Politics
John Kennedy Urges GOP To Pretend They've Been To A Grocery Store Before November
By Mor Michael, . BSN Network. Satire.
WASHINGTON, D.C. Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) issued an urgent warning to his Republican colleagues this week, urging the party not to ignore voters' concerns about the rising cost of living ahead of the midterms, a concern he reportedly developed sometime in the last fiscal quarter.
Kennedy did not specify how long Republicans had been ignoring the issue, though economists estimate it has been roughly as long as Republicans have been in charge of ignoring it.
"People are struggling out there," Kennedy said in remarks that party strategists described as 'actionable' and 'not great timing.' "They're paying more for groceries, for gas, for housing. And they're going to want to know what we're going to do about it."
When asked what Republicans were going to do about it, Kennedy said the party needed to "listen" and "engage," which insiders interpreted as a no.
Sources inside the GOP caucus say the warning was received with what one aide described as "polite concern," which is different from regular concern in that it produces no policy and takes less time.
The Republican Party spent the previous administration cutting taxes for corporations and the previous decade arguing that inflation was a myth produced by people who did not understand the economy. They are now pivoting to arguing that inflation is real and the fault of people who do not understand the economy.
Kennedy's remarks come as polling shows American voters ranking cost of living as their top concern heading into the midterms, ranking it above healthcare, immigration, and the general sensation that everyone in Washington is arguing about something that happened four years ago.
A senior Republican strategist, speaking on background, confirmed the party is "fully committed to taking this seriously," which he defined as mentioning it in ads filmed in front of a gas station.
"We hear the American people," said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who last week introduced a resolution blaming the price of eggs on a climate agenda. "And we are going to fight for them every single day, except when we're fighting about something else, which is also for them."
Democrats, for their part, spent the week arguing about whether their own messaging on inflation was insufficiently progressive, sufficiently progressive, or too focused on being sufficiently progressive to actually address inflation, a debate expected to conclude sometime after the midterms.
Kennedy's office did not respond to follow-up questions about whether the senator had a specific plan, or whether the plan was the warning.
In the meantime, grocery prices remain elevated. The eggs are still nine dollars. Nobody in Washington has touched one.
The story we are making fun of: https://www.newsweek.com/john-kennedy-gop-cost-of-living-midterms-12523011