Does the GOP Work for Fox News?

Date: March 26, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Fox News, GOP Leadership, Right-wing echo chamber, Rush Limbaugh

David Frum, the conservative speechwriter for W, who criticized Congressional Republicans for their healthcare strategy, has lost his job at the American Enterprise Institute due to AEI donor pressure.   In an interview with ABC (I can’t get the embed to work), he makes an astute observation.

Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and now we’re discovering we work for Fox. And this balance here has been completely reversed. The thing that sustains a strong Fox network is the thing that undermines a strong Republican party.

Fox is the 800 lb. gorilla of the right.  (Rush Limbaugh is the 700 lb. gorilla, though he looks like he’s put on a few pounds lately.)  I don’t watch Fox enough to know if it ever criticizes the GOP Congressional leadership for being too extreme, but if its right-wing agenda is putting the GOP in a box with a padlock on it, the implications for both are intriguing. 

If some of the more moderate Republicans start to exert themselves, can they withstand the Fox assault?  If they begin to boycott Fox because they would get pummeled, can the network sustain itself with only the most strident voices?  I’m told that Fox actually has a good following among independent voters.  Will they desert the network if it is only the wing nuts?  GOP leadership as guests must give it some seal of approval to independents, and if they leave, will a part of its audience?

MSNBC, most notably Chris Matthews, has a few right-of-center guests.  I’m not sure if Rachel Maddow tries hard to get the other side and is shunned.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Olbermann avoids them; he seems only capable of pandering questions to the left.  Matthews and especially Maddow can hold their own, so it’s a disappointment to me that she doesn’t have more opponents on her show.  But MSNBC has been critical of Democrats, especially the president and conservative Dems.  (I’ve rarely seen its hosts criticize the most liberal Dems, unless it was Rep. Kucinich for threatening to vote against the healthcare bill.)

If the GOP leadership were smart, they’d go on Fox and push back.  If they were smart…

“Pro-life” and “Pro-Choice” Are Dead

Date: March 25, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Conservative terminology, NPR

Let’s hope other news organizations follow NPR’s lead. 

On the air, we should use "abortion rights supporter(s)/advocate(s)" and "abortion rights opponent(s)" or derivations thereof (for example: "advocates of abortion rights"). It is acceptable to use the phrase "anti-abortion", but do not use the term "pro-abortion rights".

And while they’re at it, let’s hope they stop using “death tax,” “partial birth abortion,” and other advocates’ terms that have made their way into mainstream journalism.

A Use for Gitmo

Date: March 25, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: GOP Dirty Work

Maybe we’ve found a use for Gitmo after all.  Let’s send this guy there.

"To all modern Sons of Liberty: THIS is your time. Break their windows. Break them NOW."

These were the words of Mike Vanderboegh, a 57-year-old former militiaman from Alabama, who took to his blog urging people who opposed the historic health-care reform legislation — he calls it "Nancy Pelosi’s Intolerable Act" — to throw bricks through the windows of Democratic offices nationwide.

"So, if you wish to send a message that Pelosi and her party [that they] cannot fail to hear, break their windows," Vanderboegh wrote on the blog, Sipsey Street Irregulars. "Break them NOW. Break them and run to break again. Break them under cover of night. Break them in broad daylight. Break them and await arrest in willful, principled civil disobedience. Break them with rocks. Break them with slingshots. Break them with baseball bats. But BREAK THEM."

Healthcare Without the Pols

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Uncategorized

Here’s how to write a story about healthcare.  No quotes from politicians.  No anecdotes to prove a point.  Just useful facts.

For all the political and economic uncertainties about health reform, at least one thing seems clear: The bill that President Obama signed on Tuesday is the federal government’s biggest attack on economic inequality since inequality began rising more than three decades ago.

…The bill is the most sweeping piece of federal legislation since Medicare was passed in 1965. It aims to smooth out one of the roughest edges in American society — the inability of many people to afford medical care after they lose a job or get sick. And it would do so in large measure by taxing the rich.

A big chunk of the money to pay for the bill comes from lifting payroll taxes on households making more than $250,000. On average, the annual tax bill for households making more than $1 million a year will rise by $46,000 in 2013, according to the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research group. Another major piece of financing would cut Medicare subsidies for private insurers, ultimately affecting their executives and shareholders.

The benefits, meanwhile, flow mostly to households making less than four times the poverty level — $88,200 for a family of four people. Those without insurance in this group will become eligible to receive subsidies or to join Medicaid. (Many of the poor are already covered by Medicaid.) Insurance costs are also likely to drop for higher-income workers at small companies.

