President hosts a roundtable on the economy, calls affordability 'a hoax,' and launches a one-million-dollar 'Trump Gold Card.'

OK. Wednesday at the White House. The day after the one-hour-forty-minute speech in Mount Pocono. The press shop had, sensibly, scheduled a recovery event. A roundtable. On affordability. In the Cabinet Room. With CEOs. The press release used the word affordability sixteen times. Sixteen. You can count.

The President, at the roundtable, on the record, on the transcript, referring to the affordability issue, called it a hoax. He used a partisan modifier. The modifier I will leave to the wire services. The noun was hoax. He said hoax. The CEOs, at the table, did not respond. The Dell guy was at the table. The other guys were at the table. Nobody at that table said the word affordability after the President said the word hoax.

Buddy. Affordability is a measured thing. The Bureau of Labor Statistics, when it had a commissioner, measured it. The Federal Reserve, on Wednesday morning, cut interest rates for the third time this year on the basis of it. The grocery price of eggs is up nineteen percent on the year. The grocery price of coffee is up fifteen. The grocery price of beef is up twelve. Those are wire numbers. You cannot hoax those numbers. Those numbers are on the receipt in your hand when you leave the Acme.

The same roundtable, in the same hour, the President announced the Trump Gold Card. The Gold Card. One million dollars per individual. Two million per corporation. Goes to a website that, per the President, would be live in thirty minutes. The website was, in fact, live in thirty minutes. The card is, per the announcement, an expedited residency product. An immigration product. Sold from the White House. From a roundtable on affordability.

Buddy. In the same press event. Not separate days. The same press event. Ordinary affordability is a hoax. The one-million-dollar immigration product is a deal.

I have run a casino floor for thirty years. I know what a high-roller room looks like. The high-roller room is not the room you take the family to for Sunday brunch. You do not, on the same Wednesday, tell the families the kitchen is fine and then quietly slide the high-rollers up the back stairs. The families notice. The families always notice. The families have eyes.

I am arguing with the television. The television is in the Cabinet Room. The Cabinet Room is selling Gold Cards.