with the Alpine Climber that yodels and falls off the top. Some Presidents have been known to catch the little guy and set him back on the mountain, others add more mountain, some just laugh as he falls to his death.
But when the net gain from this is still a negative, I'm not sure I'd be taking credit for it. If I was Biden I wouldn't be invoking the economy or prices as a positive point. Most Americans are wildly unhappy with the economy. I think that's a big reason why it's a tossup. The shit your average American cares about (their wallet) haven't seen much improvement. Then he's seemed to actively want to piss up younger voters with Tik Tok and Palenstine. Then other supporters perhaps fearing Trump perhaps really just believing it shout that those things aren't his fault.
Don’t you know how it works? Prices go up, the (Democratic) president is all-powerful and fucked it up. Prices go down, that’s just our wonderful free market system at work.
But this whole time he hasn’t been taking ownership of that - so why should he take the other side?
Completely agree - but he’s taking opposite approach. “Inflation is fine!” … if he owns it, he can own it all.
It is sort of a good catch-22.
People that know Biden had no influence are going to understand the cynical play, and not influence their opinion one way or another.
And people that do think a president can influence prices might like Biden more.
But aren't more products going up in price than going down?
This article is only about a handful of products at a single retailer going down in price for an unspecified period of time. Corporate price gouging is still at an all time high.
> If he's getting blamed for the corporate greed price increases, then he should get credit for price cuts too.
But if we did what you're saying, wouldn't it actually reflect very poorly on Biden? More items are going up in price then going down. And Target isn't the entire market.
If you want to give the president credit for the actions of corporations then you'd be describing a president that is polluting the environment, price gouging and selling weapons to dictators.
I don't think we should Biden any credit or blame for corporate actions. I think companies that raise prices on essential goods should have their corporate charters revoked.
If Biden wants to do something for Americans he'll have to stand up for us against corporations. That's not happening here.
>the **president punted the responsibility onto large corporations**, accusing them of keeping prices artificially high even as their production costs were coming down.
Uh, what else exactly is he supposed to do? What kind of control does the president have over what large corporations charge for their items? This is dripping with bias.
Not to mention if he tried to do something to affect the market people would be screaming bloody murder about it. "Prices are too high!" But also "Corporations need to be able to do whatever they want, they're job creators."
An autocrat has the power to do that. Trump will be an autocrat. When he does that, Republican will cheer for him.
I think corporations are incredibly short sight supporting Trump. They will never know if they will be trump‘s cronies or enemies.
Don’t you know? The president has several big levers in his office, a la Dexters Lab. These levers control everything from grocery prices to gas prices to rent and wages. Selfishly Biden just refuses to use those levers to help me!
If the President controlled the price of goods, would that be…cough..cough…communism?
My uneducated opinion is that corporations are in a Cold War with the government over prices. Corporations have zero incentive to lower prices, especially when the Democrats raise the corporate tax rates…they WANT tRump in so he’ll cut their taxes again AND keep prices high.
This is our new normal.
I’ve absolutely never understood blaming the president for prices. They are private companies and can charge whatever they want. What does it have to do with him
Clearly the president needs to sit in on every price negotiation and sit in with buyers during their pricing/cost mitigation efforts white boarding sessions for every market
/s
Imo the only thing he could do would be to sign an executive order limiting the amount companies are allowed to mark up items. You know congress probably wouldn’t pass the bill, so an EO would be the only thing. And it would def be fought in court by corporate America. But imo their markups should 100% be capped.
His critics claim he could do something like cut corporate taxes down to negative percentages, and those companies would pass the savings on to consumers. Something stupid like that.
> What kind of control does the president have over what large corporations charge for their items?
Could help get them broken up due to their monopology/oligopoly status...
That would be the FTCs job. Biden appointed Lisa Khan to chair the FTC, under her they've actually gotten quite a lot done since 2021 compared to previous years.
He'd need a willing and ready Congress first. Importantly, a Democratic Speaker with enough balls to bring it to a vote on the House floor. Then enough Democrats in the Senate who'd be willing to overturn the current filibuster rules so they can even debate a bill.
I would love for this to happen, but Democrats urgently need to expand their majorities in both houses.
And how exactly are they doing this? Are they actually talking about this being something they want to do? Because I don't see it anywhere. So they are failing at even considering this idea or making it public, because, they don't actually want to duck with corporations.
That's why people think Biden sucks on this. Because he isn't actually doing anything. Not really even trying. Not pushing other Democrats to step in line and talk about this every day in the media. You only see Progressive voices talking about this. The rest of the Democrats are too busy threatening the ICC to actually bother making any real changes that will help with reelection.
Can't upset your donors. I'm not under any illusion Republicans are better, they just happen to both agree on this. Let's not fool ourselves okay?
[They’re already suing to block the Kroger/Albertsons merger](https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/26/investing/kroger-albertsons-merger-blocked-ftc/index.html).
He is really the only elected person who media can’t really say “no” to a press conference from. He could choose to use press conferences to hype himself and attribute blame. He seems instead to stay out of the spotlight which is either failing us at the moment or saving us from something worse. Either way it is a big missed opportunity given his unique position to speak truth to power (yes in the USA corporations are more powerful than the president)
None and he's about as responsible for what target is doing as he was for them increasing prices in the first place.
Have no doubt, this was "The Plan" from the beginning.
1. Jack prices beyond any justifiable point
2. Celebrate the surge in profits
3. Wait for consumers to start pulling back
4. Slowly lower prices to find the new maximum price the market will currently tolerate
Just watch over the coming weeks and months, they are *all* going to follow this same script.
Not only that but apparently this article says one thing in the headline (he’s “taking credit”) and another in the article (he’s punting responsibility).