Finally, the bill will also reduce a different kind of inequality. In the broadest sense, insurance is meant to spread the costs of an individual’s misfortune — illness, death, fire, flood — across society. Since the late 1970s, though, the share of Americans with health insurance has shrunk. As a result, the gap between the economic well-being of the sick and the healthy has been growing, at virtually every level of the income distribution.

The health reform bill will reverse that trend. By 2019, 95 percent of people are projected to be covered, up from 85 percent today (and about 90 percent in the late 1970s). Even affluent families ineligible for subsidies will benefit if they lose their insurance, by being able to buy a plan that can no longer charge more for pre-existing conditions. In effect, healthy families will be picking up most of the bill — and their insurance will be somewhat more expensive than it otherwise would have been.

…Since 1980, median real household income has risen less than 15 percent. The only period of strong middle-class income growth during this time came in the mid- and late 1990s, which by coincidence was also the one time when taxes on the affluent were rising.

For most of the last three decades, tax rates for the wealthy have been falling, while their pretax pay has been rising rapidly. Real incomes at the 99.99th percentile have jumped more than 300 percent since 1980. At the 99th percentile — about $300,000 today — real pay has roughly doubled.

The laissez-faire revolution that Mr. Reagan started did not cause these trends. But its policies — tax cuts, light regulation, a patchwork safety net — have contributed to them.

I left in the hyperlinks in the story.  They are good sources.

Cross posted on Commonwealth Commonsense.

Healthcare Without the Pols

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Good idea, Healthcare, NY Times

Here’s how to write a story about healthcare.  No quotes from politicians.  No anecdotes to prove a point.  Just useful facts.

For all the political and economic uncertainties about health reform, at least one thing seems clear: The bill that President Obama signed on Tuesday is the federal government’s biggest attack on economic inequality since inequality began rising more than three decades ago.

…The bill is the most sweeping piece of federal legislation since Medicare was passed in 1965. It aims to smooth out one of the roughest edges in American society — the inability of many people to afford medical care after they lose a job or get sick. And it would do so in large measure by taxing the rich.

A big chunk of the money to pay for the bill comes from lifting payroll taxes on households making more than $250,000. On average, the annual tax bill for households making more than $1 million a year will rise by $46,000 in 2013, according to the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research group. Another major piece of financing would cut Medicare subsidies for private insurers, ultimately affecting their executives and shareholders.

The benefits, meanwhile, flow mostly to households making less than four times the poverty level — $88,200 for a family of four people. Those without insurance in this group will become eligible to receive subsidies or to join Medicaid. (Many of the poor are already covered by Medicaid.) Insurance costs are also likely to drop for higher-income workers at small companies.

Finally, the bill will also reduce a different kind of inequality. In the broadest sense, insurance is meant to spread the costs of an individual’s misfortune — illness, death, fire, flood — across society. Since the late 1970s, though, the share of Americans with health insurance has shrunk. As a result, the gap between the economic well-being of the sick and the healthy has been growing, at virtually every level of the income distribution.

The health reform bill will reverse that trend. By 2019, 95 percent of people are projected to be covered, up from 85 percent today (and about 90 percent in the late 1970s). Even affluent families ineligible for subsidies will benefit if they lose their insurance, by being able to buy a plan that can no longer charge more for pre-existing conditions. In effect, healthy families will be picking up most of the bill — and their insurance will be somewhat more expensive than it otherwise would have been.

…Since 1980, median real household income has risen less than 15 percent. The only period of strong middle-class income growth during this time came in the mid- and late 1990s, which by coincidence was also the one time when taxes on the affluent were rising.

For most of the last three decades, tax rates for the wealthy have been falling, while their pretax pay has been rising rapidly. Real incomes at the 99.99th percentile have jumped more than 300 percent since 1980. At the 99th percentile — about $300,000 today — real pay has roughly doubled.

The laissez-faire revolution that Mr. Reagan started did not cause these trends. But its policies — tax cuts, light regulation, a patchwork safety net — have contributed to them.

I left in the hyperlinks in the story.  They are good sources.

Cross posted on Commonwealth Commonsense.

Post Anonymity Poll

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Anonymity, Washington Post

I’ve stated before that I think online commenters to blog posts or news articles should identify themselves.  (I don’t really have that problem here.)

There’s a poll on this issue at The Washington Post. It’s breaking slightly for those who favor anonymity.  If you don’t, weigh in.  If you do, please disregard this post.

There’s a Post blog post about this.

Here’s my take:  If a newspaper requires identification for a letter to the editor, how can it justify anonymity to online commenters on an article?

