We are just over a month into this new administration and already an all out war of rhetoric is breaking out between the mainstream media and the administration. Looks like they have come out of hibernation folks, and are taking a confrontational attitude with the White House.
Where were these people when we were being lied to? Why did they not do their jobs when Americans were being sent to their deaths in an unnecessary war?
Within the last few weeks the White House, and by extension those of us who support them, have been bombarded with criticism and a sort of scrutiny that would make Nixon blush. Could it be that the mainstream media has its own agenda?
Only now does the AP want to show us that they know how to FACT CHECK.
Kossack Josebrwn said it better than I ever could:
In a jumbled grab bag of opinions masquerading as financial news, they present a framework for Wall Street opposition to the president's plan under the guise of a red herring debate over the automobile and a smarmy, all or nothing implication that since "each and every" loan ever made cannot be scrutinized under an amorphous notion of fairness, then the housing plan must be wrong.
In point after tedious point the AP writers torture Obama's words. Oil imports peaked in 2005 and are off slightly. Therefore since the president said "we import more oil today than ever before", a parsing of the meaning of the word "now" is in order. Never mind that the Bush oil bubble caused a precipitous drop in demand, if you want to accept the AP's thinly veiled assertion, it looks like we really don't have an energy problem!
It just goes on and on. Obama's passing off debt to future presidents. Generational theft anyone? Republicans aren't at fault for the deregulation debacle. Democrats are! Reducing waste in government? Not gonna happen! Renewable energy? Forget it.
This is a roadmap for Republican talking points and Congressional intransigence for the next four years. Keep an eye on the AP, folks. Looks like they know who butters their bread.
Where the hell was the fact checking on Bush?!?
Only now does the St. Pete Times keep tabs on campaign promises.
Where the hell was the campaign promise tabs for the last 8 years?!? All of a sudden they care about accountability?
Only now does the White House press corp feel the obligation to ask confrontational questions.
From 538:
In a remarkable scene, Gibbs patiently and repeatedly explained that, no really, Obama actually won the election, that he'd explained exactly what he was going to do during the campaign, the American people understood and voted on it, and now he's doing it. During the campaign, Obama had pledged to cut taxes for 95% of American workers and end the catastrophic non-workingness of George Bush's trickle-down tax policy. Now, among some questioners, there seems to be confusion and alarm that Obama intends to implement that policy.
(The whole article is a must read, by the way).
These aren't right wing pundits, they are the mainstream media... liberal media bias my ass!
Then we have the mother load from Rick Santelli - what Santelli wants, what they all want, is the ability to criticize the administration without recourse. They want to ask questions and NOT be answered! This coward goes around on the talk circuit and blatantly lies that he's being threatened, PHYSICALLY THREATENED!! by the White House. And when Lauer catches him in the lie, he becomes the champion of cowardly back-peddling. What the hell does being married have to do with it?
The administration shouldn't call you out by name after you get national attention criticizing a policy? Who said that's not the way it should be done? Let's forget the enormous amount of notoriety and media attention being given to him, which I'm sure he's basking in, and let's instead concentrate on the fact that the media can no longer blatantly lie to the American people (the floor of the Chicago stock market does not represent America) and get away with it in this environment and with this administration.
Not to mention Santelli's original criticism is ludicrous. In any system of bureaucracy, there will be flaws and/or abuse by unscrupulous people. We know that there will be corruption in law enforcement, does that preclude that there should be no law enforcement? The programs and policies Obama set forth in his speech are an overall effort to fix the debacle created by all the participants, Republican and Democrat and especially the media, that have either caused or neglected their duties in preventing the multitude of crises before us.
These instances are the equivalent of the geese criticizing Capt. Sullenburger's landing of a massive plane in a river after their brethren took out the engines. There are lives and livelihoods at stake here. The president isn't going to take these attacks lying down, and we are 100% behind him. Media beware.
(cross posted from Progressive Junction)