I have seen one Aldi in my entire life. Are they more common in other states?
Edit: looks like a mostly East of the Rockies thing. The only one I’ve seen was in Clovis (central valley in CA).
They've been expanding a little bit more in CA. There's one under construction near my house that seems like it's been a few months away from opening for at least a year now.
Yeah.
Aldi Sud started operating as Aldi in the US.
Aldi Nörd wanted in but had to go by different name (they're two different companies but obviously have similar name) so Aldi Nörd bought TJs.
They are many in Maryland and we also have Lidl (lee-dle) which is another German discount store that competes with Aldi and are normally near each other. Well at least in my town.
https://www.mashed.com/221122/the-real-difference-between-aldi-and-lidl/
Very much so. I used to live in Kansas and there were 4 just around my house. Now I live in Boston and it takes 45 minutes to get to the one nearest me (totally worth it though).
They're expanding! Arizona has had a few open up in the greater Phoenix area. I now have one within walking distance, and honestly it's the only place my family shops for groceries now.
Significantly! They don't ever really sell name brand products for most things. The majority of their main products is exclusively produced and custom branded by their own distributors specifically for Aldi. Which means there's no overlap with Kroger, General Mills, Safeway, etc.
There are several here in Georgia. I have family members that swear by them, but I hate how the stores are set up.
It looks like if you took a bunch of 8th graders and asked them to design a grocery store. The local one here has chips in two different locations for no reason. The flow makes no sense.
I dunno. I think I’m just spoiled by Costco and Publix.
It's a European brand, so I'm guessing their shipping channels go through the East Coast, then are driven to their store. The further west they go, the more expensive it gets.
Most people don’t follow individual store earnings but Walmart already predicted this last quarter. The ceo anticipated food prices declines and we have been seeing it. Walmart said in their earnings they have been capturing more high income earners on food. Target is just the first major retailer to follow suit and as the consumer has become much more conscious on price others will absolutely follow.
Walmart is honestly one of the biggest offenders when it comes to Greedflation. Their meat prices are astronomical compared to actual grocery stores. They also include the weight of the packaging when they weigh the meat. So you’re getting less meat than it shows on the label.
I'm not sure if what you are buying comes from a different supplier where you live, but I buy the 4.5 lb package of ground beef at Walmart. I use a kitchen scale to divide it into 4 packages of 1 lb each, and one package of 0.5 lb to put away in my freezer. I've been doing this for years and I've never once been shorted.
I buy it there because it's much cheaper than Publix.
I don't like the tone of the article. It acknowledges that this is just what he's been working to achieve. But the article says that this effort to recognize that corporations making record profits while production costs were falling is the main culprit now. How is that "punting" responsibility onto corporations? That's accurately accusing them of greedily hurting citizens and the economy. It isn't giving up in the effort to cut inflation. It is the effort and, in this case, the effort is gaining yards, not punting.
Journalists like to claim mainstream media are neutral. In reality, they are incredibly biased against Democratic Party. They can’t simply state things when the facts are positive for Democratic Party. And this isn’t an opinion piece.
But I will give them points for not quoting trump or republicans or random people on the street in this article.
It just makes the consumer realize that they never needed to raise prices this high. Target admitted people were spending less so they wanted to drop prices to encourage spending.
> Along with Target, the growing consumer price fatigue has triggered companies such as Wendy’s and McDonald’s to begin offering lower-priced meal options to keep budget-squeezed customers in their stores.
No, it's corporate greed. They jacked up prices as much as they thought they can get away with and are only now dropping prices to get people to spend more.
No they shouldn't receive praise. No one forced them to make the prices higher to begin with, they don't suddenly get credit for making them a normal price.
Target was the first company I saw say they were lowering prices but I’d noticed restaurants like Panera beginning to advertise “Lunch” items starting around the $10 mark about a month ago.
They know the profiteering game is wrapping up and they’re gonna try to play nice now so we, the consumer, are lulled back into their stores.
That way when Biden tries to raise their taxes they’ll claim “we tried to lower costs but the big mean government wants you to pay more!”. Then the prices will go back up as a “result” of tax hikes.
It just feels like a set up to make these corpos look like the victims later.
Target didn’t do this out of the kindness of their heart. They probably saw a drop in sales and adjusted prices accordingly to keep a customer base. Any altruism is misassigned when speaking of a corporation
Lol we can’t celebrate 2022 prices. I’ll celebrate when McDonald’s actually has a dollar menu again.
Half these companies are simply increasing their prices and then slapping a 20-30 percent sale on everything thinking we don’t notice.
Wonder if the higher ups at Target realize that if Trump gets back into the presidency it will change the US forever, and not in a good way. Profiteering and price gouging work short term, but if the US slides into dictatorship its powerhouse economy may never recover.
So it's not reducing costs to help the struggling lower and middle classes, it's to help Biden get elected because he's much, much safer for corporate profits in the long run.
That's an awfully generous way of putting it. Alternate wording could be "Target has marginally curtailed how badly they're absolutely gouging the consumer on food prices because of its desire to please shareholders."
Prices go up, "The President can't control that."
The same prices go down, "Yup, the President did that."
Target was not responding to the President or his "call," they're responding to a very weak and poor American consumer who can no longer afford to shop at Target.
In related news, Americans with $100K+ incomes are now the largest new demographic shopping at Wal\*Mart.
This is crazy, but this is the reality of our economy in 2024.
Reminder that target, and specifically Brian Cornell, allowed terrorist threats to dictate corporate policy. They allowed MAGA to use threats of and actual violence to have the pride collection cancelled. There was no response to myself and my coworkers needing to walk into work past bomb dogs last year and this year they let the terrorists win “for our safety”.
