ABC did a lengthy segment last night on INFLATION!!! No mention of the real cause of increased prices (CV-19 influenced supply/demand), no mention of the fact that Americans - for the most part - can absorb the higher prices because they have more money thanks to various relief checks, just the usual hand wringing over how awful this is for Joe Biden because there is no end in sight. As usual, the reporting was shallow, leaving the impression that the goal is not to inform, but to alarm ABC's audience.
I have never watched it. I stopped watching all TV news after the 2020 elections. And in 2021 after the hit job the NY Times did on Biden and the withdrawal from Afghanistan, I ditched them too. I'm running out of reading material that isn't behind an expensive paywall.
After TFG threw Joe & Mika under the bus, the knives were definitely out… and they were very watchable (Joe as disgruntled R)…now it’s back to R business as usual (though I never thought of Mika as an actual R…?)
Mika brings nothing to the proverbial table in terms of political awareness or insight. The reference to a weather gig in a market where the weather never changes was intended to underline Mika's lack of qualification to co-host a national political show. I would have said the same thing about Billy Bush. When EVERYTHING is deemed misogyny, actual misogyny will thrive.
I don't know, I don't watch the show. I'm sure it's all about ratings. How quickly they have forgotten the vicious remarks Trump made about Mika and how he insinuated that Joe murdered his former assistant.
I maintain that the media is rooting for a Dems defeat in the midterms. Their insatiable appetite for chaos news is a guarantee that the context of inflation will never become part of the narrative. People fear paying more. Inflation has been the cause of many an election loss. I just hope that prices drop by Fall otherwise the media’s omission of the global context of inflation just might work.
On a completely different note, can you imagine had Democrats submitted fake Electoral ballots as reported by CNN? It would be the nonstop story of all print and digital media. However, because it was the good ole Republican boys, it gets the ho-hum treatment. Fucking sick!
When the Fed committed to massive taxpayer-funded bailouts after the '08 economic crash, bailouts that have continued mostly unabated since then and were increased dramatically in Fall of 2019, long before the first case of Covid in the US, it was inevitable that we would have to go through some kind of reckoning at some point in the form of period of inflation if we were ever going to get back to some degree of normalcy and balance in the economy. People should be thankful that all the other economic indicators are strong and understand that they will be able to weather this inflationary storm and come out better on the other side, with reasonable interest rates for both borrowers and savers, better pay and benefits, and a more caring and responsive President and Congress to ordinary working citizens, especially if Democrats can win a solid majority in 2022. The ONLY thing that would stop that progress from happening would be to put Republicans back in charge of the government.
I agree that is true for many of the big, high-emotion-click-bait corporate media outlets. The other big part of the problem is the belligerent ignorance of so many citizens who continue to support politicians who don't give a tinkers damn about their well-being, economic or otherwise.
Do you consider the Washington Post and NY Times to be high-emotion click-bait outlets? They have been every bit as guilty of hyping inflation while ignoring or downplay the news that our economy is outperforming everyone else’ and pulling other countries’ economies up with us.
Two of the worst offenders, in my opinion, in part because they have so much phony "credibility" with affluent Liberals, which I've been saying for decades. In reality, they are the Trojan Horses of the neo-Liberal media, pretending to care about ordinary citizens while sucking up to their fellow Corporate Oligarchs and passive-aggressively undermining the progress of true Democracy, often in their own greedy self-interest.
I completely agree. They do far more damage to Democrats than Fox News, a fact Steve Bannon has said publicly. That is because so many Democrats take their reporting as realiable, even after their WMD lies, smearing of Al Gore, hyping Hillary’s email “scandal”. I do think more and more people are realizing this but not nearly enough. Biden’s low poll numbers reflects their influence.
Both papers have suffered catastrophic drops in online readership since 2020, especially the Post, whose new executive editor seems to have added more right wing content and useless clickbait. They just had a big online subscription drive, peddling them for $9.99 a year - what this has done is to bring one big shitload of Republican trolls to the comment threads.
A lot of that drop is because a lot of people stopped paying so much attention to political news after Biden won. Cable news saw the same drop — even Fox News. Fox topped the ratings but they are down from where the were in the run up to the election. That happens after every big election.
I do too but that is not how they are perceived by the majority of Democrats and certainly not by other mainstream media outlets. If the Times or Posts reports something the mainstream media follows their lead.
The evidence is strong that the current inflation is the result of the supply chain problems, not government stimulus spending. If stimulus spending was the problem we would have seen high inflation long before the pandemic when the economy was strong and Trump had increased our debt by about $2 trillion dollars yet inflation stayed very low the entire time until the current supply chain problems happened.
The US had a much better and quicker recovery from the ‘08 economic crash than did EU countries because they doubled down on austerity while we spent to stimulate growth. As Eric noted Europe is now experiencing high inflation but it is coupled with anemic economic growth. The UK’s economic growth is pathetically low but their cost of living is soaring.
As I am writing this NBC just reported that prices are already easing and should be returning to normal by the middle of next year. Clearly stimulus spending has little to do with it.
