The Watchdog with David Bozell

“Affordability” has become one of the words of the 2026 midterm elections.

What does it mean? Apparently, that depends on who is president.

Four years ago, Americans were being hammered by the worst inflation in four decades. Gas, groceries, housing, and virtually everything else were getting more expensive. Yet much of the liberal media spent the run-up to the 2022 midterms explaining why inflation was “transitory,” why the economy was actually doing quite well, and why Americans should not believe their own wallets.

Fast-forward to 2026. Inflation is substantially lower, even with a major war with Iran disrupting the global economy, and suddenly the media have discovered an affordability crisis.

The numbers expose the double standard.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, during the five-month period from March through July 2022, inflation under President Biden averaged 8.6 percent.

During those same five months this year, amid the Iran War, inflation under President Trump averaged 3.6 percent.

8.6 percent under Biden: Don’t panic. It is transitory.

3.6 percent under Trump: Economic catastrophe may be around the corner.

That is not economic analysis. That is political spin.

Consider The New York Times. In May 2022, with inflation raging, the Times actually published a story headlined “For Tens of Millions of Americans, the Good Times Are Right Now.” The paper declared that for employed Americans, economic prospects had not been so bright “since men landed on the moon.”

There was one small problem: two-thirds of American workers said their wages were not keeping pace with inflation.

CNBC’s Ron Insana went even further. Just weeks before inflation hit its 9.1 percent peak, he argued that policymakers should stop apologizing because inflation really was “transitory.” When reality refused to cooperate, he stretched the definition of “transitory” to mean a year or two.

Now consider Insana under President Trump. In June, he was warning that the Iran War raised the specter of a “1970s re-run.”

CNN has been playing the same game. Its David Goldman warned of a looming “economic catastrophe” and even claimed Americans would not see oil below $70 a barrel or gasoline below $3 a gallon until 2032.

CNN writers also warned readers in July, “Don’t be fooled: America’s inflation problems aren’t going away anytime soon.”

Then the actual numbers arrived.

Consumer prices declined 0.4 percent for the month. Annual inflation fell from 4.2 percent to 3.5 percent, beating economists’ expectations. It was the sharpest monthly decline in six years.

The facts had ruined another perfectly good narrative.

The contrast becomes even more remarkable when you remember how the media treated Americans struggling with energy prices under Biden. When gasoline surged past $4 a gallon in 2022, CBS late-night host Stephen Colbert lectured viewers that “a clean conscience is worth a buck or two.” He said he would happily pay $15 a gallon because he drove a Tesla.

Apparently, affordability was less urgent when Joe Biden was facing a midterm election.

This matters because the liberal media are already helping define the terms of the 2026 campaign. “Affordability” will be everywhere. Every grocery receipt, gasoline price, housing number, and inflation report will become part of the political narrative Americans hear between now and November.

MRC’s job is to make sure Americans see the other half of the story.

We expose the comparisons the media would rather ignore. We preserve the receipts. And when outlets that described 8.6 percent inflation as “transitory” now sound the economic alarm at 3.6 percent, we make sure millions of Americans know exactly what they are doing.

The numbers change. The president changes.

The media’s double standard does not.

Thank you for standing with MRC as we expose it.

Take it easy,David Bozell
President