The folks at MSNBC.com seem to be dutifully following their on-air counterparts in providing cover for the failed rollout of the HealthCare.gov website, even as sister network CNBC is reporting ongoing problems with the site.
In a December 2 online piece, Sarah Muller, Senior Digital Producer for The Last Word w/ Lawrence O’Donnell, wrote a gushing pro-ObamaCare piece exulting that “Major Obamacare website bug [was] killed.”
The piece began with Muller cheering “It’s Dead!” and proceeds to push the White House line that “they’d successfully squashed the software bug responsible for many of the problems on Healthcare.gov.” As the puff piece continued, the MSNBC producer hyped the supposed 750,000 visitors to the website, repeating the Obama narrative that the problems plaguing the website are merely “glitches.”
Rather than provide its readers with a balanced perspective of the continued problems with HealthCare.gov, Ms. Muller seems perfectly content parroting administration talking points. She even went so far as to proclaim that, “a mad dash of sign-ups could come in the next three weeks.
Had Muller done her homework, she might have realized that even the folks at her sister network CNBC aren’t celebrating the so-called “Bug Killed” that MSNBC is pushing. On the same day that MSNBC.com was cheering on ObamaCare, an online piece from CNBC.com points out that despite the wishes of folks like Ms. Muller, the “ObamaCare enrollment error rate [is] still secret as more sign up.” In that story, Dan Mangan and Bertha Coombs noted how:
The federal agency running the site on Monday repeatedly refused to reveal how many Obamacare enrollments to date have software-related errors that could delay enrollees' insurance coverage, even as it announced a major fix of those problems going forward.
If Ms. Muller isn’t satisfied with that piece, she should have looked at both the front and fourth pages of the A-section of the December 3 Washington Post.. Rather than presenting a false fantasy of HealthCare.gov, the Post actually reported reality, with one story pointing out that despite heavy traffic on the website, “Users report mixed results on insurance site” whileanother story detailed that the website is still “plagued by bugs.”
Instead of merely writing propaganda pieces on ObamaCare, MSNBC.com should do some real reporting so its liberal readers actually know how bad ObamaCare is instead of creating a myth that the website and ObamaCare are working for the American people.