The current inflation is mostly just a corporate greed-driven taper tantrum, trying to manipulate average citizens into backing off on any kind of meaningful tax reform and regulation of Big Business. The upside is that it has exposed the big scam and forced the Fed to accelerate their timetable to quit printing money and giving it to Banksters and Wall Street shysters in order to prop up the phony economy. Now we can finally start the process of returning to economic reality, where responsible, hardworking people prosper (and crooks go to jail), but only if we keep Republicans from taking over Congress and keep Trump and his cabal of psychopathic criminals out of the White House. If we don't do that, we're doomed.
I remember the phrase, "consumer prices have stagnated" and economists worried about a deep recession. Really, we're seeing a rise in prices, but interest rates are still low and salaries have risen, both of which indicate this situation isn't all that dire. My daughter's house is worth almost twice as much as it was when she bought it in 2019.
The problem is that solving the supply chain problems will take time, time the media will use to obsess about inflation and blame it on Biden. As Eric points out this is a world-wide problem with no quick solution.
And you are right that the media will use this as an excuse to to return to their fear mongering over debt like they always do when Democrats— and only Democrats — are in power. The media never hyped the fact that Reagan nearly tripled our national debt then ignored the fact that Clinton and the Dems had a budget surplus that was paying down that debt.
In the early days of the Clinton administration the media harped on the debt, repeatedly showing the debt clock of doom but as soon as the Democrats started reducing the debt they found other topics to hammer them for. When Bush ran on getting rid of the surplus with tax cuts the media didn’t push back by pointing out that surplus was reducing the debt Republicans claim to abhor.
Lately I have seen media hand wringing about the debt causing inflation but not once has any of them called for Trump’s budget-busting $2trillion tax cuts to be repealed.
I am not suggesting we need to eliminate debt, just that the media and Republicans are wildly hypocritical on this issue. Most mainstream economists agree that countries with their own currencies can normally handle a high rate of debt but that is a more recent belief based, in part, on the high levels of debt Japan has been carrying for years. But most also agree that there are situations in which too much debt can become a problem. Gore ran on using the budget surplus to pay down the debt while the economy was strong so that we could easily meet future problems like the temporary SS trust fund shortfall from the retirement of the baby boomers. He wasn’t proposing eliminating the debt entirely.
The reason depressions happened was not because debt was down but because conservatives were unwilling to take on debt to stimulate collapsed economies. European countries made that mistake in ‘08, doubling down on austerity. As a result our economy bounced back much quicker due to the Obama stimulus. That pattern was repeated during this pandemic. We spent big on stimulus but Europe didn’t and now our economy is far stronger than theirs. They are also struggling with inflation.
I have never thought zero debt is something to aim for. Doing that when the economy needs stimulus from deficit spending or to meet important needs is very destructive. The fact that all those deficit hawks never complain when we drive up debt for military spending is proof no one really believes the deficit hype.
Here are facts the media doesn’t want you to know (from Business Insider):
“The US is the only member of the G7 group of rich nations to have a larger economy now than before the pandemic.”
“ The US's recovery has been so strong, it's played a significant role in lifting the world economy. Healthy third-quarter growth in the US, Korea, Israel, and some European countries led GDP in the 37-country OECD group to surpass its late 2019 levels by the end of September, according to the report. Just look at how far ahead the US is in GDP growth.”
The article makes it clear that our strong growth is the result of our having much more significant stimulus spending than other countries.
The media refuses to self-correct, and I see little reason to expect this to change. What's required is a demand by consumers for contextualized coverage and an elimination of clickbait headlines. The passivity of Democratic leadership is maddening. The largely unsupported hysteria by GOP leaders caused the media to over-correct their perceived bias, and both sides/horse race beltway journalism became the new norm. The narrative will eventually shift as the 1/6 Commission begins to air public hearings, inflation declines as the pandemic recedes, schools resume, and prosecutorial decisions are made by Georgia's DA and NY's AG, the loss of abortion rights becomes 'real', but a media that fails to understand, much less elevate, the dangers of authoritarianism is creating the conditions for their own demise.
Laurie Garrett pointed out that D leadership passivity on Franken’s recent podcast (specifically on the topic of not officially defending Fauci against ongoing death threats) - and AF appeared to casually change the subject(?!) baffling:
The only benefit that comes from Fauci's appearances in the Senate is Rand Paul's determination to show that he is a poser, a troll and laughably uninformed.
People I know have been talking about how shocked they were by what Rand Paul said. They only knew about it because Fauci fought back against his lies.
Fox News is everywhere, including our military bases around the world. That combined with the dominance of (so called) Christian and RW voices on the airwaves and the lack of small town newspapers (or ownership by the big chains which are RW) makes it exceedingly difficult for Dems to get fair coverage or get their “message” heard. Then there are the mainstream outlets, the three networks and PBS. Most Americans don’t read the NYT or WAPO or even WSJ. Throw in social media and the web and here we are. Unless people on our side wake up and vote, the worst is going to come to pass.
