Business Coverage

Well, it's not the same as saying "the company lied through its teeth and the government let them," but it's as close to that as you'll probably ever see in an establishment media outlet like the New York Times. In a column that apparently appeared on the web on Friday while appearing Sunday's print edition, Gretchen Morgenson, assistant business and financial editor at the Times, ripped into…

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. must be having trouble remembering who is president these days. Kennedy spent much of his April 30 CNN interview attacking the previous administration for last week's Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster and subsequent oil spill.  In an appearance on "Rick's List," Kennedy opined that as a nation "we should be moving away from our deadly addiction to oil. Not only because of…

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that so-called payday loans probably aren't the most reasonable option when it comes to short-term borrowing. But according to MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, it takes the federal government to let you know. On her April 28 program, Maddow charged that these lenders engage in unscrupulous practices, despite offering a service that their clientele is willing…

NBC's Matt Lauer, on Wednesday's Today show, previewed a segment about an FTC campaign to urge teachers to warn their tween-aged students about the evils of marketing, (something apparently parents are ill-equipped to do themselves) as he alerted viewers: "Plus the barrage of ads our kids see every day and what's being done to protect them from the urge to buy, buy, buy!" Amusingly that teaser,…

In his weekly address today (video only at link; transcript was not present when this post was prepared), President Obama opened with these three sentences: It was a little more than one year ago that our country faced a potentially devastating crisis in our auto industry. Over the course of 2008, the industry shed 400,000 jobs. In the midst of a financial crisis and deep recession, both…

Does anyone remember when the liberal intellectuals decried populism coming from the likes of Glenn Beck and other conservatives that was aimed at the direction the country is going under the leadership of President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress? Throughout 2009, that so-called "bottom-barrel demagogy," as Troy Patterson called it in an post for Slate one year ago, was the…

On Wednesday, the Detroit Free Press published the Mike Thompson cartoon seen at the right. It shows a GM bigwig carrying a briefcase telling a recoiling Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and three other politicians that "We're going to pay off the loan." The cartoon's caption is, "The Seven Dirty Words You Can't Say in Washington." At his blog, where a full-size version of the cartoon can be found,…

In the past 20 months, liberal media members have routinely blamed 2008's financial crisis on George W. Bush, Republicans, Wall Street, and greed.Someone that has hardly ever been accused of having a hand in what led to the tumult is former President Bill Clinton.As NewsBusters has been reporting almost since the crash began, it was Clinton who signed into law two key bills -- the Financial…

Ed Whitacre, Chairman of Government/General Motors, took to the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday to crow about repaying a loan (link may require subscription). Note the deceptive headline and its accompanying end-zone dance: The GM Bailout: Paid Back in Full The investment of U.S. and Canadian tax dollars worked. Whitacre can try to make a case that the government's loans have been repaid, but…

The Pentagon rescinded the invitation of evangelist Franklin Graham to speak at its May 6 National Day of Prayer event because of complaints about his previous comments about Islam. The Military Religious Freedom Foundation expressed its concern over Graham's involvement with the event in an April 19 letter sent to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. MRFF's complaint about Graham, the son of…

Good Morning America's George Stephanopoulos on Thursday challenged Timothy Geithner from the left, advocating that the administration really needs to "do something" tough with the financial reform bill. He complained, "I mean, you have got a situation now where the six biggest banks in the country have assets equal to more than 60 percent of GDP. Why shouldn't those big banks be broken up?"…

GfK Roper Public Affairs & Media, working for its project partner the Associated Press, conducted a poll from March 3-8 about Americans' car preferences and perceptions. The poll's results were released earlier this week, and the wire service's Dan Sewell reported on the results yesterday. Why the 40-day delay? I'll suggest the possibility that the poll was timed in hopes that the detailed…

So you do your part and pay your taxes to the federal government. However, you feel you pay too much and you don't like how that same government uses that money. Do you have the right to petition and protest that government? If it's on federal land that your tax dollars paid for, then your protest is hypocritical nonsense, according to MSNBC host Rachel Maddow. To her, the tea partiers, who…

The Wall Street Journal's headline and reporter Jeff Bennett's opening paragraph concerning Chrysler Corporation's first announcement of financial results since 2007 got right to the key points: Chrysler Reports $4 Billion Loss Since Exiting Bankruptcy Chrysler Group LLC lost nearly $4 billion since exiting bankruptcy last year, but the company reported a first-quarter operating profit this…