Townhall Review | Commentaries

President Biden’s first State of the Union was in need of the fact check industry we heard so much from during the Trump years.

One item stood out to me as particularly misleading. Biden said he was—and I quote—“The only president ever to cut the deficit by more than one trillion dollars in a single year.”

Well, yeah, but the only way to get that badge of honor is to have had a deficit which was pushing three trillion dollars to begin with. And of course, there’s the basic issue of adjusting for inflation. A trillion dollars just ain’t what it used to be because of debasing of the dollar.

Once one adjusts for the debasing of currency and size of previous deficit, Biden’s deficit drop is pretty run of the mill—especially in comparison with other times when calamities have come to an end. 

If the “Covid War” is over, then when to we get our post-War boom?

We need our economy back.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the past 14 years, we’ve witnessed three crises involving Russian incursions against its neighbors. What did all three events have in common? High oil prices—and the broader issue of global inflation.

This isn’t happening now because Putin is a tyrant: Putin has always been a tyrant. It’s not happening because America’s foreign affairs ruling class is clueless, because they’ve been clueless for a long time. 

The variable is oil prices. 2008 invasion of Georgia; 2014 annexation of Crimea and now the 2022 war against Ukraine, all followed upon oil price spikes. Russia is a Petro-state. There is a direct correlation between oil prices and Russian income and Russia’s ability to finance imperial adventures. 
 
The most powerful way to change the calculus for Putin is to starve the Russian state of revenues by simply unleashing American energy ingenuity. 

Oil is now at nosebleed high levels. If we can drive it down, we can drive down Putin’s ability to feed his war machine. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

“Iran got much more than it could expect. Much more,” brags Vladimir Putin’s negotiator to the negotiations to reinstate Barack Obama’s Iran deal. Not only did Russia deliver a better deal for the Iranian terrorist-financing theocrats, Mikhail Ulyanov bragged that China got in on the act too. “Our Chinese friends were also very efficient and useful as co-negotiators,” Ulyanov bragged.

Ulyanov’s declaration has all but confirmed that a national-security disaster authored by Russia and China may come in days.

How is this good news—in any way—for the US? And better yet, why are we outsourcing our national security to Putin’s regime and Xi Jinping? Either Biden is desperate for a foreign-policy win, or he wants access to more foreign sources of oil in order to avoid the strategic benefit of expanded American production.

This latter potential would explain Biden’s disgraceful wooing of Nicolas Maduro—the same Venezuelan dictator who has held six American oil executives on trumped-up charges for four years.

The moral compass of the Biden administration badly needs recalibration.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Look at people’s priorities. They reveal everything about who they are.

Last week, as Russia ravaged Ukraine and the President delivered the State of the Union Address, Senate Democrats were busy thinking about … abortion.

The most charitable explanation is they were ashamed of the so-called Women’s Health Protection Act, and hoped to advance it when the country was too distracted to notice.

It’s an ugly piece of work. It would nullify virtually any state laws regulating abortion. The bill would prohibit bans on abortion for even the most discriminatory reasons—including disability or gender. States would be forbidden to protect unborn babies old enough to survive outside the womb. They couldn’t enact even reasonable regulations like waiting periods, informed consent laws, ultrasound requirements—even abortion clinic safety standards. 

Someone please explain to me how that “protects” women’s health.

This kind of extremism is chilling. Thankfully, the bill failed. 

But as long as they have majorities—today’s radical ideologues are sure to try again.

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Wendy Sherman—our current Deputy Secretary of State—was speaking before a House Committee last week.

She was asked a very simple question:

“Should Europe and the West divest Western Europe, uh, in the Western world, divest of Russian energy. In your opinion?”

Her answer: “No. I think that there is a lot of rethink and there will be about energy security worldwide…”

What is that nonsense? There’s a lot of “rethink”? This is just beltway speak. It’s Aspen Institute leftwing nuttery speak. 

There will be blood on the hands of this entire administration if they do not move immediately to stop buying Russian oil.

They are financing Russia’s genocidal campaign against the Ukrainian people. 

They are allowing it to happen. 

This mirrors what we saw in the Obama years: President Biden just does not understand the difference between good and evil in everyday life.

Putin is evil. Putin is a dictator. Putin is a tyrant.

Our nation needs to stop buying Russian oil today. We should have done it earlier, but there is no excuse not to do it now.