The, AF said he agreed with Garrett, but then turned the focus to messaging. She's correct, as always. The administration should have issued a full-throated defense of Fauci and state/local public health departments across the country. The CDC Director is another story...she's qualified to be sure, but uniquely ill-suited for such a public-facing role.
Every time I encounter the word "messaging", I get a little more tired and nauseous. It's nothing but a fantasy that if just the right person said just the right thing at just the right time, the real world would follow the movie plot in your head and enough people would suddenly agree with your chosen narrative. The validity or accuracy of that narrative isn't relevant; "messaging" is just retroactive explanation or an empty scapegoat.
If anyone in the administration started pounding the tables and squealing in outrage (what you'd call a "full-throated defense") it would only cement the perspective that Democrats are weak and on the ropes and trying to blame Republicons for [Dem failure/random crazies] or trying to deflect or worried about 2022...
The messaging will never be right for those who believe that the messaging is what is wrong, and that will continue to be the case no matter how many times it happens. Thus is the power and value of blaming "messaging".
I understand your points, but it's less about delivering the ideal message than it is about interrupting the stream of propaganda. People are worried about inflation, in part because it's a real concern, but more so because it's the headline story across the country. The GOP is running the same playbook against Dr. Fauci that they used to stigmatize Hillary Clinton. The media accelerated the propaganda in 2016, and have learned few lessons in the interim. The White House can't change minds, but it is an effective platform from which to speak the truth.
The stream gets interrupted constantly. The assumption it will ever work is flawed. The bully pulpit is effective, and is being used as productively as dozens and hundreds of intelligent, hard-working, relentless people can do so, led by a world-class statesman with determination and purpose. The idea it will ever succeed at changing the media's narrative is a delusion. The reality is more complicated than most people (on either side, dammit) are willing to deal with. Blaming right wing success on the "messaging" of the left wing is nothing but a combination of hindsight, scapegoat, and sham.
I will repeat my frustration with such simplistic nonsense. Like I said, a more "full throated" reaction would simply backfire and make the situation worse in every possible way. And then that would in turn be analyzed by the disaffected with more vapid "they didn't do it right" criticism. It's all self-righteous prattling, a glaring failure to reconsider conventional assumptions and blame the easy targets instead of recognizing the root of the problem, because that root is complicated and offends the ego.
I don't think that legal investigations are what is meant by "full-throated defense", and it kind of makes my point that declaring the threats credible enough to warrant legal action when they actually aren't that credible, or even loudly denouncing them as political if they are legally actionable as personal threats is not a good strategy.
It all goes back to this whole "if only they... then things would definitely turn out like I imagine they would in my head and without unintended consequences or negative repurcussions" approach that people have these days when it comes to advising/criticizing Democratic leaders. It plays in to the Republicon's hands as much as actually following that advice would.
I respect Garrett, and Franken even more so. But neither knows more than Biden or his advisers about any of this, and let's not forget Al Franken both gave up when he shouldn't have, and probably (and justifiably) blames 'fellow Dems' for that. So he might not be shooting as straight as one might presume.
I'm convinced consumers of "news" is not the target audience of NY Slimes and WaPoo. They're serving their fascist masters and hoping for a gig in Jack Boot USA.
Of course, individual voices make a difference. There are just not enough of them...people on the left are fairly passive consumers of information, albeit choosing credentialed journalism to consume. The NYT is a repeat offender...if enough people wrote to the editor or canceled their subscriptions, it would force change. But if people don't care enough to demand better coverage, then nothing will change.
It's ideal to have a leader, but it's not essential. I closed my NYT account, I closed my FB account. It takes little time. Then I explained my decision to my circle. Some followed suit and repeated with their circle. Movements don't always need leaders, just enough people doing the right thing.
A lot of people have done that but the media has not improved. If anything they have gotten worse as evidenced by their obsessively negative coverage of Biden.
I can't speak to all media outlets, but subscriptions for the NYT, as an example, have seen explosive growth, so 'some' may have cancelled subscriptions, but clearly not 'many'. It helps to have a leader, but look at all the spontaneous protests that spring up across the country in the wake of the George Floyd murder. Enough people have to care for change to occur. It doesn't seem to be the case.
Eric, thank you again. The context of global pandemic/global supply chain/global inflation is definitely missing from these stories with the 4-column wide scare headlines. And even if the stories did include the context, it would be buried on a jump page.
I keep returning to the mysterious belief that Americans have that Economics is a science, when in fact there is almost nothing scientific about it. At best we have some correlations (as noted above with global impacts), but rarely do we have causation which would imply a corrective measure exists. There is none (other than end the pandemic and people returning to work in shipping could restock shelves, but even that is only a best guess).
Our failed political press should contextualize this, but we now exist in an age of Murdoch-styled tabloid journalism. We’re being dumbed-down by headline writers.
Apparently, if a Democrat is president, the health of the economy is not just judged by the stock market and unemployment rate. Instead, it needs to be judged by over a dozen various data points, indices, and additional analytics. Oh, and the shelves in some local supermarket in rural Oklahoma that have a few missing products.
