Economy

UPDATE: The headline at AP's 9:37 a.m. report now reads "US unemployment claims signal slower hiring." That's nice, but it won't what was broadcast immediately after the report's release until news outlets become aware of the revision. The games the Associated Press's Chris Rugaber and the wire service's headline writers are playing with the weekly unemployment claims from the Department of…

The left-wing Occupy Wall Street sit-in was kicked out of Zuccotti Park months ago, but the New York Times claimed to see its handprint in Wednesday's lead story, "Citigroup's Chief Rebuffed On Pay By Shareholders." Reporters Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Nelson Schwartz plugged the influence of the left-wing sit-in high up, in paragraph two:

CNN host Fareed Zakaria, who admitted last year that he held off-the-record conversations with President Obama even though he was covering the President's foreign policy, has now expressed his support for the Buffett Rule – legislation that Obama has pushed for in recent weeks. Zakaria is reportedly on the short list of considerations for Obama's next Secretary of State if the President is…

Charlie Rose did his best to forward liberals' talking points about Rep. Paul Ryan's budget proposal on Wednesday's CBS This Morning, during an interview of House Speaker John Boehner. Rose played up Mitt Romney's endorsement of the Ryan plan and how the former governor "talked about, perhaps, abolishing H.E.W. [sic]- I mean, HUD, as well as Department of Education." The anchor even went so…

It's difficult to be a good economist and simultaneously be perceived as compassionate. To be a good economist, one has to deal with reality. To appear compassionate, often one has to avoid unpleasant questions, use "caring" terminology and view reality as optional. Affordable housing and health care costs are terms with considerable emotional appeal that politicians exploit but have…

Members of the “mainstream” press have worked hard to promote what President Barack Obama calls an “income-inequality crisis” based on studies claiming that the middle class is shrinking and got left behind in the greatest economic expansion in modern American history. However, a new, more comprehensive investigation indicates that the earlier research isn't wrong, it's just “incredibly,…

Yesterday at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, the headline at reporter Jim Kuhnhenn's story on President Obama's latest excuse to add more bureaucrats to the government payroll ("Obama wants to target oil market manipulation") presupposed the existence of oil market manipulation when none has been proven. In 850 words, he didn't find any space for critics of the move, who…

After reading Derek Kravitz's final report of the day at 4:45 p.m. on the housing market at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, I just had to check the other wires to see if they were sipping from the same housing-market-in-recovery koolaid. The answer is no. At Reuters, Jason Lange's 3:22 p.m. dispatch reported that "Output at U.S. factories slipped in March and builders…

The stunts the folks at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, continue pulling to downplay, minimize, or whitewash bad or embarrassing economic and other news shouldn't surprise us any more. But they continue to disappoint nonetheless. Last month, a consumer sentiment index reported by the Conference Board fell by a relatively modest amount. Headlines and descriptions at…

It's not every day that the ombudsman for one of the nation's elite newspapers puts, front and center, his publication's angst about publishing information counter to the Obama administration's spin, but there it is, today, in the Washington Post. The Post's ombudsman, Patrick D. Pexton, frets that conservative bloggers overhyped a “modest” little story on a think tank's study that concludes…

CNN may claim to be the serious, centrist news network but it says something about its broadcast when a liberal comedian is a regular panel member and is allowed to toss slanted, obnoxious questions at a Republican guest. Such was the case on Tuesday's Starting Point when comedian John Fugelsang tried to stick it to Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Tex.) Discussing the Buffett Rule, Fugelsang framed…

Derek Kravitz and Alex Veiga at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, must have doubled down on the energy drinks over the weekend. A Sunday morning report (HT to a NewsBusters tipster) telling readers that signs are "pointing to a long-awaited recovery" in the housing market went on, and on, and on, and on for over 1,350 words. The factors the AP pair cited were primarily…

For months, President Obama and his faithful media minions have been engaging in a shameless class warfare campaign to convince the American people that regardless of the facts, rich people pay less in taxes than average citizens. On Tuesday, CNN.com reported the news that this misinformation campaign has succeeded, and almost 70 percent of the nation now believes the tax system favors the…

CNN's Soledad O'Brien once again tried to fact-check numbers she took issue with, and once more she failed to refute them. On Monday's Starting Point she took aim at Mitt Romney's claim that women have accounted for 92 percent of the job losses under President Obama. "That would be a shocking number if it were true, which it really isn't exactly overall," O'Brien began. Yet even ABC's George…