CNN Parrots Inaccurate Obama Claim That Republicans Ignored Economy

By Nathan Burchfiel (Bio | Archive)
September 10, 2008 - 15:35 ET
  • Bookmark and Share

CNN’s “best political team on television” is proving itself to be the best at closing its eyes, plugging its ears and repeating “la, la, la, we can’t hear you” when it comes to Republicans addressing economic concerns.

In its coverage of the Republican National Convention September 3 and 4, the cable network accused the GOP of ignoring the economy at least 27 times. The criticism originated from Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign, and CNN picked it up and ran, according to analysis from the Business & Media Institute.

Nevermind that five of the Republican convention’s headline speakers –  President George W. Bush, former Sen. Fred Thompson, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, vice presidential nominee Gov. Sarah Palin and presidential nominee Sen. John McCain – all addressed some aspect of the economy. That’s not including other speeches that were not broadcast.

Story Continues Below Ad ↓

 “The only thing that we really haven’t heard from last night coming out of the RNC was talking about the economy,” anchor Soledad O’Brien said on “Newsroom” September 3.

Later in the day O’Brien cited “a lot of criticism about no talk about the economy yesterday. I mean, a lot of talk that, you know, flags and warm feelings, but no, you know, no sort of here’s where we are. The number one issue on the minds of the American voter is the economy. No one really tackled that last night.”

O’Brien even managed to level the charge immediately after showing a clip of former senator and presidential candidate Fred Thompson talking about the economy during his speech. O’Brien wrote it off as “one of the very few times that the economy actually came up in a speech. It wasn’t really the theme last night.”

John Roberts told CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider that Palin’s speech had “a lot of red meat, but analysts are saying not a whole lot of substance on issues of great importance to Americans.” Schneider responded that economic references were “missing,” even though Palin discussed taxes in her speech.


Comments Policy

All comments are owned by whoever posted them and are subject to our terms of use. They should not be assumed to represent the views of NewsBusters.

Viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

But they

September 10, 2008 - 15:57 ET by docb

did ignore the economy for the sake of Iraq and the war on terriorism....Rovian dereg of the banks/ Ib/ are the same as the Keating 5 and RTC!!!

Since you lack economic

September 10, 2008 - 19:57 ET by fitzfong

Since you lack economic literacy, you must resort to lame talking points and debunked conspiracy theories.  How long did it take you to memorize your empty list on moron.org?

Seems to me that BHO's re-think on raising taxes "during a recession" (not to mention Stretch Pelosi's backtrack on drilling for oil) is an outright admission that tax increases (even threats of tax increases) and liberal no-growth "environmental" policies hinder the economy, leading to higher costs and lost jobs.  The only growth liberals are interested in is the growth of government, which inevitably leads to a crippling of the economy...what we've been subjected to over the last year or two has been the direct result of Democrats gaining control of the House and Senate.  God forbid they get the opportunity to further damage the economy from the Executive Branch as well as the Legislative Branch and the Judiciary.

Here's a tip...go get yourself an education on the economy before you start spouting your meaningless cliches on this site.  You embarrass yourself.

"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it." -Ronald Reagan

fitzfong.blogspot.com

Hmph

September 10, 2008 - 16:22 ET by JeffWeimer

Soledad O'Brien is Campbell Brown's Mini-Me.

ecomony

September 10, 2008 - 16:39 ET by rick007

 

Under Bush the unemolyment rate went under 5%

Under Bush the markets hit 14000

That why the Democrats are doing everything they can to ruien the economy.

Housing Bubble

Gas prices. ect. 

economy

September 10, 2008 - 16:42 ET by rick007

 

And since they took over congress the ecomony has gone down hill.

 

Pelosi and Reid are communists along with "O" Dumby  

Finally, someone mentions

September 10, 2008 - 18:48 ET by soulpile

Finally, someone mentions it!  I've noticied that even the Republicans aren't hitting the Dems where it hurts and mentioning the fact that problems started after the congress went over to the Democratside.