Per the press, with a Democrat president, sure the stock market is up and the unemployment is down, also wages are rising, but you have to look at this data point regarding males in the age range of 21-25, with pets, living in these two states, that have high unemployment. And this local store was out of saltine crackers for a week. Here’s several paragraphs on why that is a disaster for the Democrats.
At this point, don't know what else we can do. Republicans forged documents for the electoral process and are now advocating drinking their own urine to cure COVID. But tell me again that the Democrats are doomed in 2022 and 2024.
I read the Post piece last night, and in perusing the comments I was disgusted by how thoroughly the narrative has sunk in, that Biden is a failure because he's not "doing anything" about inflation or the pandemic, which sounds really childish to me, like "why doesn't daddy buy me a new tricycle?" The press is not explaining what is causing inflation in terms readers and audiences can understand, nor is it explaining the global causes. People don't realize how many consumer goods, auto parts, even food, come from far away. But despite that, the press has been framing its narrative around the "Biden is a failure" trope without a word about how economists warned us about the coming inflation as far back as 2019. Again and again, the media wrote about the effects would have on the economy, and the driving reason behind developing vaccines as soon as possible was not a humanitarian one, but economic - Trump was terrified that covid would cause the economy to collapse.
First, when Steve Inskeep is a better journalist than 99% of the people in DC who cover politics ....
Second, on inflation, I asked a couple of people at The Times and The Post if they blamed Reagan for the inflation in 1981. I didn't get an answer. I wonder why. And the Reagan point is worth delving into.
We can now count on the msm to omit context/historical backstories from their reporting
all the time. HELLO! We’re in a global pandemic. Duh! Nothing is nor will be the same as things were pre pandemic. Healthcare, politics, the global and US economy, the financial world, the educational system, etc etc. will not look or be the same. It’s the pandemic stupid. Every msm piece should include and return to that context in the lede and in every piece there after to explain WHY inflation is occurring just as Eric stresses and who is always on point.
As a non-American, it's disappointing to read how your country's mainstream media (MSM) betrays its duty to inform & educate the public.
It's disappointing & frustrating that the "professional" journalists of your major media outlets have decided that writing emotionalized, sensationalized & clickbait headlines similar to the tabloid publications is the way to get more clicks & eyeballs rather than doing more contextualized reporting of the issues that's not always America-centered.
While they may not be doing "fake news" despite the claims of Penis Pumpkinhead, the RepubliKKKans & the right-wing media, the MSM is engaged in the dishonest reporting of the issues by the selective use of facts, and the lack of context.
Seriously, they seem to be more interested in pleasing their corporate overlords and personal financial self-enrichment over actually doing a public good.
What we are experiencing is supply chain inflation which - due to the international means by which we fill America's shelves - is a global business problem.
But this is nothing new.
As I learned by using foreign sources to dig up details on Trump's international business dealings from 2016-2020, for some reason the typical J-school doesn't teach journalists that there is a world outside of America filled with journalists, who often are just as trustworthy and useful a source as yourself (or oftentimes better, as many journalists operate under a higher level of duress).
Here's a good Times explainer story on supply chain inflation, but as you and I both know, without the word Biden in the title plus something emotional, it's just not going to sell on the social networks and won't clickbait the subscribers into wonking out on a business to business problem that people typically achieve Master's degrees to learn.
First, it looks like this period of inflation is already starting to subside. It follows, then, that the likelihood of inflation in January 2022 but not on election days 2022 will have little effect on the election. Notwithstanding the buzz, a spike of inflation is to be expected given the deflationary period following the initial outbreak of Covid in early 2020. There was and is no fact-based case that the current bout of inflation is structural and not transitory.
Now, back to my normal mode.
It was okay for Donnie to sign off on a GOP-supported stimulus bill because it was an election year and it’s always good for an incumbent to give voters money. Obviously, that changes after the election, more so when the incumbent loses. Now, with a Democratic POTUS, it’s a radically different situation.
ABC did a lengthy segment last night on INFLATION!!! No mention of the real cause of increased prices (CV-19 influenced supply/demand), no mention of the fact that Americans - for the most part - can absorb the higher prices because they have more money thanks to various relief checks, just the usual hand wringing over how awful this is for Joe Biden because there is no end in sight. As usual, the reporting was shallow, leaving the impression that the goal is not to inform, but to alarm ABC's audience.
for media it’s wash, rinse, repeat re: INFLATION
And ABC’s good morning America continued right at the top of their broadcast this morning. Hyperventilating!! No context whatsoever
the less context the better, for media
And Morning Joe
Morning Joe just did a similar piece never mentioning that inflation is a global problem. So much for MSNBC being the liberal outlet.
I have never watched it. I stopped watching all TV news after the 2020 elections. And in 2021 after the hit job the NY Times did on Biden and the withdrawal from Afghanistan, I ditched them too. I'm running out of reading material that isn't behind an expensive paywall.
After TFG threw Joe & Mika under the bus, the knives were definitely out… and they were very watchable (Joe as disgruntled R)…now it’s back to R business as usual (though I never thought of Mika as an actual R…?)
If Mika's last name was not Brzezinski her TV career would have begun and ended doing weekend weather in San Diego (where it is always sunny and 75).
