After Falsely Citing CBO Numbers, CNN’s Ed Henry Claims Liberals Are ‘Attacking The CBO’
After Falsely Citing CBO Numbers, CNN’s Ed Henry Claims Liberals Are ‘Attacking The CBO’
Last night on CNN’s “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” CNN White House correspondent Ed Henry slammed “liberals” for criticizing preliminary figures from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) purporting to show that “it will take years before an infrastructure spending program proposed” by President Barack Obama “will boost the economy.” Henry said Democrats were being hypocrites, “attacking the CBO” for releasing figures “not…completely favorable” to Obama:
HENRY: What’s most interesting, when you take a step back, is for the last eight years, I’ve been covering — at least for part of it — the Bush White House. The CBO was always held up by Democrats as a gold standard of nonpartisan analysis. Now that the CBO has analyzed an Obama initiative and has not come out completely favorable, it’s interesting to see liberals now attacking the CBO and essentially saying that you can’t trust them.
Watch it:
In fact, liberals are “essentially saying you can’t trust” the media.
As ThinkProgress has reported, TV media over the last week repeatedly and misleadingly hyped the CBO figures — without noting that the so-called report analyzed only a tiny portion of the recovery plan. In fact, the first full CBO analysis came out yesterday and found that about 65 percent of the spending and tax cuts would flow into the economy by 2010, and would produce a “noticeable impact on economic growth and employment.”
Both ThinkProgress and Media Matters have noted that Henry cited the CBO figures multiple times last week to suggest that the stimulus plan would not work:
– Well that was another question raised in this Congressional Budget Office study. It was suggesting that a lot of the spending proposals in the original plan would not really take effect for a couple of years, so it wouldn’t clearly help create jobs in the first two years of the president’s administration. [CNN, 1/23/09]
– Despite those comments, Republicans are still expressing some concerns and skepticism, pointing to a Congressional Budget Office study earlier this week that showed that some of the money in this stimulus plan may not really stimulate the economy. [CNN, 1/23/09]
– The latest iteration of that has projects like that. And it’s getting Republicans wondering whether is it really going to get the economy going. Is it really going to create jobs? And, in fact, the Congressional Budget Office on Tuesday put out a report that was pretty scathing about the economic recovery plan. [CNN, 1/23/09]
Henry refused to admit any error in his reporting last night, and after slamming Media Matters for being “so silly it’s beyond belief,” Dobbs effusively thanked Henry: “As usual, your reporting was outstanding.”
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Yeah, out standing in the weeds somewhere. Henry, don’t you know its illegal to grow pot?
January 27th, 2009 at 12:24 pmDelusion. It’s what’s for breakfast.
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And lunch.
And dinner.
And midnight snack.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:25 pmYes, lets trust the republicans to decide what will create jobs, they have shown us how much they know about it.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:28 pmEven if a large part of the spending DOES take place in 2010, is that really such a bad thing? Wasn’t the big complaint about the “Wall Street Bailout” that it was rushed, lacked oversight, and the money was not going to the proper places? Then why complain that Obama’s plan doesn’t not rush all the spending out immediately?
January 27th, 2009 at 12:28 pmDobbs effusively thanked Henry: “As usual, your reporting was outstanding.”
Well, by Dobbs’ standards, it was…outstanding.
**eyes rolling**
January 27th, 2009 at 12:28 pm“In fact, liberals are “essentially saying you can’t trust” the media.”
No, just the ones who engage mouth before checking facts.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:36 pmMe thinks Media Matters must have, at some time in the past, been critical of Lube Blobbs. LOL
¶ AIO
January 27th, 2009 at 12:37 pmTIRED OF CNN’s B.S.?….DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!
