Deroy Murdock: Trump’s successful first year

Are you better off now than you were one year ago?

From the Potomac to Puget Sound, President Donald Trump and other Republicans should ask voters this exact question. Their answers should buoy GOP prospects for November’s mid-term elections.

Saturday marks one year since Trump’s inauguration. Since Jan. 20, 2017, Trump and the GOP Congress have mopped up much of the previous management’s mess. President Barack Obama’s hectoring, anti-business tone has been hushed. His class warfare, “global-warming” fetish, and lead-from-behindism are neutralized. Some 1,500 absurd and intrusive regulations, many of them Obama’s brainchildren, have been junked. And Obama’s taxaholism has been replaced with the deepest tax cuts since 1981.

These Trump/GOP reforms have over-delivered on all expectations. As Trump said Thursday in Pennsylvania: “The good news keeps pouring in.”

▪ Since Trump replaced Obama, GDP growth has climbed from 2.1 to 3.2 percent.

▪ The Dow Jones Industrial Average has soared from 19,827 to 26,017 on Thursday. This is splendid news for the 54 percent of Americans who own stocks, including retirement-account owners.

▪ The number of Americans employed has increased 1.8 million, up 1.2 percent.

▪ Unemployment has fallen from 4.7 to 4.1 percent, the lowest rate since 2001.

▪ The Consumer Confidence Index has advanced from 113.7 to 122.1, up 7.4 percent.

Unlike triumphant Republicans, Democrats achieved nothing last year. They are visionless and idea-free, other than to “Resist!” Trump.

Meanwhile, the left’s serial anti-Trump narratives have imploded, one after another:

▪ Trump is a Kremlin puppet! After digging for 18 months, the FBI and, later, special counsel Robert Mueller have unearthed zero evidence that Trump colluded with Moscow to win the White House. Meanwhile, Trump has yanked Vladimir Putin’s chain far more than Putin has pulled Trump’s strings. Sending offensive weapons to Ukraine, which might aim them at Russian troops, is hardly the behavior of Moscow’s marionette.

▪ Trump’s tax cut won’t help the middle class! Each and every congressional Democrat battled the tax-cut that has unleashed rampant economic growth.

Meanwhile, since the Trump/GOP tax cut kicked in, Americans for Tax Reform calculates that at least 190 companies have reported paying their workers bonuses of up to $3,000, boosting their pension deposits, and hiking base hourly wages up to and beyond $15. Some 2.2 million employees are savoring these $1 billion-plus in benefits.

▪ Trump is a racist! His alleged “shithole countries” remark about El Salvador, Haiti, and certain African states — reported by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) — now is disputed by Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and GOP senators Tom Cotton of Arkansas and David Perdue of Georgia. They all say that they did not hear Trump make that comment at a White House immigration meeting last week.

▪ Trump is mentally ill! Tuesday’s marathon press conference by non-partisan White House physician Ronny Jackson defanged “Fire and Fury” author Michael Wolff’s much-echoed claim that Trump is one Twitter storm away from being wheeled off in a straightjacket. On Trump’s insistence, Jackson administered the Montreal Cognitive Assessment. Trump scored 30 out of 30.

“The President is mentally very, very sharp; very intact,” said Jackson, a U.S. Navy rear admiral.

One year into the Trump/GOP era, everyday Americans are better off than they were when Obama left town. Washington Democrats? Not so much.

This story was originally published January 20, 2018 at 3:54 AM with the headline "Deroy Murdock: Trump’s successful first year."