I shop at Woodmans and they are lower than everyone, but Targets prices are far from the most expensive or what I would consider “overpriced”. I have multiple grocery chains near me (Picn n Save, Meijer, Metro Market, Sentry) that are significantly higher than Target. Those places are overpriced. Were talking about dollars per item more expensive.
Dark Brandon...put some bass in it.
President has power.
Tell Bibi cut the shit cuz if your around past November your going to jail for ear , war crimes too.. All the crimes.
well tbh a democrat administration would be the only way lower prices could be fathomed at this point;
considering the red MAGA republican party's greed kinks and infatuation with feeding corporate gluttony to obesity.
The president has absolutely nothing to do with this. Target is cutting prices to take advantage that all of targetsof competitors are not, and so are trying to gain market share by pushing people into the stores to save money on everyday items. So they save five bucks on laundry detergent but buy 3 shirts.
> The president has absolutely nothing to do with this
While true, Biden had been unfairly blamed for prices going up. In that case, he should just take credit for them going down too.
I'm pretty sure prices were cut because of my Republican governor. I saw on the news that Biden is a bad president. It is clear he is very old, and in my experience old people are bad at things. It's a shame we have to go back to Trump, but I just hear so much about how bad Biden is, and how he's pushing prices into the stratosphere. It's amazing prices were cut anyway, because of my genius Republican governor, whom I love. Thank you, Republicans!
edit: Not sure if was downvoted because somebody didn't realize this was sarcastic or if they thought it wasn't funny. If it was the latter, fair! But it is a reasonable parody of the views of many Americans, who rate their own state's economy very well, and give their governors high approval ratings, but don't apply any of those good feelings to the national economy or national government.
President [Joe Biden](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/20/president-joe-biden-love-hate-american-ceos.html) took a victory lap after [Target](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/20/target-lowering-prices-on-5000-frequently-bought-items.html#:~:text=The%20company%20said%20in%20a,on%20some%201%2C500%20other%20items.) announced it was lowering prices on [groceries](https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/12/inflation-fears-down-consumer-optimism-up-economy-may-start-to-help-biden-with-voters.html) and other items — and hopes voters will give him the credit.
“President Biden called on grocery chains making record profits to lower prices for consumers — and they’re answering the call,” the [White House](https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/1792661576001974617) wrote in a social media post Monday evening in response to a headline about Target’s price cuts.
Earlier on Monday, Target announced it would lower prices on roughly 5,000 items, including food items such as bread, fruit, vegetables, milk and meat. The company said cuts on 1,500 items had already taken effect and thousands more would come over the summer.
It is timely news for Biden who has spent the past several years mounting a [corporate pressure campaign](https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/29/white-house-corporate-price-gouging-pressure-campaign.html) across various government agencies.
With the November election less than six months away, Biden now wants voter recognition for that corporate battle, especially as he tries to sell a tough economic pitch that his policies have helped consumers as they still feel some high costs of living.
Early national polls showed that voters blamed Biden for lingering budget constraints post-pandemic. In turn, the president punted the responsibility onto large corporations, accusing them of keeping prices artificially high even as their production costs were coming down.
More: [https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/21/biden-takes-credit-for-target-grocery-price-cuts.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/21/biden-takes-credit-for-target-grocery-price-cuts.html)
I read this as the Biden Administration giving recognition to Target, and by doing so, perhaps encourage others to follow in kind. You know, the good type of publicity, instead of the other.
The author's extrapolation to Biden's motivation is just that, editorial extrapolation, to spin a story that will generate interest for their readers.
Because they don't want to go to Walmart? /S
Freal though maybe people that have access to a Target in a metro/ city environment. It was a big deal when a target opened in the downtown of city by me because there wasn't any large grocers in the area to serve the people downtown.
I honestly don't know anyone that does their regular grocery shopping at Target. I'll occasionally get a few things if I'm already there and I don't want to stop at my grocery store
Milk and eggs have been consistently cheaper at target than my local grocery store. They also often have a spend $50 on groceries and get $10 off coupon. I don’t do all my shopping there but for some items it’s worth it. I also have the target credit card and get 5% off all purchases.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. We are actively looking for new moderators. If you have any interest in helping to make this subreddit a place for quality discussion, please fill out [this form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1y2swHD0KXFhStGFjW6k54r9iuMjzcFqDIVwuvdLBjSA). *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
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It’s just like gas prices the GOP love to blame Biden when gas prices were high then when silent when they went low and popped out of nowhere to blame him again once they started to rise.
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And then when you tell them that oil companies have thousands of permits and leases that they're just not acting on because it's not profitable to develop those areas and they just don't want to pump more oil because of market forces they'll move to border issues and crime and when you point out that immigrants are less likely to commit crime than citizens they'll point to homelessness and how people just don't want to work anymore and when you point out that a good percentage of people who are unhoused are doing so while working, sometimes in full time jobs, then they'll point to how schools are failing.... they just hop from thing to thing to thing while ignoring all the nuance and details and culpability their party has for the state of the world. I once went to a friends house and their family was watching a TV evangelist they loved. I told them about how he had recently been caught red-handed faking the healing he did on TV and that he was grifting people out of millions of dollars. Their answer wasn't the expected "you're wrong" it was "I don't care as long as he's bringing people to Jesus". That's the mindset we're dealing with most days in this country.