360@cnn.com, loudobbs@cnn.com, am@cnn.com, bill.schneider@turner.com, jeanne.meserve@turner.com, jim.walton@turner.com, deirdre.walsh@turner.com, caffertyfile@cnn.com, kyra.phillips@turner.com, lou.dobbs@turner.com, miles.obrien@turner.com, candy.crowley@turner.com, jon.klein@cnn.com, greg.d’alba@cnn.com, jonathan.davies@cnn.com, Richard.Davis@cnn.com, susan.grant@cnn.com, ken.jautz@cnn.com, tony.maddox@cnn.com, jim.walton@cnn.com, jack.womack@cnn.com, Christiane.Amanpour@cnn.com, wolf.blitzer@cnn.com, soledad.obrien@cnn.com, sanjay.gupta@cnn.com, anderson.cooper@cnn.com, cnnfutures@cnn.com, dana.bash@cnn.com, Campbell.brown@cnn.com, Gloria.borger@cnn.com, Jim.Acosta@cnn.com, john.roberts@cnn.com, ali.velshi@cnn.com, Carol.Costello@cnn.com, rick.sanchez@cnn.com, joanna.digeronimo@cnn.com, JESSICA.YELLIN@CNN.COM, candy.crowley@cnn.com, drew.griffin@cnn.com
January 27th, 2009 at 12:38 pmThe corporate media is going to continue this feedback loop to discredit progressives and downplay the case not only for Obama’s changes but even prosecuting bush.
The corporate media is circling the wagons.
Witness the blatant distortion over family planning in the stimulus bill whose strawman version was given major airplay from CNN to MSNBC to FOX; even having regular pundits use the same framing: Matthews refers to China, Cafferty refers to Mao…
And FOX behaves normally, which is to say abysmally.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:41 pmNo, Ed Henry, it’s your terrible reporting which we’re attacking. You, sir, are a terrible journalist and a poor excuse for an American. Are you with the terrorists? Why do you want America to fail? Will somebody please think of the children!
January 27th, 2009 at 12:45 pmSo, when the actual CBO report comes out with the actual calculated numbers that will show something different then the rough draft that is currently being reported… how will the media report that?
Methinks we’ll have people saying that the CBO bent under pressure from the left wing media and softened their report.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:47 pm8. rastaman Says: TIRED OF CNN’s B.S.?….DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!
They have delete keys too. It’s only when the sponsors lose money that they actually care.
Remember, they will have had to ignore a great deal of integrity and accept certain outrages to reach their respective positions.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:49 pm“Every nation has its war party. It is not the party of democracy. It is the party of autocracy. It seeks to dominate absolutely. It is commercial, imperialistic, ruthless. It tolerates no opposition. It is just as arrogant, just as despotic, in London, or in Washington, as in Berlin. The American Jingo is twin to the German Junker…. If there is no sufficient reason for war, the war party will make war on one pretext, then invent another.”
January 27th, 2009 at 12:50 pmhanshiro Says:
The corporate media is going to continue this feedback loop to discredit progressives and downplay the case not only for Obama’s changes but even prosecuting bush.
The corporate media is circling the wagons.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
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I can’t imagine why, however. I mean, it certainly doesn’t benefit Viacom or GE or Disney or ClearChannel to hold up the legislation. I would think that electronic media companies would want to see the government invest in expanded broadband access and more secure electrical grids.
To me it looks more like an inherent 24-hour media bias towards conflict. Collaboration and compromise may be great for the country and for the democratic process, but it makes for boring television. So in order to fill up their 24-hour news cycle as cheaply as possible, the cable channels have to rely on the punditocracy, who thrive on obfuscation, oversimplification, and pathetic straw man debate tactics.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:50 pm“The purpose of this ridiculous campaign is to throw the country into a state of sheer terror, to change public opinion, to stifle criticism, and suppress discussion. People are being unlawfully arrested, thrown into jail, held incommunicado for days, only to be eventually discharged without ever having been taken into court, because they have committed no crime. But more than this, if every preparation for war can be made the excuse for destroying free speech and a free press and the right of the people to assemble together for peaceful discussion, then we may well despair of ever again finding ourselves for a long period in a state of peace. The destruction of rights now occurring will be pointed to then as precedents for a still further invasion of the rights of the citizen.”
