October 24, 2010
AP appears to be following in the steps of Fox and the Washington Post as it joins the crusade for deficit reduction and ignores normal journalistic standards of objectivity. The first sentence of an article that asserts that the Obama administration will make deficit reduction the top priority of his second term describes the country as “a nation sick of spending.” There is zero evidence to support this position in the article. There are also no sources within the Obama administration cited for an article titled “Obama likely to focus on deficit in next two years.”
At one point the article tells readers that the country wants to see reduced spending, then lists a number of small programs which voters are willing to see cut if it is necessary to get deficits down. It would have been worth pointing out that these programs taken together would have only a very modest impact on spending even if they were eliminated altogether.
The article tells readers:
“Moving to the fore will be a more serious focus on how to balance the federal budget and pay for the programs that keep sinking the country into debt.” In fact, it is not “programs” that keep sinking the country in debt, but rather the recession, as can be easily shown. The main cause of the run-up in debt associated with the downturn was a falloff of tax revenue and an increase in spending on automatic stabilizers, like unemployment compensation.
The article then tells readers:
“In other times, that discussion might seem like dry, Washington talk. Not now. People are fed up with federal spending, particularly as many remain jobless.” Of course the reason that the federal government is spending more is because “many remain jobless.” The statement would be like saying that people are upset with the fire department’s use of water, especially at a time when the city is seeing so many fires. In the old days, reporters would have investigated how people could be so confused, if in fact they are, instead of trying to propagate such confusion.
The article later tells readers that:
“Obama defends the huge economic stimulus plan and the bailout of U.S. automakers, and doesn’t blame people for getting tired of all the spending.” A real reporter would have written this sentence without the word “huge.” It is an especially bizarre adjective since the size of the net stimulus from the government sector was about $150 billion a year, a bit more than one-tenth of the size of the lost private sector demand.
Finally, the article gets billions and trillion confused when it tells readers:
“The yearly budget deficit stands at $1.3 billion.”
This level of confusion is typical for this article which clearly is intended to promote a deficit reduction agenda rather than inform readers about the issues involved.
Comments