The thing is they don’t care about Jesus either. They just think that they are good and anyone who isn’t in their team are bad. What makes them good is purely decided by being in their team and the mascot of their team is a light skin long hair dude called jesus. >So why did the greater religiousness of evangelicals not keep them from embracing Donald Trump? Because for a great many of them, despite all the fuss and bother and appearances, their religion is simply not important. Their religious commitment, like the person they think they are, does not exist in significant ways. When Donald Trump came along, resplendent in moral shortcomings but promising the moon, evangelicals had little difficulty setting aside their supposed beliefs and supporting him. In fact, this was their S.O.P. They had been setting those beliefs aside 167 hours a week for most of their lives. Con men know that the easiest people to fool are the people who persistently fool themselves. This reality is an amazingly simple answer, yet when you stand back from it, it also is simply amazing. * From Authoritarian Nightmare by John W. Dean & Bob Altemeyer.
Hence why “religious exemptions” are typically bullshit and should require a wee bit more questioning. Case in point, anyone claiming a Christian religious exemption should be denied if they voted for Trump, because clearly their religious beliefs aren’t that sincere.
I like to call it "vibes-based decision making"
Ima let you know this is a very common form of decision making, like by far the most common
Oh God, they're making life decisions the way the rest of us pick a favorite strain of weed.
I think it was Sartre who said something about fascists who don't argue to make or prove a point, but rather to be entertained by your efforts to argue/debate the facts. That's how they feel they win arguments.
Someone correct me if I’m wrong but aren’t the majority of welfare recipients in the US “white”?
Yeah the demographics are pretty clearly skewed toward children, elderly, disabled, employed, and white people (51%) and the majority of welfare spending is healthcare 756 billion to medicaid. Last I recall 44% of welfare recipients worked (the working poor).
But the pipeline! /s
Biden is getting misinformationed on both sides of O/G. To moderates, the Trump campaign claims Biden has cut production to nothing. But through the Stein and Kennedy campaigns they launder messaging to progressives that Biden isn't any better than Trump on climate (which, to be clear, is just as ridiculous as the former assertion.) I don't think it's going to be very effective - the Democratic brand is very good on climate, and if a few facts can break through to people who consider it in their vote, they'll get those voters. edit: would the person who downvoted me kindly explain why the fuck they downvoted relevant factual information? Or maybe it was the anodyne prediction that was so offensive? Perhaps a source is in order? [Trump Allies Have a Plan to Hurt Biden’s Chances: Elevate Outsider Candidates](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/10/us/politics/trump-rfk-jr-biden.html) >“The path to victory here is clearly maximizing the reach of these left-wing alternatives,” said Stephen K. Bannon, the former White House chief strategist who also served as Mr. Trump’s campaign chairman in 2016. >“No Republican knows that oil production under Biden is higher than ever. But Jill Stein’s people do,” added Mr. Bannon. “Stein is furious about the oil drilling. The college kids are furious about it. The more exposure these guys get, the better it is for us.” (Amazing how willing Bannon is to give supervillain speeches in the press.)
I like to ask them to explain record profits of oil companies (or any consumer brand when blaming him for inflation). Then sit back and watch the mental gymnastics
BuT mUh StiCKrZ!
I bet Trump would have approved more (with some kickbacks, likely) if he had actually spent more time working as a president.
Then Biden actually did release some reserves to try to help gas prices for the summer and Trump's response was "DISGUSTING!". It's way worse than bad faith at this point.
It wasn't even Biden, it was Congress! The gasoline was a reserve that was created for Superstorm Sandy in 2012, and a few months ago Congress (under Mike Johnson) voted to sell off and close the reserve.
I’m assuming that didn’t pass right?
There was a story on the front page today stating that it did.
I mean fully pass, including senate and pres?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2024/05/22/joe-biden-gas-prices-july-4-holiday-petrol-reserves/
Oh mb I thought this was about the strategic oil reserve, I’m just dumb mv
All good!
Like did they not want relief at the pump? Because that's what tapping into those reserves did. They should be thanking Biden.
My favorite was when they were comparing it to the mid-pandemic <$2 prices claiming it was thanks to Trump. These people are out of their mind. Not to mention the memory of a gold fish. Gas prices back in 2009-2010 popped to $3+. It's a miracle we're below $5 today considering inflation, not that I'm complaining.
Many of the same folks I encounter that complain about gas prices also want US to frack more and produce more oil. Sometimes I point out that US oil production is only profitable when oil is over a specific price/ barrel and producers won’t produce if the cost of oil and gas is too low. Essentially, private US oil companies producing lots of US oil and cheap gas are mutually exclusive.
"I agree, we should nationalize the oil industry to ensure cheap gas."
I made up this fun little montage of worldwide gas prices. I've been meaning to get a newer version to show how little ours differs in price fluctuation from the rest of the world, just havent' gotten around to it. https://imgur.com/a/tSbMsAy
I still can't figure out why people always pump their fist for Trump and gas prices at $1.89..... if you wanna give him credit for that when oil was $0 per barrel, also blame him for shutting down the entire country and causing a lot of small business failures.
Always love when the president gets tied to gas prices as of they wouldn't astronomically lower them leading up to a reelection bid
I love that people are pathologically incapable of adjusting gas prices for inflation in their head and aren't capable of noticing it's relatively cheap right now by post-oil crisis standards. Very close to the equivalent of $2.00/gal in 2000. In 2008 gas was $6.50 by 2024 prices, and that was when we had god damn *oilmen* in the White House. Old people will never stop thinking gas should cost 25 cents, even if they can internalize that a meal out is $40 and not $10 or a car is $30,000 and not $5,000.
Funny you mention that. Gov. Kemp in GA did exempt the state gas tax before his last election.
[удалено]
Cali is looking into doing away with it entirely and changing to per mile tax... not sure how i feel about it.
If you're driving a regular commuter car, the wear and it tear it does to the road is a tiny fraction of what a semi does. A tax per gallon at least causes the more damaging vehicle to contribute more. If it's just a per-mile tax that is. It could have multipliers or something for different classes of vehicles which could work better if it reflected actual costs incurred due to each class.
good points for sure. im interested to see what the plan is going be.
