Paul Krugman:
Lies, Damned Lies, And Elections
As we wait to see whether the GOP nominates the guy who claims that his health plan was nothing like Obamacare, oh no, or the guy who claims that Freddie Mac paid him $1.6 million as a historian, one thing is obvious: this election is going to pose a major challenge to the news media. How will they handle the lies problem?
I’m not optimistic.
Back in 2000, George W. Bush made a discovery of enormous consequence: you could base a whole political campaign on claims that were flatly untrue, like the claim that your big tax cuts for the wealthy went to the middle class, or the claim that diverting Social Security funds into private accounts would strengthen the system’s finances, and reporting would never point this out. That’s when I formulated my doctrine that if Bush said the earth was flat, headlines would read Views Differ on Shape of Planet.
All indications are, however, that Campaign 2012 will make Campaign 2000 look like a model of truthfulness. And all indications are that the press won’t know what to do — or, worse, that they will know what to do, which is act as stenographers and refuse to tell readers and listeners when candidates lie. Because to do otherwise when the parties aren’t equally at fault — and they won’t be — would be “biased”.
Gee Paul, you’re being a little disingenuous yourself. You work for the news media. What are YOU gonna do? Back in 2000, the newspaper you work for spent a lot of time trying to convince people that Al Gore was an habitual liar. Have you ever fact-checked their reporting?
Let me rewrite that middle paragraph:
Back in
20002008,George W. BushBarack Obama made a discovery of enormous consequence: you could base a whole political campaign on claims that were flatly untrue, like the claim thatyour big tax cuts for the wealthy went to the middle classyou consistently opposed the war in Iraq, or the claim thatdiverting Social Security funds into private accounts would strengthen the system’s finances, and reporting would never point this outHillary Clinton was running a racist campaign. That’s when I formulated my doctrine that ifBushObama said the earth was flat, headlines would readViews Differ onHillary Lied About Shape of Planet.
Everything Obama says is a lie, including “and” and “the.”
You are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and stayed not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
– John 8:44
Filed under: Barack Obama, Disingenuous Democrats, Media Zombies, Uncategorized Tagged: | Barack Obama
Then there’s Jonathan Martin at Politico….who blindsided Cain with sexual allegations…..
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/69710.html
I guess he knows what’s best for us too, eh?
Yes Jonathan Martin is the one who ridiculed, along with Andrea Mitchell, the notion of a Journalist’s code of ethics. Over this story in fact.
http://dailycaller.com/2011/11/07/msnbcs-andrea-mitchell-politicos-jonathan-martin-snicker-at-journalisms-code-of-ethics-video/
Of course Mrs. Greenspan would’ve had to have dismissed a journalist’s code of ethics years ago.
Vermin.
Yup. I’m not over it either.
I find it jaw-dropping how much of a pass Obama gets at every turn.
Every day there is another preposterous charge by the Dems & the media as they panic about 2012–something that they are blatantly guilty of themselves. Are they deliberately lying and/or delusional? It’s hard to imagine they are that stupid, to not see their own relentless bias and hypocrisy.
Is this seriously shaping up to be Newt/Obama? Just when you think it can’t get anymore depressing…out of 311 million people, this is the best we can do?!
Depressing and infuriating. If it turns out to be the newt v teh fraud- we are being given the choice between two assshats. Who have one major thing in common. Both have a history of trying to destroy Clintons.
Seriously sick “choice” Are both sides TRYING to make Clinton voters stay home?
This should be the write-in primary. Dems should write-in Hillary and GOPers should write in Palin.
That is my plan. Not sure if I am going to write in Hillary/Bayh or Hillary/Sarah!
VM – check your email
myiq, I sked a post.
Good, because I hate Mondays.
I feel like breaking my rule about no drinking booze before breakfast.
For a few seconds I almost forgot that Newt’s crazy.
Amazing, ain’t it?
Newt is not crazy. He’s two-faced and speaks with forked tongue. Big diff.
Seems fair
That candidate’s forum that Huckabee just did was great, in terms of actually creating a forum where people could become acquainted with the candidates. It was almost like real journalism. None of the candidates themselves really impressed me, but it was a good way of presenting them without any biases, opinions, and gotcha moments.
The press, and a lot of the politicos, including Krugman, want dirty laundry. They want conflict, controversy, ugliness. The problem is we don’t get accurate information when various pundits are all about themselves and their opinions. It’s all about them and their egos and actual political journalism just goes under the bus.
My biggest problem with the way the media covers candidates is the inconsistency. Take Obama and Palin for example.
Obama wrote an autobiography and the media took it as gospel. They wanted to inspect Palin’s uterus.
They should have been treated exactly the same – and I would rather see all candidates getting Palinized than getting a free ride.
There is a double standard, but I think maybe we spend too much time bringing smut up on candidates. Clinton for example, was a great president in spite of his dirty laundry. I think there are many things we don’t need to know, like Palin’s alleged bogus affair with a basketball player in college. True or false, something like that says nothing about her ability to lead.
In a way, Obama was vetted, at least we knew of most of the controversies, but what the media did was worse, they spun the issues away. He’s just a guy in my neighborhood, he’s just the minister of a church i sat in for 20 years….
I’d enjoy muckracking media politics and SNL more if they included Obama as a target.
OT but ROFL- I picked this link up at Uppity’s
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/occupier_gets_an_occupation_o8x0D8DkpsWB60rSMhcEgP
She got a job with one of the big, evil, greedy capitalist Wall St firms!
Except for the PostHole Digger it sounds like someone I know.
ROFL- I had the same thought!
http://biggovernment.com/tobytoons/2011/12/05/wanting-still-another-4-hope-and-change-are-out-the-door/
this has to be one of the best pictures of the backtrack presidency
http://money.cnn.com/2011/12/05/news/economy/gasoline_export/index.htm?hpt=hp_t2
what is wrong with this picture???
The USA is EXPORTING more gasoline then ever