Dwain Northey (Gen X)

History has many traditions. Some nations have tea ceremonies. Others have royal parades. The modern GOP, however, has perfected a far more flexible ritual: the ceremonial blaming of the nearest Democrat for something that already happened.

Take the current episode starring Vice President J. D. Vance. With gasoline prices climbing thanks to the latest geopolitical fireworks, Vance has heroically stepped forward to explain that the real culprit is… of course… Joe Biden. Never mind that the price spike followed the war initiated by President Donald Trump. In this storytelling method, cause and effect are treated more like loose acquaintances than close relatives.

Apparently, the logic goes something like this: if Biden once lived in the same century as the problem, he is probably responsible for it.

But this creative approach to timelines is not new. The GOP has a proud history of it. After the horrific attacks of September 11 attacks, some particularly imaginative voices eventually managed to work Barack Obama into the blame narrative—even though, at the time, Obama was serving as a state senator in Illinois and was roughly as responsible for global counter-terrorism policy as the guy running the hot-dog stand outside Wrigley Field.

Still, details like chronology can be terribly inconvenient when you’re trying to build a good political ghost story.

The pattern is simple:

Something goes wrong. Someone from the GOP helped cause it. A Democrat—preferably one who was nowhere near the controls—must be located immediately.

It’s less a governing philosophy and more a national game of political hot potato, except the potato is on fire and the same people who lit the match keep yelling, “Why would Biden do this?”

At this point, it almost feels unfair to single out Trump as the first president or GOP leader to blame others for his problems. That would ignore the long, storied tradition of creative historical editing that made the moment possible.

In fact, if gas prices go any higher, we may soon discover that Biden wasn’t the only one responsible. Give it time and someone will probably trace it all the way back to Obama… or Jimmy Carter… or possibly the inventor of gasoline itself.

Because in this particular political universe, responsibility works a lot like inflation: it always seems to drift away from the people currently holding power.