Why am I getting a whiff of misogyny here?
Mika brings nothing to the proverbial table in terms of political awareness or insight. The reference to a weather gig in a market where the weather never changes was intended to underline Mika's lack of qualification to co-host a national political show. I would have said the same thing about Billy Bush. When EVERYTHING is deemed misogyny, actual misogyny will thrive.
I’m surprised that’s how she’s viewed. I think it’s more ‘legacy’ vs misogyny?
Yeesh
Is that a word?
I don't know, I don't watch the show. I'm sure it's all about ratings. How quickly they have forgotten the vicious remarks Trump made about Mika and how he insinuated that Joe murdered his former assistant.
Oh I see… it’s a Carville/Matalin type thing…sure.
Maybe Jill Biden should wear a smart Zara jacket that says, "I really don't care about inflation, do u?"
Ha!
Freaking FANTASTIC. Omg
The press would lose its mind 🤯
Humor can be a way to cut through a lot of CR-p… love this!!!! ;)
I maintain that the media is rooting for a Dems defeat in the midterms. Their insatiable appetite for chaos news is a guarantee that the context of inflation will never become part of the narrative. People fear paying more. Inflation has been the cause of many an election loss. I just hope that prices drop by Fall otherwise the media’s omission of the global context of inflation just might work.
On a completely different note, can you imagine had Democrats submitted fake Electoral ballots as reported by CNN? It would be the nonstop story of all print and digital media. However, because it was the good ole Republican boys, it gets the ho-hum treatment. Fucking sick!
sadly, It’s hard to argue otherwise
The bigotry of low expectations always benefits Republicans going back to Bush II.
When the Fed committed to massive taxpayer-funded bailouts after the '08 economic crash, bailouts that have continued mostly unabated since then and were increased dramatically in Fall of 2019, long before the first case of Covid in the US, it was inevitable that we would have to go through some kind of reckoning at some point in the form of period of inflation if we were ever going to get back to some degree of normalcy and balance in the economy. People should be thankful that all the other economic indicators are strong and understand that they will be able to weather this inflationary storm and come out better on the other side, with reasonable interest rates for both borrowers and savers, better pay and benefits, and a more caring and responsive President and Congress to ordinary working citizens, especially if Democrats can win a solid majority in 2022. The ONLY thing that would stop that progress from happening would be to put Republicans back in charge of the government.
press not interested in those other strong indicators, tho
I agree that is true for many of the big, high-emotion-click-bait corporate media outlets. The other big part of the problem is the belligerent ignorance of so many citizens who continue to support politicians who don't give a tinkers damn about their well-being, economic or otherwise.
Do you consider the Washington Post and NY Times to be high-emotion click-bait outlets? They have been every bit as guilty of hyping inflation while ignoring or downplay the news that our economy is outperforming everyone else’ and pulling other countries’ economies up with us.
Two of the worst offenders, in my opinion, in part because they have so much phony "credibility" with affluent Liberals, which I've been saying for decades. In reality, they are the Trojan Horses of the neo-Liberal media, pretending to care about ordinary citizens while sucking up to their fellow Corporate Oligarchs and passive-aggressively undermining the progress of true Democracy, often in their own greedy self-interest.
I completely agree. They do far more damage to Democrats than Fox News, a fact Steve Bannon has said publicly. That is because so many Democrats take their reporting as realiable, even after their WMD lies, smearing of Al Gore, hyping Hillary’s email “scandal”. I do think more and more people are realizing this but not nearly enough. Biden’s low poll numbers reflects their influence.
I totally agree.
Both papers have suffered catastrophic drops in online readership since 2020, especially the Post, whose new executive editor seems to have added more right wing content and useless clickbait. They just had a big online subscription drive, peddling them for $9.99 a year - what this has done is to bring one big shitload of Republican trolls to the comment threads.
Idea: Fed subsidize the Free Press! If you can help out a freakin car company -WHY NOT???
A lot of that drop is because a lot of people stopped paying so much attention to political news after Biden won. Cable news saw the same drop — even Fox News. Fox topped the ratings but they are down from where the were in the run up to the election. That happens after every big election.
https://deadline.com/2021/12/fox-news-ratings-november-1234883298/
The NY Times and WaPo are at the top of the most popular subscription news sites.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/04/ranked-paid-subscription-news-websites-nyt-washing-post-wsj/
I do.
I do too but that is not how they are perceived by the majority of Democrats and certainly not by other mainstream media outlets. If the Times or Posts reports something the mainstream media follows their lead.
The evidence is strong that the current inflation is the result of the supply chain problems, not government stimulus spending. If stimulus spending was the problem we would have seen high inflation long before the pandemic when the economy was strong and Trump had increased our debt by about $2 trillion dollars yet inflation stayed very low the entire time until the current supply chain problems happened.
The US had a much better and quicker recovery from the ‘08 economic crash than did EU countries because they doubled down on austerity while we spent to stimulate growth. As Eric noted Europe is now experiencing high inflation but it is coupled with anemic economic growth. The UK’s economic growth is pathetically low but their cost of living is soaring.
