The other day, for reasons that I won’t go into in detail, I visited the White House twitter page. This is something that I generally avoid doing, because the Biden administration’s way of looking at the world is so different than mine, that I inevitably become angry and frustrated when reading their public statements on any issue.
The White House’s recent tweets are no exception.
The first thing that stood out to me was the Biden administration’s wrong and illogical way of looking at taxation and spending. Tweet after tweet mentioned the “cost” of tax cuts and how former president Trump allegedly increased the national debt and how “tax giveaways” would “add $3.5 trillion to the debt.” These tweets ignore the fact that tax cuts do not cost anything, because a tax cut does not consist of spending any money but rather consists of collecting less revenue. These tweets also ignore the fact that tax cuts are not “giveaways,” because they do not entail giving anything away to anyone, but rather reducing the amount of money that is being taken. This is so obvious that it shouldn’t even need to be stated, but stealing less of a person’s money is not the same thing as giving that person money.
The other thing that stood out to me is that the Biden administration, to put it bluntly, doesn’t look at people as individuals. It looks at people as members of groups based on gender, race, age, relationship status, and other demographic categories.
On the issue of “gun violence,” why does the Biden administration only care about children? Silly me, but I thought that it is sad whenever an innocent person is lost to violence, no matter how old the person is. But apparently, to the Biden administration, adults’ lives are not important.
In this tweet, in addition to ageism, the Biden administration also displays a lack of understanding of basic moral principles. Guns are not a killer of anyone. People using guns might be the number one killer of children in America, but to equate people who use guns with the guns themselves completely ignores the role of the individual people who choose to commit mass shootings.
Celebrating mothers is perfectly fine, but people who don’t have children also deserve to be celebrated.
Isn’t it also possible for junk fees to add up to hundreds of dollars a year for hardworking people? Apparently, to the White House, it’s perfectly fine for single people without children to pay unfair charges to hotels, airlines, and cable companies, as long as families don’t have to pay those charges. Protecting individual people from junk fees apparently is not important to the Biden administration.
Obviously, anti-Semitism is a bad thing. But instead of singling out Jewish people for special protections, why not simply treat everyone equally? Why not condemn, and take action against, all prejudice and discrimination? Second Gentleman Emhoff claims that the administration is taking “bold action” to confront bigotry and hate in all their forms, but the administration’s public statements and policy positions demonstrate otherwise. The administration regularly goes out of its way to condemn bigotry and hate against certain groups, while remaining completely indifferent to much more egregious and widespread bigotry and hate against other people and groups who happen not to be politically favored.
Here, the Biden administration again singles out a group of people for special recognition based on their demographic characteristics. People of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander descent are praised for shaping and strengthening the fabric of our nation, while everyone else is ignored.
Putting money back in the pockets of hardworking people seems not to matter to the Biden administration. Capping the price of insulin saves money for seniors who are single, just as it does for those who are part of families. But apparently, the financial well-being of single people is not considered important.
In conclusion, I want a president who values people as people, not a president who values people only due to their role as part of a family, or their membership in a particular demographic group. I want a president who treats everyone equally and includes everyone, not a president who singles out favored groups for special praise, recognition, and attention while treating everyone else like chopped liver. Every person is an individual, and every person matters by virtue of being an individual person. I want a president who recognizes that basic moral fact.
