AP Spins Today's Glum (For Organized Labor) Union Membership Report

Tom Blumer
January 23rd, 2015 4:46 PM
Someone looking at the annual "Union Members" report released this morning by the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics would logically conclude that 2014 was a year organized labor would rather forget. While average nonagricultural wage and salary employment increased by over 2.32 million from 2013 to 2014, union membership only went up by 48,000, or about 2 percent of the nationwide…
 

Not News: Fewer Than 0.5% Live in Fully Recovered Counties

Tom Blumer
January 23rd, 2015 9:44 AM
In his State of the Union address — perhaps, based on the recommendations for government involvement and control he made therein, better described as his Statist of the Union address — President Obama referenced the "growing" U.S. economy at least three times, but "recovery" only once. Specifically, he claimed that "thanks to a growing economy, the recovery is touching more and more lives." The…
 

As Homelessness Rises in Seattle and Elsewhere, National Press Snoozes

Tom Blumer
January 22nd, 2015 11:53 PM
A week ago, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, a Democrat, called homelessness in his city and the rest of King County a "full-blown crisis." Based on the numbers presented in coverage of the area's situation, we can certainly add the Emerald City to the list of areas where homelessness has been on the rise. Odds are that many readers here didn't know that, because the national press hardly ever pays…
 

Mario Cuomo in 1984: High on Passion, Low on Accuracy

Tom Blumer
January 2nd, 2015 7:29 AM
Former New York Governor Mario Cuomo, who died on Thursday, is predictably being lionized today by USA Today's Aamer Madhani "as (a) giant in political rhetoric," and by others elsewhere in similarly glowing terms. Madhani goes on to characterize the three-term Empire State chief executive's 1984 Democratic Convention speech in San Francisco as "what is widely considered one of the finest pieces…
 

Thin Gruel: AP Hypes How 'Job Market Hits a Turning Point'

Tom Blumer
December 8th, 2014 2:41 PM
Friday's Employment Situation Summary contained one strong element: In November, the economy added 321,000 seasonally adjusted payroll jobs. That's not insignificant, but that news, especially in the report's full context, certainly didn't justify the level of elation seen in much of the press. Predictably, the Associated Press found a specious reason to characterize the government's report as…
 

LAT Guest Blogger: Use Thanksgiving to Debate ‘Crazy Right-Wing Uncle'

Tom Blumer
November 28th, 2014 10:51 AM
Sometimes, one has to remember that op-ed writers don't always get to pick their headlines, though I would hope that they're allowed to register their objections. So it's not clear that Los Angeles Times guest blogger Joel Silberman is responsible for the headline at his Monday blog post about how, or even whether, to deal with relatives who disagree with you politically on Thanksgiving. But…
 

Schumer: Election Results Show That Dems Need to Go Further Left

Tom Blumer
November 25th, 2014 11:33 PM
An Associated Press story late this afternoon has New York Senator Chuck Schumer saying the darnedest things, with only a tiny bit of pushback from reporter Charles Babington. In the wake of a midterm election rout which saw Republicans win at least eight Senate seats, increase their House majority, and take gubernatorial races in at least three deep blue states (MD, MA, and IL), Schumer now…
 

AP Is Stunned at Japan's Recession Despite 'Unprecedented Stimulus'

Tom Blumer
November 25th, 2014 7:10 PM

After reading Elaine Kurtenbach's coverage of how Japan's latest dive into yet another recession is affecting young people there, I can only say, "The Keynesian koolaid is strong in this one." The AP reporter's headline says that the recession was "unexpected," and her first sentence calls it "a surprise." Anyone watching economic events in the country, and I think that's supposed to include…

 

Press Buys Fed's Claim That Extended Jobless Benefits Had Small Impact

Tom Blumer
November 20th, 2014 10:03 AM
Boy, it's a good thing that the unemployment benefits Congress continued to extend during most of the first five-plus years of Barack Obama's presidency didn't hurt the economy much. A study commissioned by the Cleveland branch of the Federal Reserve concluded that extended benefits "only account for a fraction of the actual increase in the unemployment rate." The allegedly minimal impact of…
 

Keynesian Fail: Japan 'Unexpectedly' Falls Into Another Recession

Tom Blumer
November 18th, 2014 11:41 PM

There were several more of those infamous "U-word" ("unexpectedly") sightings yesterday in the business press, as Japan — to the surprise of no one who has successfully avoided the Keynesian koolaid — reported that its economy shrank for the second quarter in a row, officially falling into yet another recession. The U-word hit the trifecta, appearing in reports at the Associated Press,…

 

In Oct. 2008, AP Said Obama Would Inherit A Deficit of $700 Billion

Tom Blumer
October 18th, 2014 11:04 PM
On October 8, Andrew Taylor at the Associated Press wrote that "(President Barack) Obama inherited a trillion-dollar-plus deficit after the 2008 financial crisis." In a NewsBusters post later that day, I pegged Obama's true inheritance at roughly $245 billion as of when he was first sworn into office, and at about $600 billion if projected over the full fiscal year. The actual deficit for fiscal…
 

AP's Andrew Taylor: Obama 'Inherited a $1 Trillion-Plus Deficit'

Tom Blumer
October 8th, 2014 2:44 PM
In a sign that the historical revisionists and Barack Obama legacy builders at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, may have shifted their operation into high gear for the final weeks of the midterm election campaign, Andrew Taylor has written that "Obama inherited a trillion-dollar-plus deficit after the 2008 financial crisis." The occasion for Taylor's tripe is the…
 

AP Tries to Make Horrid Homebuilding Numbers Palatable

Tom Blumer
September 18th, 2014 5:33 PM
The Census Bureau reported earlier today that seasonally adjusted housing starts and homebuilding permits fell by 14.4 percent and 5.6 percent, respectively, in August. The detail wasn't any better, as the two categories within each statistic — single-family and multiple-dwelling homes — also fell. You can tell that the news wasn't seen as good at the Associated Press, because Josh Boak's…
 

AP: 'Job Market Has Improved by Pretty Much Every Gauge Except Pay'

Tom Blumer
September 8th, 2014 10:21 PM
The Obama administration-prepared koolaid delivered to the Associated Press's economics writers on Monday must have been extraordinarily concentrated. How else can you explain how the AP's Christopher Rugaber could have written the following — "The U.S. job market has steadily improved by pretty much every gauge except ... Pay" — without doubling over with laughter? No, Chris. The reason pay…