As I am writing this NBC just reported that prices are already easing and should be returning to normal by the middle of next year. Clearly stimulus spending has little to do with it.
The current inflation is mostly just a corporate greed-driven taper tantrum, trying to manipulate average citizens into backing off on any kind of meaningful tax reform and regulation of Big Business. The upside is that it has exposed the big scam and forced the Fed to accelerate their timetable to quit printing money and giving it to Banksters and Wall Street shysters in order to prop up the phony economy. Now we can finally start the process of returning to economic reality, where responsible, hardworking people prosper (and crooks go to jail), but only if we keep Republicans from taking over Congress and keep Trump and his cabal of psychopathic criminals out of the White House. If we don't do that, we're doomed.
I remember the phrase, "consumer prices have stagnated" and economists worried about a deep recession. Really, we're seeing a rise in prices, but interest rates are still low and salaries have risen, both of which indicate this situation isn't all that dire. My daughter's house is worth almost twice as much as it was when she bought it in 2019.
The problem is that solving the supply chain problems will take time, time the media will use to obsess about inflation and blame it on Biden. As Eric points out this is a world-wide problem with no quick solution.
And you are right that the media will use this as an excuse to to return to their fear mongering over debt like they always do when Democrats— and only Democrats — are in power. The media never hyped the fact that Reagan nearly tripled our national debt then ignored the fact that Clinton and the Dems had a budget surplus that was paying down that debt.
In the early days of the Clinton administration the media harped on the debt, repeatedly showing the debt clock of doom but as soon as the Democrats started reducing the debt they found other topics to hammer them for. When Bush ran on getting rid of the surplus with tax cuts the media didn’t push back by pointing out that surplus was reducing the debt Republicans claim to abhor.
Lately I have seen media hand wringing about the debt causing inflation but not once has any of them called for Trump’s budget-busting $2trillion tax cuts to be repealed.
I am not suggesting we need to eliminate debt, just that the media and Republicans are wildly hypocritical on this issue. Most mainstream economists agree that countries with their own currencies can normally handle a high rate of debt but that is a more recent belief based, in part, on the high levels of debt Japan has been carrying for years. But most also agree that there are situations in which too much debt can become a problem. Gore ran on using the budget surplus to pay down the debt while the economy was strong so that we could easily meet future problems like the temporary SS trust fund shortfall from the retirement of the baby boomers. He wasn’t proposing eliminating the debt entirely.
The reason depressions happened was not because debt was down but because conservatives were unwilling to take on debt to stimulate collapsed economies. European countries made that mistake in ‘08, doubling down on austerity. As a result our economy bounced back much quicker due to the Obama stimulus. That pattern was repeated during this pandemic. We spent big on stimulus but Europe didn’t and now our economy is far stronger than theirs. They are also struggling with inflation.
I have never thought zero debt is something to aim for. Doing that when the economy needs stimulus from deficit spending or to meet important needs is very destructive. The fact that all those deficit hawks never complain when we drive up debt for military spending is proof no one really believes the deficit hype.
Here are facts the media doesn’t want you to know (from Business Insider):
“The US is the only member of the G7 group of rich nations to have a larger economy now than before the pandemic.”
“ The US's recovery has been so strong, it's played a significant role in lifting the world economy. Healthy third-quarter growth in the US, Korea, Israel, and some European countries led GDP in the 37-country OECD group to surpass its late 2019 levels by the end of September, according to the report. Just look at how far ahead the US is in GDP growth.”
The article makes it clear that our strong growth is the result of our having much more significant stimulus spending than other countries.
https://www.businessinsider.com/chart-us-economic-recovery-beats-other-advanced-economies-gdp-rebound-2021-11
Interesting!
The media refuses to self-correct, and I see little reason to expect this to change. What's required is a demand by consumers for contextualized coverage and an elimination of clickbait headlines. The passivity of Democratic leadership is maddening. The largely unsupported hysteria by GOP leaders caused the media to over-correct their perceived bias, and both sides/horse race beltway journalism became the new norm. The narrative will eventually shift as the 1/6 Commission begins to air public hearings, inflation declines as the pandemic recedes, schools resume, and prosecutorial decisions are made by Georgia's DA and NY's AG, the loss of abortion rights becomes 'real', but a media that fails to understand, much less elevate, the dangers of authoritarianism is creating the conditions for their own demise.
Laurie Garrett pointed out that D leadership passivity on Franken’s recent podcast (specifically on the topic of not officially defending Fauci against ongoing death threats) - and AF appeared to casually change the subject(?!) baffling:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=R4eBplA-BHo
The only benefit that comes from Fauci's appearances in the Senate is Rand Paul's determination to show that he is a poser, a troll and laughably uninformed.
People I know have been talking about how shocked they were by what Rand Paul said. They only knew about it because Fauci fought back against his lies.
You can bet that the Fox/NewsMax/OANN audiences only hear Paul's side of the exchanges.
That has been the case for decades. What matters is what the rest of the public hears because that is the majority of Americans.
