CNN, ABC, and CBS's morning newscasts on Tuesday all touted the Philadelphia Daily News's thinly-veiled comparison of Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler on their front page. On Good Morning America, George Stephanopoulos pointed out to Trump himself that the headline "says, 'The New Furor Over Donald Trump,' showing you raising your hand in a pretty demonstrative gesture." On New Day, CNN's Chris Cuomo held a picture of the front page on-camera: "You wound up on the Philadelphia Inquirer (sic) front page like Hitler! They got you in a personage of Hitler right now!"
Asia
By Tom Blumer | November 27, 2015 | 11:24 PM EST
Twenty years of economic growth averaging less than 1 percent have failed to convince Japan's leaders — and apparently its citizens — that Keynesian-style government spending and handouts are not the answer to turning that long-suffering nation's economy around.
So the Shinzo Abe government, fresh from learning that the country is in yet another recession — its fifth since 2008 — is doing more of the same, while counting on press shills around the world like the Associated Press's Elaine Kurtenbach to be gentle in their coverage. Kurtenbach cooperated as expected early Friday morning (bolds and numbered tags are mine):
By Tom Blumer | November 16, 2015 | 12:35 AM EST
Japan's two-decade romance with Keynesian economics has led to another betrayal — and yet the press and all the supposedly smart economists and analysts seem to believe that just one more fling might bring about a different result.
The Land of the Rising Sun, aka the Land of the Two-Decade Zombie Economy, has just reported an annualized contraction of 0.8 percent in the third quarter. The decline, following a revised 0.7 percent second-quarter downturn, means that the country is once again in a recession — its second in three years (Update: And fifth since 2008). Oh, but don't worry. It's no big deal. The Associated Press insists that it's only a "technical" recession, and more Keynesian "stimulus" could set things right — even though such measures, in place to varying degrees since the 1990s, have consistently failed to bring about sustained, meaningful recoveries:
By Jeffrey Meyer | September 6, 2015 | 8:42 AM EDT
Appearing on Sunday’s Today, Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd conceded that President Obama obtaining the 34 Senate votes to sustain a presidential veto on the Iran deal was not a victory but rather “about avoiding defeat. It’s surviving.” NBC’s Peter Alexander surprisingly framed the Iran vote not as a victory for the White House and actually wondered “is this a victory or is it more that he’s just avoiding defeat here?”
By Jeffrey Meyer | September 3, 2015 | 10:43 AM EDT
After Democratic Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland became just the 34th supporter in the Senate of the Iran deal, the “Big Three” networks all cheered the impeding vote as a major “victory” for the president while offering up zero soundbites from the majority of Congress and public who oppose the deal.
By Curtis Houck | August 25, 2015 | 10:19 PM EDT
On Tuesday night, CBS and NBC teamed with Spanish-language networks Telemundo and Univision to hide from their viewers news that U.S. Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy has been using a private e-mail server to conduct government business and send sensitive material. Surprisingly, ABC’s World News Tonight stepped up to the plate with a scant 50-second report on this new e-mail scandal by chief White House correspondent and a lead in by fill-in anchor and Clinton Foundation donor George Stephanopoulos.
By Tom Blumer | August 17, 2015 | 1:20 PM EDT
Japan, once a feared world economic powerhouse already at "two decades of little or no real economic growth," just reported that its economy contracted during the second quarter at an annual rate of 1.6 percent.
The common thread throughout the two-decade slump has been the alleged need for ever-increasing levels of Keynesian "stimulus." Apparently refusing to believe there are any other viable alternatives to what hasn't worked for 20 years, the world's press is expecting — and creating pressure for — even more "stimulus."
By Tom Blumer | August 6, 2015 | 1:16 AM EDT
How absolutely serendipitous it is that alleged comedian and actual White House propagandist Jon Stewart’s last broadcast of The Daily Show is today, August 6, the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan.
You see, Stewart, whose influence is especially nefarious when he is revising and distorting history for his relatively young audience, committed his most outrageous such act when, in a 2009 interview with Cliff May, he agreed that U.S. President Harry S. Truman should be considered a "war criminal" for approving that horrific but necessary bombing mission.
By Matthew Balan | July 9, 2015 | 12:42 PM EDT
On Wednesday, the New York Post's Andrea Morabito spotlighted Dr. Sanjay Gupta's appearance on CNN's New Day earlier in the day, where he issued a "clarification," as he put it, about apparently mixing up two earthquake victims he treated during the aftermath of the April 2015 earthquake in Nepal. Morabito noted that Dr. Gupta is "now under fire for some Brian Williams-like exaggerations of his surgical exploits."
By Curtis Houck | May 27, 2015 | 1:01 AM EDT
At the top of Tuesday’s Kelly File on the Fox News Channel, host Megyn Kelly tore into President Obama and his remarks at Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day where “America's commander in chief celebrate[d] the absence of a major war, while his own top security advisers warn the American people directly that the danger right now is greater than at any time in a half century.”
What Would We Do Without Socialist European Experts? NYT: 'Low U.S. Rail Spending Leads to Poor Safety, Experts Say'
By Clay Waters | May 21, 2015 | 12:23 PM EDT What would America do without socialist European experts to guide us? New York Times reporter Nicola Clark delivered the latest Euro-flavored knee-jerk response to the deadly Amtrak crash. Clark assumed the crash was caused by insufficient funding, even though findings indicate the train was going double the speed limit around a tight curve when it derailed: "Low U.S. Rail Spending Leads to Poor Safety, Experts Say."
By Tom Blumer | April 28, 2015 | 12:47 PM EDT
Japan just reported yet another awful retail sales result. Though it far exceeeded predictions of a 7.3 percent fall, the 9.7 percent March 2015 plunge compared to March 2014 doesn't reveal much, as March 2014 saw a splurge at the stores ahead of a steep sales tax increase which took effect on April 1. The really telling figure is the 1.9 percent seasonally adjusted dive compared to February.
Proving once again that they haven't learned, and probably never will, the press and financial commentators are really hoping that the government will respond, after two decades of Keynesian deficit spending and quantitative easing which have given the country slow growth, several recessions and a dispirited populace, with (good heavens) more stimulus.