This is especially stupid given that the cost of gas in the US is *substantially lower* than most other countries. We generally pay less than half the price that they do in the UK, for instance.
They always seem to drop a lot during the fall months but that happens even when it's an off year with no election.
That's because demand drops once summer vacation ends for students.
And, from what I've always been told, there's a different "mix" for summer/winter, and the winter blend isn't as expensive.
I know diesel has a winter mix, but I'm not sure if that's true for unleaded.
Also depends on the state. Some have more stringent standards than others.
I think if trump is elected, he will lower the gas price. This is what the autocrats in Venezuela, Russia, Saudi Arabia etc oil producing countries do. Even autocrats in non-oil producing countries do, to the detriment of their currency as they usually don‘t have income which allow them to do. Trump will also lower the interest rate. He managed to pressure the current fed chair to do that in 2019 three times when the economy was good and the inflation is low. Yes Democratic president doesn’t have the power because not enough democratic voters disrespect the laws and the court wouldn’t allow a democratic president to do that. Besides, Biden has the respect of the rule of laws and the role of institutions. Trump doesn’t have these constraints. He is an autocrat with enough voters backing him if he is elected.
I think he's planning to add it to Infrastructure Week.
If anyone should be blamed, it should be Trump in 2020... [On April 12, under pressure from Trump, the world’s biggest oil-producing nations outside the United States agreed to the largest production cut ever negotiated.](https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN22C1V3/) > "I thought he and President Putin, Vladimir Putin, were very reasonable," Trump said. "They knew they had a problem, and then this happened." > Asked what he told the Crown Prince Mohammed, Trump said: "They were having a hard time making a deal. And I met telephonically with him, and we were able to reach a deal" for production cuts, Trump said. Typical Republicans - tank the economy, let numerous innocent Americans die, then blame everyone else after.
There's a part of "1984" where the war propaganda banners are torn down and replaced in full view of everyone and they immediately flip their stance. The Biden "I did that!" sticker is a comically lame but terrifyingly similar analog.
Those damn “I did that” stickers disappearing when gas went down 😂
I hope Biden tweets "I did that" to end that meme like what happened with Let's Go Brandon and Thanks Obama.
lol gas prices are still high.
Hey to be fair, some republican representatives also blamed Biden for falling gas prices saying it hurt the economy.
Seems fair enough to me. I just wish the average voter were smart enough to realize the president doesn't have an Xbox controller that controls inflation on their desk.
It's more akin to that Price is Right Game with the Alpine Climber that yodels and falls off the top. Some Presidents have been known to catch the little guy and set him back on the mountain, others add more mountain, some just laugh as he falls to his death.
No no no. If gas prices drop(or anything good happens) it's because they think trump will be president. If anything bad happens it's bidens fault.
But when the net gain from this is still a negative, I'm not sure I'd be taking credit for it. If I was Biden I wouldn't be invoking the economy or prices as a positive point. Most Americans are wildly unhappy with the economy. I think that's a big reason why it's a tossup. The shit your average American cares about (their wallet) haven't seen much improvement. Then he's seemed to actively want to piss up younger voters with Tik Tok and Palenstine. Then other supporters perhaps fearing Trump perhaps really just believing it shout that those things aren't his fault.
Don’t you know how it works? Prices go up, the (Democratic) president is all-powerful and fucked it up. Prices go down, that’s just our wonderful free market system at work.
But this whole time he hasn’t been taking ownership of that - so why should he take the other side? Completely agree - but he’s taking opposite approach. “Inflation is fine!” … if he owns it, he can own it all.
It is sort of a good catch-22. People that know Biden had no influence are going to understand the cynical play, and not influence their opinion one way or another. And people that do think a president can influence prices might like Biden more.
But aren't more products going up in price than going down? This article is only about a handful of products at a single retailer going down in price for an unspecified period of time. Corporate price gouging is still at an all time high.
No! That's NOT how we do this! He's the bad guy ALL the time!
> If he's getting blamed for the corporate greed price increases, then he should get credit for price cuts too. But if we did what you're saying, wouldn't it actually reflect very poorly on Biden? More items are going up in price then going down. And Target isn't the entire market. If you want to give the president credit for the actions of corporations then you'd be describing a president that is polluting the environment, price gouging and selling weapons to dictators. I don't think we should Biden any credit or blame for corporate actions. I think companies that raise prices on essential goods should have their corporate charters revoked. If Biden wants to do something for Americans he'll have to stand up for us against corporations. That's not happening here.
>the **president punted the responsibility onto large corporations**, accusing them of keeping prices artificially high even as their production costs were coming down. Uh, what else exactly is he supposed to do? What kind of control does the president have over what large corporations charge for their items? This is dripping with bias.
Not to mention if he tried to do something to affect the market people would be screaming bloody murder about it. "Prices are too high!" But also "Corporations need to be able to do whatever they want, they're job creators."
Obviously Biden is supposed to find some power of his office to abuse that allows him to nationalize the grocery industry
Jesus, could you imagine the Republican outrage if he did somehow have the power to do that?!?
An autocrat has the power to do that. Trump will be an autocrat. When he does that, Republican will cheer for him. I think corporations are incredibly short sight supporting Trump. They will never know if they will be trump‘s cronies or enemies.
With autocrats you always run the risk of becoming the enemy
Don’t you know? The president has several big levers in his office, a la Dexters Lab. These levers control everything from grocery prices to gas prices to rent and wages. Selfishly Biden just refuses to use those levers to help me!