January 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pmNo raynman, they won’t bother. Once the full report comes out and there is no way to spoin it, both the Republicans and their wholly owned subsidiary known as the mainstream news media will move on. There will be no point in discussing old news.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pm“America is not made, it is in the making. Mere passive citizenship is not enough. Men must be aggressive for what is right if government is to be saved from those who are aggressive for what is wrong.”
These quotes have been brought to you by “Fighting Bob” La Follette (June 14, 1855 – June 20, 1925).
What goes around, comes around.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:53 pmraynman Says:
So, when the actual CBO report comes out with the actual calculated numbers that will show something different then the rough draft that is currently being reported… how will the media report that?
It already did! This is their response! They’re not only ignoring the fact that it was their inaccurate reporting that was criticized, they’re now ignoring the fact that the actual report now exists and contradicts their previous reporting! It’s absolutely mind boggling.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:55 pmshoeless Says:
No raynman, they won’t bother. Once the full report comes out and there is no way to spoin it, both the Republicans and their wholly owned subsidiary known as the mainstream news media will move on. There will be no point in discussing old news.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
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And by then there will be a report from the American Enterprise Institute or some other conservative think tank claiming that the stimulus plan is doomed to failure. The pundits will only have to change the acronym in their talking points.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:56 pmEd Henry: CNN’s new John King!
Contest for most massive tool: Ed Henry or John King?
January 27th, 2009 at 1:00 pmHonestly…I am truly effing *sick* of being blamed (as a liberal) for every stupid flarking thing under the sun that the Repukes have screwed up.
I wish I could think of something really mean to do to them all. You know, like putting a dead frog in their socks?
*sigh*
January 27th, 2009 at 1:06 pmWell, that is just incompetence. Someone will get in trouble for not realizing that the full report is out. How will they know to move away from this story as quickly as possible?
I’d guess that they will notice sometime today, and this entire episode will go down the memory hole by the time of tonight’s evening newscasts.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:08 pmThe MSM amazes me. Instead of accepting responsibility for the laziness in not bothering to obtain a copy of a report (how difficult is it to que up a web site and print – or not – since it didn’t exist), they try to spin it and somehow make it the fault of the democrats that they didn’t do their jobs! Amazing!
January 27th, 2009 at 1:10 pmIt’s depressing to observe a complete absence of quality, accountability, or even basic professional pride in journalism today. On top of that, journalists seem incredibly thin-skinned and childish about any criticism whatsoever.
I predict rough waters ahead for the MSM. Reality has overtaken them, and they are being left behind with the Busheviks.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:13 pmstewarjt Says:
Ed Henry: CNN’s new John King!
Contest for most massive tool: Ed Henry or John King?
Do we really have to choose – can’t it be a tie???
January 27th, 2009 at 1:15 pmLook, Obama isn’t going to be surprised by CBO numbers. Since back in the days when Congress submitted bills to the CBO and then crossed their fingers to find out what it would cost, the CBO has implemented a set of fixed rules to determine the costs of proposals. That means the people designing the proposals can crunch the numbers ahead of time, and know what the CBO’s going to say before it says it.
This is a huge difference. Surprise numbers from the CBO were a big factor in killing Hillary’s health care plan in ‘92. But this time, Obama’s team knew what the numbers would say.
So the MSM’s little story about the CBO saying it won’t work, doesn’t wash to begin with. Obama wouldn’t have drafted a bill that the CBO would say won’t work. They just want to play the tug-o-war game, and they’ll use anybody’s lie to do it. Which makes life for the Republicans easy; all they have to do is lie and say that this or that pitfall suddenly popped out of nowhere.
The truly astonishing thing about this is you’d think someone in the newsroom would say, “we’d better make sure we’re not reporting that the CBO says the opposite of what the CBO report will say when it comes out, or else we’ll lose credibility.” But, no. They just don’t care anymore. FAUX News has demonstrated that credibility just doesn’t really matter any more, and the rest of them are sliding down that slope.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:26 pmI don’t know who Ed Henry is, but the first clue that this report would be rightwingnut trash is that it appeared on Lou Dobbs. That guy’s show is moronic.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:28 pmDamn liberal media…..
