The latest political rage is the “Affordability Crisis” – which basically means inflation is eating away at your paycheck.

Ironically, the people who most loudly proclaim the Affordability Crisis are the ones who caused the problem in the first place by supporting over-spending and over-regulation by the government. They also think the answer is (curiously) more spending and more regulation.

Under Biden, inflation averaged over 5% per year, with one year being over 9%. By comparison, it was under 2% when Trump 45 left office, and was reduced to 2.7% in Trump 47’s first year. However, more must be done.

Biden’s attack on fossil fuels stifled production and inflated American energy prices. His promise to “end fossil fuels” wasted trillions of dollars on useless wind and solar, which inevitably inflated energy costs, making it less affordable to consumers. Remember $5 a gallon gas? By driving up the price of oil, he fed Putin’s war machine.

The totally unnecessary COVID lockdown (2020-2022) caused huge shortages due to low productivity. American school children lost over a full year of attainment because the Teachers’ Unions refused to work, even though COVID had little effect on children. How much did Fauci, Collins, and the teachers’ unions cost us?

In 2022 the Democrat Congress pushed Biden’s massive $2 Trillion (so-called) Inflation Reduction Act – IRA. They actually claimed they would fight inflation by printing money! The result was stagflation – a stagnant economy with more inflation. Only Jimmy Carter ever duplicated that feat.

Biden’s IRA increased taxes by about $1 trillion, thereby taking resources away from job-creating private investment. Biden then added nearly 100,000 non-productive government jobs, enabling bureaucrats to eat from the economic pie, while contributing nothing to it. Hint: more inflation.

The (Un)Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – was so poorly designed that it cannot survive without massive additional subsidies. Obama promised it would save us $2,500 per year, but it actually doubled our healthcare premiums, while making Health Insurance Executives very wealthy. Was Obama deliberately dishonest?

Healthcare is the second-highest component of U.S. inflation (behind colleges – also highly subsidized). Big Pharma profited hundreds of billions of dollars on defective COVID treatments mandated by Biden policies – most of it subsidized by taxpayers.

Thanks to Biden’s open border policy supported by Dems, our healthcare system has been overwhelmed by illegals that don’t pay their own way, while working Americans wait in line for care they actually paid for. Do Dems really care about affordability?

A recent study showed that half of New York City is on Medicaid, with 32% of public housing and 40% of New York City rent-controlled units being occupied by foreign nationals. Hence, American citizens are forced to subsidize housing and Medicaid for foreign nationals. Clearly, affordability problems are the direct result of Dem policies, and Mamdani is about to make it worse. The irony is rich.

Under Biden’s watch, $80 billion was lost to fraudulent small business loans, and another $200 billion was lost to fraudulent COVID “Economic Injury” grants – where the “injuries” were caused by Biden’s lockdowns. Yet, Chuck Schumer has openly vowed to reinstate the taxpayer rip-offs if he regains power.

The Washington Times just reported that 61% of illegal immigrant households are receiving Welfare benefits. Who is paying for that?

In Minnesota alone, investigators have found around $19 Billion in social services fraud, while nearly a $Billion in welfare cash was shipped overseas, likely funding Somali Al-Shabaab terrorists. Somali ISIS recruits used US education loans to pay for their travel to the Middle East, courtesy of US taxpayers.

Newly minted Virginia Dem Governor Spanberger just announced that she will deal with affordability by increasing taxes, adding 40 new taxes, pushing DEI, and wasting more taxpayer money on hyper-expensive “Green” energy. You can’t make this stuff up.

If affordability is a problem, why don’t New York Dems slash the state budget (and taxes) by 40% to bring it in line with other states? Why does New York annually spend $37,000 per student in public schools, when better-performing private schools costs half that?

If NY Dems are concerned about affordability, why do they force taxpayers to subsidize hyper-expensive Wind/Solar/BESS projects that will have no effect on climate, but will chase businesses and people out of NYS?

On a happier note, rental costs are down 6.5% across the nation since ICE began removing illegals, hence improving affordability for Americans.

Scott Axelson is a Jamestown resident. Michael Dee is a Silver Creek resident.