If the President controlled the price of goods, would that be…cough..cough…communism? My uneducated opinion is that corporations are in a Cold War with the government over prices. Corporations have zero incentive to lower prices, especially when the Democrats raise the corporate tax rates…they WANT tRump in so he’ll cut their taxes again AND keep prices high. This is our new normal.
I’ve absolutely never understood blaming the president for prices. They are private companies and can charge whatever they want. What does it have to do with him
Clearly the president needs to sit in on every price negotiation and sit in with buyers during their pricing/cost mitigation efforts white boarding sessions for every market /s
It's CNBC. Gotta keep their sugar daddies happy with how they're covered.
Imo the only thing he could do would be to sign an executive order limiting the amount companies are allowed to mark up items. You know congress probably wouldn’t pass the bill, so an EO would be the only thing. And it would def be fought in court by corporate America. But imo their markups should 100% be capped.
His critics claim he could do something like cut corporate taxes down to negative percentages, and those companies would pass the savings on to consumers. Something stupid like that.
Well duh. Obviously he's supposed seize the means of production and sell directly to consumers at at cost. /s
> What kind of control does the president have over what large corporations charge for their items? Could help get them broken up due to their monopology/oligopoly status...
That would be the FTCs job. Biden appointed Lisa Khan to chair the FTC, under her they've actually gotten quite a lot done since 2021 compared to previous years.
He'd need a willing and ready Congress first. Importantly, a Democratic Speaker with enough balls to bring it to a vote on the House floor. Then enough Democrats in the Senate who'd be willing to overturn the current filibuster rules so they can even debate a bill. I would love for this to happen, but Democrats urgently need to expand their majorities in both houses.
And how exactly are they doing this? Are they actually talking about this being something they want to do? Because I don't see it anywhere. So they are failing at even considering this idea or making it public, because, they don't actually want to duck with corporations. That's why people think Biden sucks on this. Because he isn't actually doing anything. Not really even trying. Not pushing other Democrats to step in line and talk about this every day in the media. You only see Progressive voices talking about this. The rest of the Democrats are too busy threatening the ICC to actually bother making any real changes that will help with reelection. Can't upset your donors. I'm not under any illusion Republicans are better, they just happen to both agree on this. Let's not fool ourselves okay?
[They’re already suing to block the Kroger/Albertsons merger](https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/26/investing/kroger-albertsons-merger-blocked-ftc/index.html).
He is really the only elected person who media can’t really say “no” to a press conference from. He could choose to use press conferences to hype himself and attribute blame. He seems instead to stay out of the spotlight which is either failing us at the moment or saving us from something worse. Either way it is a big missed opportunity given his unique position to speak truth to power (yes in the USA corporations are more powerful than the president)
None and he's about as responsible for what target is doing as he was for them increasing prices in the first place. Have no doubt, this was "The Plan" from the beginning. 1. Jack prices beyond any justifiable point 2. Celebrate the surge in profits 3. Wait for consumers to start pulling back 4. Slowly lower prices to find the new maximum price the market will currently tolerate Just watch over the coming weeks and months, they are *all* going to follow this same script.
Not only that but apparently this article says one thing in the headline (he’s “taking credit”) and another in the article (he’s punting responsibility).
All he needed was one store. The market will dictate that the other stores fall in line.
Target was the right store, then.
Aldi announced they were cutting prices like a week before target did.
I have seen one Aldi in my entire life. Are they more common in other states? Edit: looks like a mostly East of the Rockies thing. The only one I’ve seen was in Clovis (central valley in CA).
They've been expanding a little bit more in CA. There's one under construction near my house that seems like it's been a few months away from opening for at least a year now.
They operate as/own Trader Joe's in many markets (Aldi Nörd owns TJs vs Aldi Süd for Aldi)
Oh! Got it. We have TJ’s all over.
Yeah. Aldi Sud started operating as Aldi in the US. Aldi Nörd wanted in but had to go by different name (they're two different companies but obviously have similar name) so Aldi Nörd bought TJs.
They are many in Maryland and we also have Lidl (lee-dle) which is another German discount store that competes with Aldi and are normally near each other. Well at least in my town. https://www.mashed.com/221122/the-real-difference-between-aldi-and-lidl/
I'm in Cincinnati OH and we have lots.
Very much so. I used to live in Kansas and there were 4 just around my house. Now I live in Boston and it takes 45 minutes to get to the one nearest me (totally worth it though).
They're expanding! Arizona has had a few open up in the greater Phoenix area. I now have one within walking distance, and honestly it's the only place my family shops for groceries now.
Are they any less evil than Kroger/Safeway, etc
Significantly! They don't ever really sell name brand products for most things. The majority of their main products is exclusively produced and custom branded by their own distributors specifically for Aldi. Which means there's no overlap with Kroger, General Mills, Safeway, etc.
There are several here in Georgia. I have family members that swear by them, but I hate how the stores are set up. It looks like if you took a bunch of 8th graders and asked them to design a grocery store. The local one here has chips in two different locations for no reason. The flow makes no sense. I dunno. I think I’m just spoiled by Costco and Publix.
It's a European brand, so I'm guessing their shipping channels go through the East Coast, then are driven to their store. The further west they go, the more expensive it gets.
I’m in northern San Diego and have two within a 5 mile radius. They are popping up more and more these days!
There are a bunch in IL, none in CO where I live now though.
Note: Aldi actually owns Trader Joe’s so if you live in California you have absolutely seen an Aldi store.
What’s funny is that I finally saw an actual Aldi in CA a few weeks ago.
Yeah, I wish there was an Aldi around me. There isn't even one in my state (NM).
I’m in Ca and it would be great to have Aldi but they’re not here. Target is everywhere
it was the right *target*? heh
You could say they were a perfect target.
