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AP: Voter disdain spreads as ‘fiscal cliff’ looms
No, voter disdain is not spreading. What we have here is a baldfaced lie to promote a sense of impending crisis and doom, and all for that grand goal, so the rich and the President get their cuts to Medicare.
The AP propagandist, Steve Peoples, echoes the headline with this:
Evidence of Congress’ plummeting popularity is everywhere.
Well, no, that sure ain’t apparent in the opinion polls. In fact Peoples is forced to contradict himself, when he finally feels obliged to give us the actual numbers:
A recent Associated Press-GfK poll found that 74 percent of Americans disapprove of the way Congress is handling its job; just 23 percent approve. The figures are virtually unchanged from June and slightly above Congress’ recent low point of 12 percent approval during the debt ceiling debate in August 2011.
How does “The figures are virtually unchanged from June …” equal “Evidence of Congress’ plummeting popularity is everywhere.”?? What the hey? And in fact the figures are virtually unchanged since August, 2011.
Well, at least he allows these reassuring words from the real world: “… most people say they’re not following the daily developments that consume Washington.”
And this was nice too (!):
John Baker, 65, a Denver psychologist, said … “It’s a typical Washington, ‘Let’s hit the panic button and keep people scared so they will let us do what we want to do,’” Baker said in a downtown Denver Starbucks. “Ultimately, it will be fixed but not until a lot of pockets are lined.”
Peoples somehow interprets the preceding as support for “let’s make a deal before the ‘deadline’.” Sounds more like cynicism about the real intentions of Congress, the President, and the fingers-all-over-the-panic-button corporate media. And anyone’s who’s been following this knows he’s exactly right:
If history is any guide, the ever-accommodating Obama could still portray an increase in the Medicare eligibility age as a quid pro quo–the unavoidable tradeoff–for the Republicans allowing taxes on the rich to increase…even though the Republicans can’t prevent increases in taxes on the rich if the Democrats don’t make a deal!
6 Comments
Rec’d.
Does the Peterson Foundation pay these guy in cash?
Since no one watches the watchers there’s no need for subterfuge. We need a democratic media not one ruled by the rich and free of democracy.
That is so very true. One of the big talking points, with the Talking Heads letting the publc know how scarey scarey scarey the Fiscal Cliff “reality” is happens to be this one: If the situation is not managed “properly,” then the credit rating agencies will lower the cet ratings on the American government.
My response to that is this one: Are these the same credit rating agencies that as part of their “ratings for pay” offered up triple A and higher ratings on the mortgage companies and entities like Lehman Bros until mere weeks before the firms took a dive? How much credibility should these firms have? Why do they even exist? I would think they should be required to dissolve, period, in return for not being put in prison for all their underhandedness. One day they are giving so many firms on Wall Street a free pass, with Triple A ratings passed out like cookies at a day care, then the next day the economy is belly up, and very few at any ratings agencies saw it coming…
Fairleft, I wonder if you wondered why the Donkey wasn’t doggin’ your thread. (He and Socrates got banned a week or two ago.) I asked about it at a watercooler, and was told management doesn’t comment on stuff like this (although sometimes they have). He/they were annoying, but I still don’t care for bannings.
Propaganda: lying to people about what they are comfortable believing. (or something like that)
Wendy, thanks for the update. I didn’t know that. Haven’t been following goings on here all that closely lately. He might not think so, but Donkeytale’s antics toward me recently have been classically trollish, just sad and demeaning to anyone coming in close contact with them.
But I don’t know why he would be banned. Just lower the volume and violent feelings. Again, it seems the PTB at blogs like these prefer extreme solutions rather than gentler ones.
I did try to stay away from his posts as he seemed to just enjoy throwing out live bait for the fun of it. Since they were banned together, I reckoned it might have been because of dual identities, although I’ve blogged places that was allowed. On one obscure site it was encouraged, so that authors and commenters would try to write differently so they wouldn’t be identified as themselves…or something. Not to my taste, but they all had fun with it.
Yes, I’d prefer warnings first, and allowing people to make their cases. I’ve only ever even flagged one comment since I’ve been here; I prefer the comments to take care of bullies and idiots, not that it’s always effective. ;o)