Strangely

September 10, 2008 - 20:13 ET by fitzfong

Strangely enough, Congressional Republicans have allowed Clinton to take credit for any economic good times that occurred while he was President...when they were the ones who actually created the good times against his wishes.  That set the precedent.

Now that the Democrat majorities in Congress have wasted taxpayer money on Stalinist show trials and allowed energy prices to skyrocket and the mortgage industry to collapse on their watch, they believe they're entitled to benefit from their failed policies with increases in their Congressional majorities and the installation of their messiah as President.

 "Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it." -Ronald Reagan

fitzfong.blogspot.com

Who else ignored the economy?

September 10, 2008 - 18:37 ET by Gary Hall

Who else ignored the economy?

Without a doubt it's a real rough patch. But the liberal / progressive economists out there have made their case (censored by the MSM), from the left POV, that the roots of today's rough patch, as with the roots of the last rough patch (2000-2002) were in the Clinton era. As expected, they also blame the Bush years for adding to the problem.

Point - according to the leftists, the Bush years were 8 more years of the Clinton years. If one is an Obama supporter (are you listenning MSM?) then your line should be, "do you want 4 more years of the Clinton/Bush years?" I know it sounds weird - but at least it would make the Democrats think.

From March, 2001 -  Dean Baker, CEPR (my bold):

The nation's political leaders [during the Clinton years] chose to ignore the stock market bubble....  As a result, millions of families have seen their dreams of a secure retirement or their children's college education vanish with the stock market bubble. The level of negligence of the nation's political leaders in ignoring the stock bubble exceeds anything since the days of Herbert Hoover."

Now for starters, since the media adores Dean Baker here, Bursting Bubbles, and Timothy Conova here, The Legacy of the Clinton Bubble, give there views on how the Clinton administration helped in lay the groundwork for the current housing bubble crash and credit crisis, and the MSM has refused to report on such economic views of those they respect so much, perhaps this is a good time for the MSM to talk about who really ignored the economy. Seems to me that the Bush administration, has been an activist leader in pushing tax cuts to stall off a serious recession following the historic bubble crash of 2000 and the fallout from the historic terrorists attacks on 9/11. The Bush administration, and the Fed has been more  pro-active than the previous administration in addressing these recent crisises - perhaps that is why we see a rather comfy supportive media and Democratic party with the administrations more socialistic responses this past year. Personally, I still stand in awe, that we pulled out so well from the double whammy of the dot.com bubble crash, and 9/11.  

Oh, a couple of my favorite lines from that second referenced piece, ones the media is not likely to pass along to the country:

Chickens Come Home to Roost (no, not Rev Writht)

HISTORY SHOULD deal harshly with Bill Clinton. Throughout his terms, real wages stagnated, manufacturing and service jobs moved overseas in large numbers, and the middle class was squeezed. With the federal government asleep at the wheel, there was a significant rise in predatory lending practices by banks and mortgage companies. By Clinton’s final years in office, all of these trends had contributed to an ominous rise in delinquencies and foreclosures on subprime mortgage loans. This was particularly pronounced in urban America. In Chicago, for instance, foreclosures on subprime mortgages rose from 131 in 1993 to more than 5,000 in 1999.

Some community service, Obama.

When the msm talks about

September 10, 2008 - 20:56 ET by Smartypants

When the msm talks about Republicans not addressing the economy during the convention, what they really mean is that none of the speakers actually admitted responsibility for the economic slowdown, because ultimately that's what they're looking for here.  Democrats do not address the economy either, other than to blame it on Bush and Republicans.  This is satisfactory, even preferable, to the media.  John McCain referenced the economy and the struggles of certain individuals at length in his speech and, when it was over, the lib pundits claimed he said nothing about the economy.  He just did not say the words they are looking for, that's all.

The root of our economic problems right now lies in energy costs.  High gas costs have destroyed the domestic auto industy and taken a lot of disposable income out of the pockets of middle-Americans.  This is why there is a slowdown.  McCain and the Republicans want to drill domestically to help relieve the price pressure on oil; they also want to pursue alternative energy sources for the same reason.  Many of the speakers addressed this very issue.  To say it was not addressed is the result of partisan blindness.