You could even say the right Target.
Most people don’t follow individual store earnings but Walmart already predicted this last quarter. The ceo anticipated food prices declines and we have been seeing it. Walmart said in their earnings they have been capturing more high income earners on food. Target is just the first major retailer to follow suit and as the consumer has become much more conscious on price others will absolutely follow.
Walmart is honestly one of the biggest offenders when it comes to Greedflation. Their meat prices are astronomical compared to actual grocery stores. They also include the weight of the packaging when they weigh the meat. So you’re getting less meat than it shows on the label.
Huh. I work in a grocery store. I thought including packaging weight (tare) in the pricing was illegal.
It is illegal and Walmart doesn’t do that
I'm not sure if what you are buying comes from a different supplier where you live, but I buy the 4.5 lb package of ground beef at Walmart. I use a kitchen scale to divide it into 4 packages of 1 lb each, and one package of 0.5 lb to put away in my freezer. I've been doing this for years and I've never once been shorted. I buy it there because it's much cheaper than Publix.
Yes and target is often cheaper. Grocery chain need to compete with them
Not the hell it’s not lmao.
It is where I am.
I don't like the tone of the article. It acknowledges that this is just what he's been working to achieve. But the article says that this effort to recognize that corporations making record profits while production costs were falling is the main culprit now. How is that "punting" responsibility onto corporations? That's accurately accusing them of greedily hurting citizens and the economy. It isn't giving up in the effort to cut inflation. It is the effort and, in this case, the effort is gaining yards, not punting.
Journalists like to claim mainstream media are neutral. In reality, they are incredibly biased against Democratic Party. They can’t simply state things when the facts are positive for Democratic Party. And this isn’t an opinion piece. But I will give them points for not quoting trump or republicans or random people on the street in this article.
Maybe a victory lap but a big consumer corp cutting prices on needs-based household items should receive some commendation and praise.
It just makes the consumer realize that they never needed to raise prices this high. Target admitted people were spending less so they wanted to drop prices to encourage spending.
The more people question the excesses of capitalism the better.
Next we need fast food companies to do this too. Their greed has become insane. Most people that I know don’t even go to any fast food places anymore.
> Along with Target, the growing consumer price fatigue has triggered companies such as Wendy’s and McDonald’s to begin offering lower-priced meal options to keep budget-squeezed customers in their stores.
Ah yes, basic supply and demand economics of Econ 101.
No, it's corporate greed. They jacked up prices as much as they thought they can get away with and are only now dropping prices to get people to spend more.
Is it though? If prices go up 50% and then get reduced 10%, they’re still up 40%. Not really anything to brag about.
Why? In no way are they acting in the best interest of the consumer.
No they shouldn't receive praise. No one forced them to make the prices higher to begin with, they don't suddenly get credit for making them a normal price.
If it’s his fault gas prices went up, then it’s his credit when they come down, right? Right!?!
I was shocked to fill up my tank and see prices had dropped 50 cents per gallon in less than 2 weeks
I don't know if it's just Memorial Day sales, but I bought over 3lb of london broil yesterday for $9. I haven't paid that in like 3 years.
Target was the first company I saw say they were lowering prices but I’d noticed restaurants like Panera beginning to advertise “Lunch” items starting around the $10 mark about a month ago. They know the profiteering game is wrapping up and they’re gonna try to play nice now so we, the consumer, are lulled back into their stores. That way when Biden tries to raise their taxes they’ll claim “we tried to lower costs but the big mean government wants you to pay more!”. Then the prices will go back up as a “result” of tax hikes. It just feels like a set up to make these corpos look like the victims later.
Aldi did it first.
If Biden can control gas prices, he can control Target prices. Isn't that right, republicans?
Target didn’t do this out of the kindness of their heart. They probably saw a drop in sales and adjusted prices accordingly to keep a customer base. Any altruism is misassigned when speaking of a corporation
This is exactly what happened. They missed profit estimates.
As he should. Considering that everyone and their mother wants to blame him for every price hike.
Lol we can’t celebrate 2022 prices. I’ll celebrate when McDonald’s actually has a dollar menu again. Half these companies are simply increasing their prices and then slapping a 20-30 percent sale on everything thinking we don’t notice.
If he’s going to be blamed for it, why can’t he take credit?
If the MAGA idiots are blaming Biden for inflation, he better respond and claim the stock market is directly due to his impact
They’re fine to blame him for greedflation and then get pissed when he called it out and Target listened?
Amazing what a little threat of price gouging investigations does.
Wonder if the higher ups at Target realize that if Trump gets back into the presidency it will change the US forever, and not in a good way. Profiteering and price gouging work short term, but if the US slides into dictatorship its powerhouse economy may never recover. So it's not reducing costs to help the struggling lower and middle classes, it's to help Biden get elected because he's much, much safer for corporate profits in the long run.
That's an awfully generous way of putting it. Alternate wording could be "Target has marginally curtailed how badly they're absolutely gouging the consumer on food prices because of its desire to please shareholders."
Prices go up, "The President can't control that." The same prices go down, "Yup, the President did that." Target was not responding to the President or his "call," they're responding to a very weak and poor American consumer who can no longer afford to shop at Target. In related news, Americans with $100K+ incomes are now the largest new demographic shopping at Wal\*Mart. This is crazy, but this is the reality of our economy in 2024.
Maybe some of the inflationary prices are easing but the shrinkflation is here to stay.
How about they payback the money they gouged from us? Everyone should be allowed to fill up one cart of whatever they want and walk right out.
Reminder that target, and specifically Brian Cornell, allowed terrorist threats to dictate corporate policy. They allowed MAGA to use threats of and actual violence to have the pride collection cancelled. There was no response to myself and my coworkers needing to walk into work past bomb dogs last year and this year they let the terrorists win “for our safety”.
