Meet the Press had Democratic congressional leaders (Durbin and Clyburn) but no GOP congressional leaders on this morning, after starting the show with White House senior adviser David Axelrod
On the eve of perhaps the decisive week in Congress regarding Obamacare after over a year of debate, NBC’s Meet the Press managed to have solely Democratic politicians on this morning, with White House senior strategist David Axelrod first interviewed (very timidly) to start the show by Tom Brokaw, and then two Democratic members of Congress, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-SC) and Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), answering Brokaw’s softball questions. Apparently, similar to the Obama Administration, NBC feels that only Democratic politicians have a say on Obamacare, as most of the program focused on building a narrative of the “inevitability” of Obamacare passage and Brokaw repeatedly tossed Axelrod, Clyburn and Durbin softball after softball to allow a full, uncontested recitation of the latest Democratic talking points.
Anyone who is a true student of the year-long Obamacare debate learned absolutely nothing from Meet the Press this morning, and except perhaps to feel a tinge of embarrassment for the tottering Tom Brokaw, who hardly stirred in the face of several misrepresentations and even outright lies from his Democratic guests.
For instance, in response to Brokaw’s question about Scott Brown’s Saturday GOP message critiquing the continued Obamacare push as opposed to a focus on jobs by Democrats, Axelrod amazingly stated in part that “the life of Medicare will be extended” by Obamacare. This Democratic talking point, of course, has been completely debunked by the Congressional Budget Office and Medicare officials, as pointed out by Tennessee Senator Bob Corker (R-TN):
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Bob Corker, R-Tenn., Ranking Member of the Senate Aging Committee, is highlighting recent reports from the Obama administration’s own Medicare officials as well as the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) which conclude that the health care bill passed by the Senate on December 24 (The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, PPACA) counts $540 billion in Medicare savings TWICE – once to offset the cost of the bill and again to extend the life of the Medicare Part A trust fund. The reports further determine that Medicare savings will actually be lower under the bill and the life of the Medicare trust fund will not be extended.
“This comes down to elementary school logic: you can’t spend the same dollar twice,” said Corker. “Tennesseans have a lot of common sense and have understood from day one that taking over half a trillion dollars from Medicare to leverage a new entitlement would not make Medicare more solvent, and I’m glad President Obama’s own Medicare officials have now reached the same conclusion.
The double counting of the nearly $500 billion in Medicare cuts over 10 years in Obamacare as both paying for the hundreds of billions in proposed new entitlement spending and extending the life of the Medicare trust fund is Washington doublespeak at its worst, and, sadly, Brokaw approved of this explicit lie by Axelrod this morning despite the public documents, such as the CBO letter, which outline its falsity. That CBO letter “explains to Congress that it can’t cut $500 billion from Medicare and claim to have extended Medicare’s life by 5 years, while simultaneously using that same $500 billion to insure those who are currently uninsured.” The average, middle of the road American who is not paying close attention would falsely think, from Brokaw’s reaction, that Axelrod was being objectively truthful throughout the interview.
NBC’s form of “balance” was to have Karl Rove, and no present GOP politicians, and for less than a quarter of the air time provided to the present Democratic leaders Axelrod, Clyburn and Durbin, interviewed by Brokaw so that Brokaw could attack Rove’s claims about the Bush years in Rove’s new book. Of course, less than 2 minutes of Rove’s interview even discussed Obamacare, with the substantial majority dedicated to Brokaw spouting left wing talking points, such as a claim that the Bush Administration obtained authorization for the Iraqi war based on obtaining access to Iraqi oil, which is simply false and parrots hard-left claims of “blood for oil” during the Bush years. In marked contrast to the softballs questions and muted response from Brokaw with his Democratic guests, Brokaw actually argued with Rove when Rove corrected Brokaw on that issue and several others, despite allowing explicitly false Democratic claims such as “the life of Medicare will be extended”, in fact all answers by the first three Democratic guests, to pass without comment or push back of any kind.
Then, Meet the Press concludes by having two New York Times columnists, David Brooks and Tom Friedman (both of whom are ardent supporters of the Obama Administration), on to “analyze” the health care issue and others. Even Obama cheerleader Brooks couldn’t manage praise the cost-ballooning Obamacare, calling claims of reducing costs via Obamacare “”totally bogus”, and as lefty Tom Friedman nodded, noted that the only real cost control mechanism, the excise tax, has been gutted. Brokaw then, of course, quickly changed the subject before Friedman weighed in on the health care cost issue, perhaps the most important part of the Obamacare debate.
Brooks made up for the apostasy of criticizing Obamacare in the rest of the segment, worshipping Obama again and again and condemning all of Obama’s critics, those on the left or right, for essentially lying about the “pragmatic reformer” Obama. Such commentary from Brooks is unsurprising considering Brooks fell in love with Obama years ago by viewing Obama’s “perfectly creased” pants during an interview. Perhaps not since the Clinton Administration, if ever, have viewers of Meet the Press had to endure a more ideological lineup of guests and questioning in favor of the party controlling the DC establishment, without any significant airing of the minority party’s response on the various issues of the day. Meet the Press has done a disservice to its viewers this morning by failing to have GOP and Democratic congressional leaders face off over Obamacare on this perhaps final Meet the Press before the all-important Obamacare vote and instead riggingthe show to be an infomercial on behalf of the Obama Administration and its signature health care reform plans.
In summary, MTP had on four guests and two analysts to be questioned by Brokaw, and only one of those seven individuals, Karl Rove, can be fairly described as anything other than an Obama apologist. All in all, today’s Meet the Press is a microcosm of the overall tone of the establishment media’s coverage of the Obama Administration and the health care reform debate, a slanted, one-sided tone that basically ignores the explicit misrepresentations in the Democratic talking points. pushes the narrative of “inevitability” of passage of Obamacare and refuses to air dissenting conservative views. Today’s MTP is just the latest evidence proving that the establishment media has cast its vote for the Obama Administration and Obamacare and is desperately pushing the public to fall in line.
