Paul Ryan Strikes Back at 'Intellectually Lazy' Paul Krugman
Republican Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin has struck back at Paul Krugman calling the New York Times columnist "intellectually lazy."As NewsBusters reported Saturday, Krugman wrote an article the previous day castigating Ryan as "The Flimflam Man" calling the Congressman a "charlatan" and a "fraud" while claiming his "Roadmap" to balance the nation's budget was "drenched in flimflam sauce…
Keith Olbermann Revises History to Praise Clinton and Bash Gingrich
Keith Olbermann on Monday revised history to praise former President Bill Clinton and bash former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.In the opening segment of MSNBC's "Countdown," the host railed against a proposal by Republicans to once again reintroduce the balanced budget amendment. Olbermann pointed out to his tiny audience that this was "also pushed by then Speaker Newt Gingrich as part of the 1994…
Arianna Huffington Displays Staggering Ignorance of Business, Taxes an
Liberal publisher Arianna Huffington on Monday displayed an absolutely staggering ignorance of business, taxes, and economics.Appearing on MSNBC's "Countdown" to discuss Republican plans to stimulate the economy and curb the exploding budget deficits, Huffington was sarcastically asked by Keith Olbermann, "Does Huffington Post hire more people when your personal tax rate changes?"Realizing the…
David Gregory Badgers Boehner About 'Paying For' Tax Cuts
As media make their case to the American people that the Bush tax cuts should expire, one of the strategies being employed is to claim that Republicans are refusing to "pay for" their extension.A perfect example of this tactic was seen on Sunday's "Meet the Press" when host David Gregory badgered House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Oh.) on this subject for over three minutes.After playing a…
'Recovery Summer' vs. 'Mission Accomplished': Will MSM Immortalize Oba
For the media, "Mission Accomplished" represents everything that was wrong with the George W. Bush administration and its war policy. The image of Bush declaring unequivocal victory mere weeks after the invasion of Iraq has been ballyhooed as a visual representation of Bush's arrogance, naivete, even dishonesty (the media contrived most of this meme - more on that below).Will Barack Obama have a…
Obama Admin's IT Outsourcing Assistance to Sri Lanka, Armenia Gets Lit
On August 3 ("U.S. To Train 3,000 Offshore IT Workers"), InformationWeek.com's Paul McDougall reported that the U.S. Agency for International Development is operating at cross purposes with the Obama administration's stated goal to keep high-tech jobs in the U.S. USAID has since attempted to do some backing and filling about the assistance it is providing in Sri Lanka, but its arguments may ring…
Samuelson: Higher Taxes Inhibit Having Children, Will Destroy Economy
As media predictably pound the table for Congress to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire, an interesting analysis by Washington Post contributor Robert J. Samuelson should raise a caution flag.Higher taxes inhibit couples from having children which in other developed nations has led to longterm economic paralysis.In a western civilization that got drunk on entitlement programs in the previous…
Howard Fineman: Obama's Economic Policies 'Saved The Day
Despite unemployment sitting at 9.5 percent and over 3 million jobs lost since this President was inaugurated, Newsweek's Howard Fineman says the economic policies enacted by Barack Obama "were good ones and smart ones and saved the day."Chatting with MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Friday's "Countdown," Fineman was nicely set up by the shill asking the questions."Does anyone -- can anyone actually…
As GM Plans IPO, AP Finally Makes Prominent Reference to Drivers' 'Res
In what I believe is the first direct acknowledgment by the wire service of what so many have known for so long, the Associated Press's Tom Krisher wrote the following in an August 5 story about plans for an initial public offering by government-controlled General Motors (bolds are mine throughout this post): Ever since the Obama administration gave the automaker a $50 billion dollar survival…
Zing! Paul Krugman Says Rep. Paul Ryan's 'Drenched in Flimflam Sauce
Paul Krugman's Friday column in the New York Times attacked Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, who has dared to present an intellectually honest budget, as "The Flimflam Man." Joseph Lawler at the American Spectator calls it "unusually partisan even by Krugman's standards" and he's right; Krugman calls Ryan's efforts a "fraud," Ryan himself "a flimflam man" whose work is (zing!) "drenched in flimflam…
‘The Other Guys’: Will Ferrell Lecturing On Economics…Really
The last thing I was worrying about was that The Other Guys would be too preachy. Sure, Will Ferrell has a long history of deep, thought-provoking critiques of society and culture, so that should have been my big concern. Also subtitles. And having the last shot of the film be the word "Fin" superimposed over the freeze-framed image of a crying child alone on a beach symbolizing death or…
CNN's Unemployment Error: Kyra Phillips Misreports 60,000 Jobs 'Vanish
CNN "Newsroom" anchor Kyra Phillips reported the "breaking news" about July's unemployment data just after 9 a.m. Aug. 6. Misreported would be more accurate. "We begin with the breaking news this morning on a broken economy. We have new evidence of just how feeble the recovery is and how many Americans have nothing to show for it," Phillips said. "The nation's unemployment rate has…
More Unexpected Economic News, But Only If You’re an Economist in D
Bad economic news just keeps piling up. Today, the news about jobless claims from the AP:Initial requests for jobless benefits rose last week to their highest level since April, a sign that hiring remains weak and some companies are still cutting workers.The Labor Department said Thursday that new claims for unemployment insurance rose by 19,000 to a seasonally adjusted 479,000. Analysts had…