President Biden: It’s time to lead.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hoping Putin stops is apparently the strategy that the Biden administration is pursuing.

Though there have been some encouraging points of clarity—like the commitment from President Biden to defend “every inch” of NATO land — the administration has not been consistent in sending the sort of strong message required to get the attention of a leader whose rising instability is a danger to the world.

Putin might be concluding that the lack of comprehensive sanctions for his attack on Ukraine might mean the United States and its allies are not willing to pay the sort of price that would back up their words with action.

Putin sees a West that avoids doing difficult things if they result in inconvenience. Would a paranoid sociopath conclude that NATO’s Article 5 is real, or suspect that, if tested, it might evaporate?

Starting with President, our nation’s resolve needs to match that of Reagan during the Cold War: “Here’s my strategy on the Cold War,” the Gipper said, “We win, they lose.”

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What an opportunity squandered. 

With his first State of the Union address, President Biden could have shown he gets it. Americans are besieged by inflation, rising fuel prices, skyrocketing crime, an open border. They are uneasy about Russia’s brutal and unprovoked war on Ukraine. He could have acknowledged some of his policies must change—and that they will. 

He could have pivoted.

Instead, Biden offered a pablum of big promises, leavened with large doses of gaslighting. He vowed to “end cancer as we know it” but said nothing about curbing inflation or securing energy independence. He pledged to cap insulin prices—reinstating a policy he reversed upon entering office. He denounced open borders and defunding the police, unaware or undisturbed that he and his party have enthusiastically embraced both.

All countries have challenges. But our leaders must face them and fix them. Biden concluded by insisting America was stronger today than it was a year ago. Please, Mr. President. We can handle the truth, and we need to know you see it.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Joe Biden has approached the crisis in Ukraine just as he has every acute issue his administration has faced: Reactively, leading—as they say—from behind. From the supply chain crisis to record inflation, the collapse in Afghanistan and Biden’s abandonment of thousands of Americans, right up to Vladimir Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine and energy policy, Biden has barely acted tactically, let alone strategically.

Even as the U.S. ramps up the sanctions, Biden trails other Western leaders. Biden only agreed to limited SWIFT sanctions when Germany and eastern Europe got out ahead of him. Switzerland, of all places, threatened asset seizures before the U.S. finally targeted Russia’s central bank and sovereign funds. 

Biden had an opportunity to keep Putin at bay by aggressively producing oil and natural gas—through efforts like the Keystone pipeline—to keep prices low and Russian profits minimal. Even in this crisis, Biden wants to avoid sanctions on Russian energy sales to keep even higher gas prices from further undermining his domestic support. 

Leading from behind is not leading at all. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the run-up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Putin offered a very clear manifesto. He gave it in a speech that could only accurately be called “The World According to Vladimir Putin.” 

He began by speaking of Ukraine as not even being a real country. He said, “I would like to emphasize once again that Ukraine is not just a neighboring country for us, it is an integral part of our own history, culture, and spiritual space.”

He went on for a full hour, claiming that Ukraine was simply invented by Russia itself. He made clear that he is willing to forego Leninist communism to regain Soviet glory, the glory of what had been the Russian empire.

Vladimir Putin is entirely responsible for his actions—and like so many autocrats seeking to gain conquest, he simply lies. And he also has invented a history tailor-made to justify what we’re seeing unfold in Ukraine right now.  

But it actually cannot be justified and somewhere in that head, Vladimir Putin really does know it.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

President Putin has very quickly precipitated a crisis in Europe with Russia’s military attack on Ukraine. We are witnessing the largest military invasion in Europe since the Second World War.

Vladimir Putin has finally begun to play out his hand.

So: How are we to understand where things are going to go from here?

Thomas Friedman, writing for the New York Times, argues that the “only place to be for understanding this war is inside Russian President Vladimir Putin’s head.” That's right. 

This is a war that ultimately is not traced to Russia or to Ukraine, but to the head of Vladimir Putin. This is his war. This is his doing.

Friedman summarizes, “Putin is the most powerful unchecked Russian leader since Stalin. And the timing of this war is a product of his ambitions, strategies, and grievances.”

What we see here is what happens when you mix a powerful military and a dictator with political and military opportunity.

Putin really is the singular leader of virtually every dimension of Russia. 

That is an extremely dangerous and inherently deadly proposition.

Watch carefully … and watch prayerfully.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.