July 06, 2011
The Post reported on President Obama’s assertion that it is necessary to make large cuts in projected deficits, telling readers:
“Obama weighed in Tuesday, noting that a remarkable bipartisan consensus has emerged about the scope and severity of the nation’s debt problem. ‘Most of us already agree that to truly solve our deficit problem, we need to find trillions in savings over the next decade, and significantly more in the decades that follow,’”
It would have been more appropriate to use the term “asserting” rather than “noting.”
Noting implies that the claim that President Obama is making about a consensus is true. It is not.
People familiar with economics know that the main reason that the country is facing large budget deficits is because of the economic crisis created by the collapse of the housing bubble. Contrary to President Obama’s assertion, the main way to solve the deficit problem is to get the economy back to full employment.
This is yet another case where the Post has ignored journalistic standards in a front page story to foist its editorial position on readers.
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