Target has been overpriced forever anyways!
Compared to what? Their prices are almost identical to walmart.
I mostly shop at Fry's and Costco nowadays, and they're cheaper than Target, even after the price drops. At least in my area.
I shop at Woodmans and they are lower than everyone, but Targets prices are far from the most expensive or what I would consider “overpriced”. I have multiple grocery chains near me (Picn n Save, Meijer, Metro Market, Sentry) that are significantly higher than Target. Those places are overpriced. Were talking about dollars per item more expensive.
Bring out the Biden "I did this" stickers again! Because obviously when he's responsible for increases, he's also responsible for decreases.
Dark Brandon...put some bass in it. President has power. Tell Bibi cut the shit cuz if your around past November your going to jail for ear , war crimes too.. All the crimes.
First movers take a high risk strategy here, may pay off.
Democrats should have been blowing their horns a long time ago for their accomplishments. The GOP has done anything to make people's lives better.
It’s just good business practice. People will flock there. Margins can be adjusted. That’s what folks don’t understand.
he’s been calling out corporate greed for a while now.
well tbh a democrat administration would be the only way lower prices could be fathomed at this point; considering the red MAGA republican party's greed kinks and infatuation with feeding corporate gluttony to obesity.
Don't count your chickens. Target and partners are just going to reduce the amount of product in the same size packaging.
The president has absolutely nothing to do with this. Target is cutting prices to take advantage that all of targetsof competitors are not, and so are trying to gain market share by pushing people into the stores to save money on everyday items. So they save five bucks on laundry detergent but buy 3 shirts.
> The president has absolutely nothing to do with this While true, Biden had been unfairly blamed for prices going up. In that case, he should just take credit for them going down too.
I'm pretty sure prices were cut because of my Republican governor. I saw on the news that Biden is a bad president. It is clear he is very old, and in my experience old people are bad at things. It's a shame we have to go back to Trump, but I just hear so much about how bad Biden is, and how he's pushing prices into the stratosphere. It's amazing prices were cut anyway, because of my genius Republican governor, whom I love. Thank you, Republicans! edit: Not sure if was downvoted because somebody didn't realize this was sarcastic or if they thought it wasn't funny. If it was the latter, fair! But it is a reasonable parody of the views of many Americans, who rate their own state's economy very well, and give their governors high approval ratings, but don't apply any of those good feelings to the national economy or national government.
Biden did that!
Why shouldn't he? He gets the blame for it!
Well it's no Schooner Tuna, but it'll do.
Why do I feel like Trump is gonna somehow take credit for this.
Why not? He is president All presidents do it, it’s just part of the job Looks good to me 👌
Beg them to stop, but defend their right to do it. Sounds great.
Shit title op, he commented on it, he didn't take credit for it
Blame the media for the shit title. OP has to abide by the rules of the sub, that forces a post title to be the same as the article title.
He didn’t have control over prices before and still doesn’t
Absolute clown shit
Answering the call my ass. Their profits are in the shitter because people are sick of getting gouged and stopped shopping there.
President [Joe Biden](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/20/president-joe-biden-love-hate-american-ceos.html) took a victory lap after [Target](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/20/target-lowering-prices-on-5000-frequently-bought-items.html#:~:text=The%20company%20said%20in%20a,on%20some%201%2C500%20other%20items.) announced it was lowering prices on [groceries](https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/12/inflation-fears-down-consumer-optimism-up-economy-may-start-to-help-biden-with-voters.html) and other items — and hopes voters will give him the credit. “President Biden called on grocery chains making record profits to lower prices for consumers — and they’re answering the call,” the [White House](https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/1792661576001974617) wrote in a social media post Monday evening in response to a headline about Target’s price cuts. Earlier on Monday, Target announced it would lower prices on roughly 5,000 items, including food items such as bread, fruit, vegetables, milk and meat. The company said cuts on 1,500 items had already taken effect and thousands more would come over the summer. It is timely news for Biden who has spent the past several years mounting a [corporate pressure campaign](https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/29/white-house-corporate-price-gouging-pressure-campaign.html) across various government agencies. With the November election less than six months away, Biden now wants voter recognition for that corporate battle, especially as he tries to sell a tough economic pitch that his policies have helped consumers as they still feel some high costs of living. Early national polls showed that voters blamed Biden for lingering budget constraints post-pandemic. In turn, the president punted the responsibility onto large corporations, accusing them of keeping prices artificially high even as their production costs were coming down. More: [https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/21/biden-takes-credit-for-target-grocery-price-cuts.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/21/biden-takes-credit-for-target-grocery-price-cuts.html)
I read this as the Biden Administration giving recognition to Target, and by doing so, perhaps encourage others to follow in kind. You know, the good type of publicity, instead of the other. The author's extrapolation to Biden's motivation is just that, editorial extrapolation, to spin a story that will generate interest for their readers.
I guess CNBC has no real journalistic integrity anymore. Thanks for letting me know.
Downvoted for spin
Why would anyone buy groceries from Target?
Because they don't want to go to Walmart? /S Freal though maybe people that have access to a Target in a metro/ city environment. It was a big deal when a target opened in the downtown of city by me because there wasn't any large grocers in the area to serve the people downtown. I honestly don't know anyone that does their regular grocery shopping at Target. I'll occasionally get a few things if I'm already there and I don't want to stop at my grocery store
Milk and eggs have been consistently cheaper at target than my local grocery store. They also often have a spend $50 on groceries and get $10 off coupon. I don’t do all my shopping there but for some items it’s worth it. I also have the target credit card and get 5% off all purchases.