President Joe Biden has unveiled a three-part plan to fight inflation — or at least make people think he is fighting inflation. One part of the plan involves having government agencies “fix” the supply chain problems that have led to shortages of numerous products. Of course, any attempt by the government to solve the supply chain problems (which were caused by prior government interventions such as shutting down the economy for over a year) will not just fail to solve the supply shortages but will create new problems.

Deficit reduction is another part of Biden’s anti-inflation plan. However, Biden is not proposing cutting welfare or warfare spending. Instead, his deficit reduction plan consists of “tax reforms to increase revenue,” which is DC-speak for tax increases. History shows that tax increases unaccompanied by spending cuts end up increasing the deficit.

The last and most important part of Biden’s inflation plan is recognizing that the Federal Reserve “has the primary responsibility to control inflation.” President Biden has pledged to “respect the Fed’s independence,” unlike former President Trump, who Biden accused of “demeaning the Fed” by subjecting the central bank to mean Tweets.

It is hard to believe that someone who has been in DC as long as Joe Biden really thinks Donald Trump was the first President to try to influence the Fed’s conduct of monetary policy. Since the Fed’s creation, Presidents have used public and private pressure to “convince” the Fed to tailor monetary policy to advance their policy and political goals. When it comes to “demeaning” the Fed, Trump has nothing on Lyndon Johnson, who, frustrated over the Fed’s refusal to tailor monetary policy to finance the Great Society and Vietnam war, threw the Fed chairman against a wall.

By “passing the buck” on inflation, Biden no doubt hopes to deflect blame from himself and his party before the midterm elections. Unlike Biden’s previous inflation scapegoats — greedy corporations and Vladimir Putin — the Fed actually is responsible for creating and controlling inflation.

Price increases in specific sectors of the economy may be caused by a variety of factors, but economy-wide price increases are always the result of the Federal Reserve’s easy money policies. Inflation is actually the act of money-creation by the central bank. Widespread price increases are a symptom, not a cause, of inflation.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell remains committed to more rate increases this year. However, even if the Fed follows through on all its projected rate increases, rates will still be at historic lows. While there are those on the Fed board who want more and bigger rate increases, others worry that going too far too fast in increasing rates will cause a recession. Already many economic experts are saying America should be prepared for increase in unemployment caused by the Fed’s efforts to vanquish inflation. This “tradeoff” between high prices and high unemployment illustrates the insanity for our monetary policy.

Treasury Secretary and former Fed Chair Janet Yellen and Chairman Powell have both admitted they were wrong to publicly dismiss inflation as “transitory.” The fact that the two most recent Fed chairs made such a huge blunder (or purposely refused to admit what was clear to many people for over a year), shows the folly of relying on a secretive central bank to manage monetary policy. Instead of “respecting the Fed’s independence,” President Biden should work with Congress to audit, then end the Fed.

Ron Paul

Tyrants and sociopaths weaken you by taking everything away from you. But they always miscalculate: Because when you have nothing left to lose, their vulnerability rises. Especially in a place like America, where so much is being lost.

Every dictatorship in history has collapsed. You can’t truly be strong when you’re counting on the weakness of your victims to survive. Joe will not always be laughing.

Michael J. Hurd

It’s so funny. Most of the people I still see wearing masks are YOUNG people, late teens and twenty-somethings. I keep reading that two-thirds of young people (at a minimum) want some form of socialism; and that they hate capitalism. Yet they are 100 percent dependent on the judgment of PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES, who work for a profit, to tell them to keep wearing masks, get vaccines, etc. The government doctors they follow faithfully, like Fauci, become millionaires through their open alliances with those companies.

I am in favor of capitalism, and against government. I want big (and small) profit-making companies, but I want government to be TOTALLY UNINVOLVED. No subsidies, and no regulations (outside of fraud). Yet most of these young people are AGAINST capitalism. They don’t think people (other than themselves, of course) should be making big profits (or maybe any profits). So how do they justify following BLINDLY the will of gigantic, largely unaccountable (at least with COVID), profit-making pharmaceutical companies?

Michael J. Hurd

I suspect the Kremlin has concluded that the limited intervention in Ukraine was a mistake. I don’t mean that the Kremlin will fail in its effort to drive all Ukrainian military units out of Donbass. The mistake the Kremlin made was in thinking that the military intervention could be limited.

The US and NATO are now involved in the conflict. Ukraine is being supplied with heavy weapons and with training in their use. Washington has now arranged to send missiles capable of hitting Russian territory. Clearly, there is nothing limited about the conflict.

The dilemma for Russia is that by confining its military operations to the Donbass region in east Ukraine, Western weapons are accumulating in west Ukraine where it is possible to raise an army to replace the one the Russians are destroying in Donbass. Whereas the Kremlin will succeed in liberating Donbass, it will fail in its goal to demilitarize Ukraine and turn Ukraine into a neutral state unless the intervention is expanded to all of Ukraine.

Additionally, the conflict has also expanded by the request of neutral Finland and Sweden to join NATO. The addition of Finland to NATO would greatly expand the presence of NATO on Russia’s borders, which the intervention in Ukraine intended to prevent.

The Kremlin warned that countries that intervene in the conflict would be treated as combatants, but has failed to take any action. The Russian threat is so disregarded that even militarily insignificant Denmark openly sends weapons to Ukraine. The consequence will be more intervention by the US and NATO.

A dangerous situation has been created by the Kremlin’s declaration of red lines that it does not enforce. Delayed and limited Russian responses to Washington’s provocations are the reason for the present conflict, and delayed and limited responses are the reason the present conflict is likely to spin out of control.

It was obvious that the Kremlin needed a quick and total conquest of Ukraine to prevent the expansion of the war by Western intervention and to intimidate non-NATO Europe from abandoning neutrality. Instead, the limited Russian action has given Washington months to widen the conflict and to keep the conflict going after Ukraine’s defeat in Donbass. Western propaganda has even succeeded in convincing the Western populations that Ukraine is winning the war.

The Kremlin, it seems, is unable to comprehend that there is no peaceful or diplomatic solution. It was the Kremlin’s false hope for the delusional Minsk Agreement that gave Washington 8 years in which to train and equip a Ukrainian force to retake the Donbass republics. The entire conflict could have been avoided if the Kremlin had accepted the request of Donbass to be reunited with Russia like Crimea. This strategic error by the Kremlin followed a larger and earlier error when the Kremlin stood aside and permitted Washington’s overthrow of the Ukrainian government and installation of a puppet regime hostile to Russia.

I admire the Kremlin’s restraint and disinclination to resort to violence. The question is whether this behavior encourages Washington to move more aggressively with the Wolfowitz doctrine against countries that are obstacles to Washington’s hegemony.

Russia can again sit on her hands, as she did during the previous 8 years, while Washington raises and trains yet another Ukrainian army, or she can deliver a quick knockout blow to Ukraine, replace the government, and hunt down and terminate all Nazi and CIA elements, or she can call it quits. Otherwise, the chances are high that increasing Western intervention will spin the conflict out of control.

The Kremlin sees this itself and warns of the prospect of nuclear war, but does not take the necessary action to foreclose this prospect.

Johnny Depp will always be remembered as the first man to win an argument with a woman.

Michael J. Hurd, Daily Dose of Reason