By Bob Bonner
August 8, 2016
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), followed up on a Buzzfeed claim that 99% of Obama news coverage is uncritical. FAIR looked at 100 stories going back about four months and found 65 to be positive, 34 neutral, and only one critical.
As media and the public fawn over the First Family, the scope and intensity of war widens, drawing in more countries into conflict, creating untold death and destruction, and spurring the growth in the refugee population.
According to Tavis Smiley, economic conditions for the African American community are worse in every category after eight years of Obama leadership. Police killings of people of color continue unabated with nice words but nothing of substance emanating from the Oval Office that would change police behavior .
Labor leadership has provided uncritical support to this White House. They have been rewarded with a renewed pledge to support the Trans Pacific Partnership, and fierce attacks on union whistleblowers. The Administration oversaw the dismantling of guaranteed pension plans. It failed to increase Social Security benefits or to ensure they won’t be bargained away. It turned a blind eye to cuts in pay and benefits of federal employees. It failed to support card check elections. It failed to provide for a public option in the ACA (“Obamacare”) plan, or to order “model employer” standards for public contractors.
If this were a Republican administration, AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka and many leaders of the American peace movement would be apoplectic in their condemnation. Instead we have a horrifying silence in the face of the continuing decline in the US labor movement, US living standards and quality of life, and drones raining bombs on anyone the President determines to be an “enemy combatant” and any others that may be in the vicinity of the target! This is Obama’s due process.
So why is corporate media tripping over itself to be first in line to praise Obama and the Frst Family even as he and the Department of State beat the drums of war with Russia, North Korea, China, and of course ISIS, the gift to the arms manufacturers that never stops giving. The media not only endorses the behavior but consciously assists in the creation of a false narrative calling for US military interventions with the purported goal of establishing “peace and democracy” throughout the world!
The Obamas are an attractive family in a country that cares more about looks than injustice and prosperity for its people. They worship at the feet of the daughter of the Democratic nominee who married a hedge fund manager and who gleefully took to the campaign trail spreading lies about the Sanders’ campaign.
How we love the pretty and the privileged! We celebrate their birthdays, graduations, and accomplishments as the bodies of children wash up on the shores of Europe.We deport parents and children and ascribe horrible traits to them as we pledge “liberty and justice for all.”
We pretend to support democracy as we attack voting rights of poor and minority people and exclude third party candidates as just 9% of of the electorate chose two candidates that a majority of the country does not trust! The White House war machine is planning what was once unthinkable, fighting and winning a nuclear war. A trillion dollars to upgrade nuclear weapons when one in five Americans live in poverty!
Who would be the beneficiaries of such an insane scenario? Certainly not you and I. We don’t seek to control foreign governments, markets, or resources.
The Clinton delegates drown out dissent at the Democratic Convention with chants of “USA!, USA!”, the arms industry smiles as people in war-torn countries tremble.
It is past wake-up time in America.
