MSM Madness

Off Topic but Important QOTD, Joe Sudbay: It's like an evil plot cooked up by the mad policy-makers in the Bush White House: Let's destroy the economy and ruin the banking system. We'll start to "fix" it in a way that won't work. Then, Obama will inherit the mess and when he tries to solve it, there will be a populist backlash and he'll never pass his agenda. The scariest thing is that it could work.


Cheney had an hour interview with John King on CNN. To give you the flavor of how it went, here's atrios: So, Mr. Cheney, Is Obama Worse Than Hitler? John King is so awful.

Repeat from Media Matters. This still simply staggers me.

John King cites Human Events headline, asks Cheney, "Is the president of the United States trying to brazenly deceive the American people?"

Published Sun, Mar 15, 2009 12:51pm ET by Media Matters staff

atrios: So, Mr. Cheney, Is Obama Worse Than Hitler?

In case there were any doubt, here's Think Progress: Cheney on Limbaugh: ‘I love him.’

Limbaugh was extremely close to the Bush administration. In January, President Bush invited Limbaugh to the Medal of Freedom ceremony and hosted a private birthday party for him. Last summer, Cheney sent Limbaugh a recorded message, calling him “one of the great names in broadcasting history.” In 2007, Karl Rove granted his first post-resignation interview to Limbaugh.

On a related point, when was the last time you saw a deeply unpopular former vice-president given an hour of teevee time on CNN to bash the current president?

sgw on Real Answers Vs Bloviating Rhetoric

The contrast was stark today on Meet The Press between the answers given by Dr. Christina Romer Chairwoman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisors and House Republican Whip Eric Cantor. David Gregory was his usual Republican talking point repeating self but even he couldn't cover up the fact that Romer was giving him straight answers while Cantor was doing nothing but criticism without even a hint of a viable alternative. Here are some of the highlights of Romer's segment and some of the lowlights of Cantor's: ...
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• More from Ezra Klein: TV IMITATES LIFE. NBC was plugging today's "ECONOMIC SHOWDOWN" on Meet The Press. The combatants? Christina Romer and Eric Cantor. A credentialed macroeconomist and some guy who helps congressional Republicans figure out their messaging. And the pity is that that's actually a pretty accurate depiction of the country's economic debate.

Oh, and here's another one. Benen: CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS NOT DUE....

Wall Street had a nice little rally this week, but former White House Press Secretary Dana Perino hopes President Obama doesn't get too much credit.

Former White House spokesperson Dana Perino said on Sunday that the Bush administration, while presiding over the start of the current recession, nevertheless deserved some credit for the modest uptick that Wall Street experienced this past week.

Appearing on CSPAN's Washington Journal, the last of Bush's press secretaries said it was "not a secret" that the current economic mess started under her boss's watch. But, she cautioned, the public had yet to realize the full extent to which the past president's policies "alleviat[ed] the downturn." Take, for instance, the improvement in the Dow Jones Industrial average this week.

"You were just speaking earlier about the possibility that since we had a little bit of a better week on Wall Street does that spell a turnaround?" Perino said. "Can all the credit go specifically to President Obama? Well, I would say no. We are just going to have to take a while to let all of this settle down and let the policies that our administration and the new administration are trying to put in place have a chance to work."

I see. Just so we're clear, here's a helpful guide to the rules of market watching, as they relate to partisan politics:

When the market went down on Bush's watch before the 2008 elections, this was Bill Clinton's fault.

When the market went down on Bush's watch between November 2008 and January 2009, this was Barack Obama's fault.

When the market went down during Obama's first seven weeks in office, this was definitely Barack Obama's fault.

And when the market rallies on Obama's watch during the second week in March, George W. Bush deserves at least some of the credit.

I'm glad Perino helped set the record straight. Putting aside whether watching Wall Street is a useful guide to measuring the strength of economic policies -- it clearly isn't -- the point to remember is that positive developments are evidence of Republican wisdom, and negative developments are evidence of Democratic failure.

Remember when you were a kid and someone told you, "I'll flip a coin -- heads I win, tails you lose"? It's kind of like that.