Fox News is everywhere, including our military bases around the world. That combined with the dominance of (so called) Christian and RW voices on the airwaves and the lack of small town newspapers (or ownership by the big chains which are RW) makes it exceedingly difficult for Dems to get fair coverage or get their “message” heard. Then there are the mainstream outlets, the three networks and PBS. Most Americans don’t read the NYT or WAPO or even WSJ. Throw in social media and the web and here we are. Unless people on our side wake up and vote, the worst is going to come to pass.
Fauci was great per usual.
But he DOES get his sound/video bite for 🦊 amirite?
The, AF said he agreed with Garrett, but then turned the focus to messaging. She's correct, as always. The administration should have issued a full-throated defense of Fauci and state/local public health departments across the country. The CDC Director is another story...she's qualified to be sure, but uniquely ill-suited for such a public-facing role.
Every time I encounter the word "messaging", I get a little more tired and nauseous. It's nothing but a fantasy that if just the right person said just the right thing at just the right time, the real world would follow the movie plot in your head and enough people would suddenly agree with your chosen narrative. The validity or accuracy of that narrative isn't relevant; "messaging" is just retroactive explanation or an empty scapegoat.
If anyone in the administration started pounding the tables and squealing in outrage (what you'd call a "full-throated defense") it would only cement the perspective that Democrats are weak and on the ropes and trying to blame Republicons for [Dem failure/random crazies] or trying to deflect or worried about 2022...
The messaging will never be right for those who believe that the messaging is what is wrong, and that will continue to be the case no matter how many times it happens. Thus is the power and value of blaming "messaging".
I understand your points, but it's less about delivering the ideal message than it is about interrupting the stream of propaganda. People are worried about inflation, in part because it's a real concern, but more so because it's the headline story across the country. The GOP is running the same playbook against Dr. Fauci that they used to stigmatize Hillary Clinton. The media accelerated the propaganda in 2016, and have learned few lessons in the interim. The White House can't change minds, but it is an effective platform from which to speak the truth.
The stream gets interrupted constantly. The assumption it will ever work is flawed. The bully pulpit is effective, and is being used as productively as dozens and hundreds of intelligent, hard-working, relentless people can do so, led by a world-class statesman with determination and purpose. The idea it will ever succeed at changing the media's narrative is a delusion. The reality is more complicated than most people (on either side, dammit) are willing to deal with. Blaming right wing success on the "messaging" of the left wing is nothing but a combination of hindsight, scapegoat, and sham.
Ok, so what's the reality that only you are privy to? Other than insults, you have provided no insights or substance.
True - not really criticizing AF - just interesting LG found the omission of full-throated throated D support ‘glaring’…
I will repeat my frustration with such simplistic nonsense. Like I said, a more "full throated" reaction would simply backfire and make the situation worse in every possible way. And then that would in turn be analyzed by the disaffected with more vapid "they didn't do it right" criticism. It's all self-righteous prattling, a glaring failure to reconsider conventional assumptions and blame the easy targets instead of recognizing the root of the problem, because that root is complicated and offends the ego.
I share your frustration.
I think she (Garrett) meant aren’t threats to a public officials’ personal safety against the law - in any way? Crossing a line at all…
I don't think that legal investigations are what is meant by "full-throated defense", and it kind of makes my point that declaring the threats credible enough to warrant legal action when they actually aren't that credible, or even loudly denouncing them as political if they are legally actionable as personal threats is not a good strategy.
It all goes back to this whole "if only they... then things would definitely turn out like I imagine they would in my head and without unintended consequences or negative repurcussions" approach that people have these days when it comes to advising/criticizing Democratic leaders. It plays in to the Republicon's hands as much as actually following that advice would.
I respect Garrett, and Franken even more so. But neither knows more than Biden or his advisers about any of this, and let's not forget Al Franken both gave up when he shouldn't have, and probably (and justifiably) blames 'fellow Dems' for that. So he might not be shooting as straight as one might presume.
I'm convinced consumers of "news" is not the target audience of NY Slimes and WaPoo. They're serving their fascist masters and hoping for a gig in Jack Boot USA.
How can we demand that? Individual voices are not likely to make a difference.
Of course, individual voices make a difference. There are just not enough of them...people on the left are fairly passive consumers of information, albeit choosing credentialed journalism to consume. The NYT is a repeat offender...if enough people wrote to the editor or canceled their subscriptions, it would force change. But if people don't care enough to demand better coverage, then nothing will change.
I think we need someone to lead a group protest but I’m not sure who could make that happen.
It's ideal to have a leader, but it's not essential. I closed my NYT account, I closed my FB account. It takes little time. Then I explained my decision to my circle. Some followed suit and repeated with their circle. Movements don't always need leaders, just enough people doing the right thing.
A lot of people have done that but the media has not improved. If anything they have gotten worse as evidenced by their obsessively negative coverage of Biden.
I can't speak to all media outlets, but subscriptions for the NYT, as an example, have seen explosive growth, so 'some' may have cancelled subscriptions, but clearly not 'many'. It helps to have a leader, but look at all the spontaneous protests that spring up across the country in the wake of the George Floyd murder. Enough people have to care for change to occur. It doesn't seem to be the case.
