AP's Wiseman Weakly Spins 'Jobless Trend' and Not Jobless Rate as Pred
Even with recent "improvements" which are still weak when compared to other post-World War II recoveries and which, as shown yesterday (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog), are less substantive than December's two major reported numbers (unemployment rate of 8.5% and seasonally adjusted job additions of 200,000) would indicate, it seems fairly likely that the nation's unemployment rate will be higher…
Why Yesterday's Jobs Numbers Don't Signify 'Gaining Steam' or a 'Surge
The headline New York Times (HT Clay Waters at NewsBusters) after yesterday's job report was: "U.S. Economy Gains Steam as 200,000 Jobs Are Added." At the Associated Press: "Nation adds 200,000 jobs in December hiring surge."
Telling millions of news consumers that it's so doesn't make it so.
Job Figures Give Obama 'Head of Steam,' Says NYT Reporter Who Once Saw
Reporter Shaila Dewan saw a “head of steam,” enough “to cheer President Obama as he enters an election year,” in Labor Department figures released Friday morning showing the U.S. unemployment rate fell from 8.7% to 8.5%: “Economy Gains Steam as 200,000 New Jobs Added.” Does this mean Dewan will no longer ask, as she did in a 2009 story, "Weren't we working too much, anyway?"
AP's LoBianco Laments Financial Penalties Facing Indiana Dem Legislato
Indiana House of Representatives Democrats could incur fines for every day that they refuse to show up to work. Democratic caucus members have threatened to fail to report for duty as a protest against a Republican bill that would make Indiana a right-to-work state.
Reporting the story for the Associated Press today, Tom LoBianco (available here on Twitter) heavily weighed down his report…
AP Item on 'Summer Jobs Initiative' Omits That Most of 180,000 'Opport
An unbylined item appearing at the Associated Press shortly after midnight (captured in full as a graphic here due to its brevity; for fair use and discussion purposes) crowed about how President Barack Obama "is looking to boost summer job prospects for kids," has "gotten commitments for nearly 180,000 youth employment opportunities for next summer," and only says that "Many of the positions…
ABC Hails Obama's Dubious Recess Appointment: A 'Consumer Champion
World News anchor Diane Sawyer on Wednesday hailed a questionably legal recess appointment by Barack Obama, praising the incoming arrival of a "consumer champion" who will "help" Americans with their financial problems. The program offered no skepticism as to whether a new, unrestrained bureau could harm businesses in America.
Sawyer teased the program, "Consumer champion. Can this brand new…
WashPost Hails Obama's 'Bold Act' in Making Recess Appointment While S
Washington Post scribes David Nakamura and Felicia Sonmez dutifully set out today to paint President Obama as the hero of the masses for his "bold act of political defiance" in naming "Richard Cordray as head a new consumer watchdog agency Wednesday, bypassing Republican opposition in the Senate that derailed his nomination last month."
Nakamura and Sonmez waited until the 10th paragraph in…
AP's Kravitz Ignored Available Data in Holding Out False Hope For Impr
A few readers asked me for my reaction to Derek Kravitz's December 23 report at the Associated Press on new-home sales. I thought that it was reasonably good, but felt that his leaving open in readers' minds the idea that this year's sales could conceivably top last year's was in bad form.
I was too kind. Based on data available elsewhere, Kravitz should have known (and maybe did) that…
Socialist Thom Hartmann Lectures Caller: Capitalism a Cancer, Libertar
On Tuesday, liberal radio host Thom Hartmann engaged a conservative caller who was tired of the anti-capitalist rhetoric from President Obama and the left. “From the president’s own mouth, the anti-capitalist rhetoric is so poisoned,” said the caller.
Hartmann interrupted: “It is rhetoric in opposition to the excesses of unregulated capitalism. Unregulated capitalism can become a cancer just…
Why Greed Is In Fact Good
What human motivation gets the most wonderful things done? It's really a silly question, because the answer is so simple. It turns out that it's human greed that gets the most wonderful things done. When I say greed, I am not talking about fraud, theft, dishonesty, lobbying for special privileges from government or other forms of despicable behavior. I'm talking about people trying to get as…
Phooey on Fouhy: AP Reporter Needles GOP Candidates For Rarely Bringin
In 1984, an Associated Press writer covering the Democratic primaries wrote that "In a presidential contest dominated by concerns over the economy, inflation, and unemployment, the Democratic candidates have been loath to acknowledge the extent to which Carter administration policies contributed to those problems. Democrats have also controlled Congress for most of the past three decades, which…
AP Approves of Obama's 2012 Strategy of Virtually All Campaigning, All
On December 31, 2003, looking ahead to the upcoming 2004 election year, an Associated Press reporter -- I think it would have been Jennifer Loven at the time -- wrote about how George W. Bush was going to spend as much of the next 10-plus months as possible figuring that "he no longer needs Congress to promote his agenda." Therfore, he would use "aggressive campaign fundraising and use…
AP Wrongly Claims Palin's Figurative 'Death Panels' Contention 'Now Wi
There are quite a few problems with Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar's December 28 coverage ("New fee coming for medical effectiveness research") concerning a new fee (i.e., tax) which will imposed on health insurance companies for each person they cover starting tomorrow.
Several times (twice in the body and once as seen above in the headline), the story refers to the assessment as a "medical…
AP's Pace Perpetuates Pathetic Claim That National Debt's Rise Is Due
There are press memes which won't go away no matter what, and no matter how often disproven. One, repeated in an Associated Press report a couple of weeks ago as our troops were about to leave Iraq, claimed that "No WMD were ever found" there. The truth: Yes they were — along with 550 metric tons of yellowcake uranium found in Iraq after Saddam was overthrown, specifically “the stuff that can…
