It’s a phrase generally linked to Ronald Reagan: “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” The Republican asked it the first time in 1980, as a way of making the case against then-President Jimmy Carter, and Reagan asked it again four years later, during his re-election bid.
Most voters answered the question the way Reagan wanted him to, and he won both races with ease. But in the process, as we’ve discussed, the GOP icon created a standard that comes up anew every four years, as the electorate is asked to consider whether the status quo marks an improvement over the recent past.
It’s also a standard that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy seems eager to embrace, but in a different context.
About a month ago, during a debate over the Democrats’ ambitious reconciliation package, McCarthy took to the floor and asked a tweaked version of Reagan’s phrase: “Answer me this question: Is America better off today than they were two years ago?”
Grammatical concerns aside, the California Republican pitched a very similar line last week. The Hill reported on McCarthy’s prebuttal to President Joe Biden’s speech on democracy:
“Democrats control every committee in Congress responsible for our nation’s safety, our prosperity, our education, and our government oversight. They are in charge of every federal agency responsible for law enforcement, for drug enforcement, for Homeland Security, for our border security,” he said. “Are you better off?”
The political strategy isn’t subtle: With polls showing Americans dissatisfied with the nation’s direction, the House minority leader wants them to reject the incumbent Democratic majority and vote for a dramatic shift to the right. If folks don’t believe they’re “better off” than they were two years ago, the argument goes, then they should necessarily rally behind the opposition party that isn’t in power.
There is, however, a fundamental problem with McCarthy’s pitch: The United States is most definitely better off than it was two years ago. The Republican leader wasn’t making the case for throwing Democrats out of office; he was inadvertently making the case that the nation should stay the course.
Does McCarthy remember what things were like in the summer of 2020? There was civil unrest in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. The national unemployment rate in August 2020 was 8.4% (it’s 3.7% now). Covid was claiming the lives of over 1,500 Americans per day — a number that was climbing — and the first vaccine shots were still months away. The United States’ international reputation and credibility were in the toilet. The question isn’t whether the United States is better off now than it was two years ago. The question is why Kevin McCarthy doesn’t know the answer. To be sure, there’s ample room for conversation about how much further we have to go. What’s more, if Republicans want to have a discussion about how much credit Democrats and their legislative successes deserve for helping turn things around, that sounds like a debate worth having. But if the House minority leader is convinced we were better off two years ago, he either has an exceedingly short memory or he’s confused about what “better” means.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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