January 27th, 2009 at 1:28 pmaaaaaaaaand you’re done.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:41 pmWhen the Repugs are in power, the reporters knock the Dems.
When the Dems are in power, the reporters knock the Dems.
It seems like the msm is eager to make up for more than 8 years of brown-nosed coverage of Bush&Co with daily criticism of Obama and the Dems.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:45 pmSounds like another Shock Doctrine coming……..look out below.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:57 pmThe MSM needs access to people in power so the pundits toss away their ethics and bend over. They take the words given to them and simply repeat them – over and over and over. No questions, no problem. The media will cause the destruction of this country. Mark my words.
January 27th, 2009 at 2:01 pm14. hussein toasterhead Says: I can’t imagine why, however. I mean, it certainly doesn’t benefit Viacom or GE or Disney or ClearChannel to hold up the legislation. I would think that electronic media companies would want to see the government invest in expanded broadband access and more secure electrical grids.
Not exactly. You’re correct that the media companies want the government’s money used to expand broadband,(socialize the costs and privatize the profits and regulations) but they also want exclusive control and to be able to regulate all content, forming a tier network that charges based upon client affluency; effectively stemming and filtering information access and restoring their place as news dissemmbler.
January 27th, 2009 at 2:02 pmIt’s all our fault…all the time…about everything….Repukes had nothing to do with it….it’s Obama’s recession….it’s those darn libs fault for 911…and Iraq…and Iran… and Repukes are needed to fix it…
Hey, how about that…it’s easy doing reporting.
January 27th, 2009 at 2:08 pmElBruce Says:
They’re not only ignoring the fact that it was their inaccurate reporting that was criticized, they’re now ignoring the fact that the actual report now exists and contradicts their previous reporting! It’s absolutely mind boggling.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
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Well, it doesn’t exactly contradict their previous reporting, does it? The new report just puts those preliminary figures into context. The new report confirms that only about 40% of the infrastructure spending would occur in the first one and a half fiscal years. What it adds is that other provisions of the bill, adding up to 65% of the total, will have a much quicker impact in FY09-10.
What bugs me is what a moronic metric this is. Who cares how fast the government can spend the money? Don’t we WANT the government to take its time, so that the procurement process is fair and transparent?
I guarantee you that, if the bill were to be structured so that infrastructure and other spending were to be spent in a six-month timeframe, these same pundits who are complaining now abotu the “spending lag” would be instead complaining about the no-bid contracts and cronyism that would result from an accelerated procurement process.
January 27th, 2009 at 2:28 pmNice call, hussein toasterhead. No one can fix this tomorrow. I say, let cooler heads prevail and let the rebuild be thought out.
January 27th, 2009 at 2:38 pmObama is going to need to have “fireside debunks.” Sort of a televised version of factcheck.org which he narrates. The wingnuts have no shame when it comes disseminating false, misleading and even nonexistent data.
Here’s one from the lunatic fringe that I found absolutely (sardonically) hysterical: Repeal of DADT will lead to ‘homosexual takeover of the military branches’
http://www.tips-q.com/content/repeal-dadt-will-lead-homosexual-takeover-military-branches
January 27th, 2009 at 2:43 pmIt’s a favorite right-wing tactic: If all else fails, blame the “scary liberals” for assailing the helpless conservatives. After all, we’re the party that wants to assail homosexuals and their marriage, regulate the bodily processes of a mother with intrusive legislation, etc…
Oh, wait.
January 27th, 2009 at 6:42 pmis THIS what has ed henry in a snit?
Obama taking attention away from where it belongs: the White House press corps
[...]
CNN’s crack reporter Ed Henry was especially angry: “It is ironic, the same day that the president is talking about transparency, we were not let in.”
http://www.236.com/news/2009/01/23/press_complaining_about_obama_11170.php
January 27th, 2009 at 10:46 pmTo fight back, go to this link:
January 28th, 2009 at 1:12 amhttp://mediamatters.org/action_center/dobbs_games/?f=h_top