The opening of this Politico piece made me snort: “Only after Rep. Katie Porter put bacon in her cart at her local grocery store recently did she notice that its price had spiked to $9.99 a pound. Reluctantly, she put the package back.”
Do you mean inflation is just now bothering Porter? How could that be?
One might sympathize with Porter, but Politico doesn’t mention that Porter is a millionaire and has a $174,000 a year salary. Instead, she continues to act like she is one of us.
Porter is a single mother of three, but in 2021, she has between $1.2 million and $2.8 million in assets:
Porter has largely evaded questions on her wealth and frequently earns praise for being more “relatable” than most politicians. In early 2020, the San Francisco Chronicle wrote of how her “empathy” stems from being a single mother of three school-age children “wrestling with the same questions other working parents face.”But data also show that Porter is well above the salary threshold of the average single parent. According to the 2018 Census Bureau data, households led by single mothers took in a median $45,128 annually. Porter earns a $174,000 congressional salary—nearly four times more than what the average single mother takes in.Porter has also falsely claimed to be the only single mother of young children in Congress.Porter reports between $300,000 and $600,000 in mortgage liabilities, meaning her net worth at its minimum sits between $600,000 and $2.2 million. Figures in financial disclosures are reported in broad ranges rather than exact numbers. Her Truth to Power PAC did not respond to requests for comment.
We also must not forget that Porter voted for bills that required way more spending and printing of money.
The realization might be too late for Porter, a top GOP target, and her fellow Democrats. Porter is worried the Democrats do not know how to communicate with regular Americans about inflation and the cost of living:
When Porter gave an emotional speech about how inflation has been hitting her family for months during a private House Democratic Caucus meeting last week, she said it seemed like the first time the personal toll of high consumer prices had sunk in for some lawmakers in the room.“Too often, Congress recognizes issues too late,” Porter, a top GOP target this fall in a swing district, said in an interview. “I had a colleague mention to me, ‘We’re not seeing it in the polls’ … Well, you don’t know what to ask.”For Porter, the episode revealed how much work Democrats still need to do to assure voters they understand everyday anxieties, particularly inflation’s strain on family budgets. She’s not alone: Some Democrats have warned for months their party is falling short when it comes to communicating to an increasingly exasperated public.
The Democrats obsess over social issues that rarely affect most Americans while ignoring most Americans’ issues.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer made the senators vote on a radical and disgusting abortion bill today to show off what we already know: Democrats, except for Manchin, are okay with infanticide.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi supposedly wants the chamber to vote on a gas-prices package before Memorial Day. I didn’t know she cared because all we’ve heard about is abortion.
Politico acknowledges that Biden spends more time pointing the finger than telling us how he wants to fight inflation:
President Joe Biden, too, has sought to convey his urgency, calling inflation his “top domestic priority” at a Tuesday press conference. He spoke about his own childhood, how his family had a “kitchen table” discussion when gas or food prices went up. He told Americans, “I know you’ve been frustrated.”But Biden also spent much of his time explaining the causes of inflation — using policy-heavy rhetoric that some Democrats who watched the speech compared to an economics lesson more than a political rallying cry. He echoed, as he did earlier this week at a private fundraiser in suburban Maryland, how little his administration can do to immediately fix the situation.
A Democrat staffer admits the obvious: “If you’re explaining, you are losing.”
The Democrats admit they need to work on messaging, but they still do not realize that people care about results and not blame. We are to the point where we want relief, and they’re looking at everyone but themselves:
Senior Democrats have since acknowledged that inflation is a highly complex economic problem, pointing to pandemic shutdowns, direct government payments approved to stave off poverty and, most recently, gas prices driven up by Russia’s war on Ukraine.[New Hampshire Rep. Ann] Kuster, who sits on the House Energy and Commerce panel, has been digging into antitrust concerns with oil companies to understand why gas jumped from $3.89 to $4.29 in her hometown in just a matter of weeks.
Maybe Kuster should look around her for that answer. Maybe Kuster should look at the government’s actions during these last three years.
Maybe, just maybe, all of them should go away and leave us alone. Stop spending. Stop printing.
Flashback for Porter:
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