Cong. Perriello’s Brother’s Gas Line Severed

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Uncategorized

Charlottesville Daily Progress is reporting that police have been alerted that a gas line was severed at the home of Rep. Tom Periello’s brother.  Tea party activists recently posted the address of what they thought was the Congressman’s residence.  But it was that of his brother.

Support for Healthcare Downplayed by Media

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Healthcare, Polls, Washington Post

As I reported yesterday, the press is tending to underplay the actual support for healthcare reform.  If I were asked in a poll if I support the bill that was passed, I would have said no because it doesn’t go far enough.  The CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted during the weekend showed that when you combine those who supported the legislation signed by the president yesterday and those who opposed it because it did not go far enough, 52% of Americans support the bill and/or even greater reform.

Today in The Washington Post, reporter Scott Wilson again mischaracterizes the level of support for reform.

In staging such a high-profile event, the Obama administration was helping to make health-care reform something for Democrats to run on in the midterm elections this fall, despite the fact that a majority of the electorate opposes it, according to opinion polls conducted before the vote. Rarely, if ever, have such events been as raucous as the ceremony-turned-political rally that rocked the ornate East Room for just over half an hour.

Looking at the healthcare polls on PollingReport.com, few of them ask whether opposition is based on the idea that the current bill or general principles about reform don’t go far enough.  But I found two that did.

A Ipsos/McClatchy poll in late February found that overall 41% supported “health care reform proposals presently being discussed" and 47% opposed them.  The poll then asked those who “opposed” the proposals, “Is that because you favor health care reform overall but think the current proposals don’t go far enough to reform health care; OR you oppose health care reform overall and think the current proposals go too far in reforming health care?"  The result:  37% said they favored reform but that the current proposal didn’t go far enough, meaning another 17% actually support greater reform.  The overall support for reform, then, is 58%. 

In a CBS poll in early January, 57% of respondents said the “changes to the healthcare system under consideration in Congress” either were about right or “don’t go far enough.”  When asked about the proposals to “regulate the health insurance industry,” 61% said they were about right or didn’t go far enough.

Electorally, I can’t imagine that those who are disappointed that reform hasn’t gone “far enough” or isn’t “liberal enough” would vote for Republicans in 2010 based on their opposition to reform.  They may stay home because they are disappointed with Democrats, but they won’t be GOP voters.

If you like, write Post reporter Wilson (wilsons@washpost.com) and ask that he not mischaracterize the public’s opinion of healthcare reform.

Cross posted on News Commonsense.

Support for Healthcare Downplayed by Media

Date: March 24, 2010
Author: Bob Griendling
Categories: Healthcare, Polls, Washington Post

As I reported yesterday, the press is tending to underplay the actual support for healthcare reform.  If I were asked in a poll if I support the bill that was passed, I would have said no because it doesn’t go far enough.  The CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted during the weekend showed that when you combine those who supported the legislation signed by the president yesterday and those who opposed it because it did not go far enough, 52% of Americans support the bill and/or even greater reform.

Today in The Washington Post, reporter Scott Wilson again mischaracterizes the level of support for reform.

In staging such a high-profile event, the Obama administration was helping to make health-care reform something for Democrats to run on in the midterm elections this fall, despite the fact that a majority of the electorate opposes it, according to opinion polls conducted before the vote. Rarely, if ever, have such events been as raucous as the ceremony-turned-political rally that rocked the ornate East Room for just over half an hour.

Looking at the healthcare polls on PollingReport.com, few of them ask whether opposition is based on the idea that the current bill or general principles about reform don’t go far enough.  But I found two that did.

A Ipsos/McClatchy poll in late February found that overall 41% supported “health care reform proposals presently being discussed" and 47% opposed them.  The poll then asked those who “opposed” the proposals, “Is that because you favor health care reform overall but think the current proposals don’t go far enough to reform health care; OR you oppose health care reform overall and think the current proposals go too far in reforming health care?"  The result:  37% said they favored reform but that the current proposal didn’t go far enough, meaning another 17% actually support greater reform.  The overall support for reform, then, is 58%. 

In a CBS poll in early January, 57% of respondents said the “changes to the healthcare system under consideration in Congress” either were about right or “don’t go far enough.”  When asked about the proposals to “regulate the health insurance industry,” 61% said they were about right or didn’t go far enough.

Electorally, I can’t imagine that those who are disappointed that reform hasn’t gone “far enough” or isn’t “liberal enough” would vote for Republicans in 2010 based on their opposition to reform.  They may stay home because they are disappointed with Democrats, but they won’t be GOP voters.

If you like, write Post reporter Wilson (wilsons@washpost.com) and ask that he not mischaracterize the public’s opinion of healthcare reform.

Cross posted on Commonwealth Commonsense.