Fear, failure, and decline in America

**David Pakman** (0:00)
Today we have a show about a political movement that is increasingly driven by fear, failure and decline. Donald Trump's promise to make life affordable has collapsed as food prices are at their most expensive in 50 years. There's a former top MAGA ally who is now saying, it's time to impeach Donald Trump. And even the hosts of Fox and Friends seem stunned by the president's incoherent answers. Trump then couldn't stay awake during Lindsey Graham's funeral. And new reporting suggests that he is privately obsessed with his own death. And speaking of death, Iran has now put out a video indicating that they have a plan to assassinate Melania Trump and Barron Trump. It's a very dark situation. And then speaking of darkness, Stephen Miller, one of Donald Trump's top policy people, is using Mussolini style rhetoric straight up. Just classic authoritarian rhetoric designed to make political violence feel like they're just defending themselves, even though they're suggesting violence. And at the same time, more demands for real, believable proof of life from Mitch McConnell. What can Kentucky Governor Beshear do and what can't he do? All of that and more today.
How are your grocery prices doing lately? I've been talking to a lot of voters recently, including some right wing voters, and they're all talking to me about I go to the grocery store, I spend one hundred and ten dollars and it feels like I get nothing. Now remember that Donald Trump promised to bring grocery prices down right away. He made endless promises of just the your corn will be so afraid of me that when I win, it will automatically go down in price and related promises. And what we actually have, if we look at prices, is Americans confronting the largest grocery price spike in half a century with the right wing New York Post warning that there is no relief in sight. Even the New York Post is reporting it. And this is part of a bigger story I've been covering, which is that Fox News and the New York Post, both publications, media outlets owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation are preparing for a situation in which even Republican voters are no longer aligned with the mago wing of the Republican Party.
Food prices are up 33 percent over the last seven years. Not all of that includes time that Donald Trump is president. Ground beef reached almost seven bucks a pound in June. That's 79 percent higher than in 2019
Food prices projected to rise another 3.1 percent this year, another 3.1 percent next year. Now, I always say hold elected officials accountable to their promises. Trump said grocery prices would come down while also saying the entire concept of grocery affordability is a scam. Everybody said the prices would come down and instead they're going to go up. Now the reporting is not from MSNOW or MSNBC or CNN or some left wing group trying to change or damage Trump politically. It's the New York Post, a reliably pro Trump newspaper, admitting that grocery prices have effectively reset at a permanently higher level and are going to keep going up. Now, I you all, I don't know how other shows out there are doing it.
I try to just be very transparent with you on these economic numbers. Trump didn't cause the entire 33 percent increase over the last seven years. Some of it was during the pandemic. Some of it was during the Biden administration. COVID disrupted supply chains. Russia's invasion of Ukraine affected grain markets and cattle herds are smaller. That does relate to the Trump administration. But then you've got labor and transportation costs that have gone up. But Trump ran on saying, I will fix it and I will fix it quickly. We're going to get the prices down. Groceries, cars, energy, everything. And he repeated it and promised that on day one, these prices were going to start to come down. And he attacked Kamala Harris for not immediately owning food costs and telling voters that she would get them down. She was being a little more realistic about what presidents can and can't do. And then once the election ended, suddenly Trump discovers that this was a promise he made over and over again. But it's kind of difficult to actually make good on it. And he even said weeks into his second term, it's hard to bring things down once they've gone up. It's very hard, which is true.
And it's interesting how that works. Before the election, Trump is the only person that can fix it. Everything will come down. Drill, baby drill, eggs, bacon, ground beef. They're going to be giving themselves away. And after the election, oh, prices are complicated. The economy is a difficult thing because there's so many factors that affect it, which is true. I would just rather get that up front. And to this end, I spoke about this on the Gavin Newscom podcast last week.