Eric, thank you again. The context of global pandemic/global supply chain/global inflation is definitely missing from these stories with the 4-column wide scare headlines. And even if the stories did include the context, it would be buried on a jump page.
I keep returning to the mysterious belief that Americans have that Economics is a science, when in fact there is almost nothing scientific about it. At best we have some correlations (as noted above with global impacts), but rarely do we have causation which would imply a corrective measure exists. There is none (other than end the pandemic and people returning to work in shipping could restock shelves, but even that is only a best guess).
Our failed political press should contextualize this, but we now exist in an age of Murdoch-styled tabloid journalism. We’re being dumbed-down by headline writers.
Apparently, if a Democrat is president, the health of the economy is not just judged by the stock market and unemployment rate. Instead, it needs to be judged by over a dozen various data points, indices, and additional analytics. Oh, and the shelves in some local supermarket in rural Oklahoma that have a few missing products.
Per the press, with a Democrat president, sure the stock market is up and the unemployment is down, also wages are rising, but you have to look at this data point regarding males in the age range of 21-25, with pets, living in these two states, that have high unemployment. And this local store was out of saltine crackers for a week. Here’s several paragraphs on why that is a disaster for the Democrats.
At this point, don't know what else we can do. Republicans forged documents for the electoral process and are now advocating drinking their own urine to cure COVID. But tell me again that the Democrats are doomed in 2022 and 2024.
yes, stock market, Dow and maybe home sales used to be the only matrix
I read the Post piece last night, and in perusing the comments I was disgusted by how thoroughly the narrative has sunk in, that Biden is a failure because he's not "doing anything" about inflation or the pandemic, which sounds really childish to me, like "why doesn't daddy buy me a new tricycle?" The press is not explaining what is causing inflation in terms readers and audiences can understand, nor is it explaining the global causes. People don't realize how many consumer goods, auto parts, even food, come from far away. But despite that, the press has been framing its narrative around the "Biden is a failure" trope without a word about how economists warned us about the coming inflation as far back as 2019. Again and again, the media wrote about the effects would have on the economy, and the driving reason behind developing vaccines as soon as possible was not a humanitarian one, but economic - Trump was terrified that covid would cause the economy to collapse.
First, when Steve Inskeep is a better journalist than 99% of the people in DC who cover politics ....
Second, on inflation, I asked a couple of people at The Times and The Post if they blamed Reagan for the inflation in 1981. I didn't get an answer. I wonder why. And the Reagan point is worth delving into.
We can now count on the msm to omit context/historical backstories from their reporting
all the time. HELLO! We’re in a global pandemic. Duh! Nothing is nor will be the same as things were pre pandemic. Healthcare, politics, the global and US economy, the financial world, the educational system, etc etc. will not look or be the same. It’s the pandemic stupid. Every msm piece should include and return to that context in the lede and in every piece there after to explain WHY inflation is occurring just as Eric stresses and who is always on point.
AWESOME summary/analysis- thanks.
thanks
As a non-American, it's disappointing to read how your country's mainstream media (MSM) betrays its duty to inform & educate the public.
It's disappointing & frustrating that the "professional" journalists of your major media outlets have decided that writing emotionalized, sensationalized & clickbait headlines similar to the tabloid publications is the way to get more clicks & eyeballs rather than doing more contextualized reporting of the issues that's not always America-centered.
While they may not be doing "fake news" despite the claims of Penis Pumpkinhead, the RepubliKKKans & the right-wing media, the MSM is engaged in the dishonest reporting of the issues by the selective use of facts, and the lack of context.
Seriously, they seem to be more interested in pleasing their corporate overlords and personal financial self-enrichment over actually doing a public good.
What we are experiencing is supply chain inflation which - due to the international means by which we fill America's shelves - is a global business problem.
But this is nothing new.
As I learned by using foreign sources to dig up details on Trump's international business dealings from 2016-2020, for some reason the typical J-school doesn't teach journalists that there is a world outside of America filled with journalists, who often are just as trustworthy and useful a source as yourself (or oftentimes better, as many journalists operate under a higher level of duress).
Here's a good Times explainer story on supply chain inflation, but as you and I both know, without the word Biden in the title plus something emotional, it's just not going to sell on the social networks and won't clickbait the subscribers into wonking out on a business to business problem that people typically achieve Master's degrees to learn.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/business/inflation-supply-chain.html
Atypically for me, a little good news, maybe.
First, it looks like this period of inflation is already starting to subside. It follows, then, that the likelihood of inflation in January 2022 but not on election days 2022 will have little effect on the election. Notwithstanding the buzz, a spike of inflation is to be expected given the deflationary period following the initial outbreak of Covid in early 2020. There was and is no fact-based case that the current bout of inflation is structural and not transitory.
Now, back to my normal mode.
It was okay for Donnie to sign off on a GOP-supported stimulus bill because it was an election year and it’s always good for an incumbent to give voters money. Obviously, that changes after the election, more so when the incumbent loses. Now, with a Democratic POTUS, it’s a radically different situation.