NY Times vs Social Security
Not to beat up exclusively on the Times -- I'm sure that the scene on cable news is considerably worse -- but today's lead article offers a textbook example of how to skew reporting toward not so much the Bush agenda of private accounts as the Bush agenda of falsehood and generalized obfuscation.
Now, the article is ostensibly about the use of taxpayer money to promote Bush's political agenda. I would argue that this point gets slightly underplayed, not coming up until the 5th paragraph. But let that slide.
What is really unconscionable is giving free air time to Bush's personal campaign ("The system is broken, and promises are being made that Social Security cannot keep," in the 2nd graf, for example), presenting his cronies' slanted statistics ("A policy brief prepared by the agency says those benefit cuts "would double the poverty rate of Social Security beneficiaries aged 64 to 78," increasing the number of indigent people in that age bracket to 1.8 million, from 875,000") and even throwing in some weird innuendo ("Social Security employees denied that their concerns were motivated by a bureaucratic mentality, a fear of change or a desire to protect their jobs") all before getting to this, like, utterly decisive fact buried at the end of the article:
Other analysts, including the Congressional Budget Office, have reached a different conclusion. They say the combination of benefits from the trust fund and individual accounts is likely to be less than actual benefits under the current system.
Oh. So you mean the premier bipartisan overseer of our nation's economy has analyzed the problem and thinks privatization is a bad idea? And all this 'balance' over the Social Security "crisis" is actually concealing the fact that serious analysts don't think there is a crisis and even if there were, privatization isn't the answer? Alright, then. Good to know. But, why didn't you tell me that above the fold? In fact, come to think of it, why wasn't that the headline?
Why indeed.
Now, the article is ostensibly about the use of taxpayer money to promote Bush's political agenda. I would argue that this point gets slightly underplayed, not coming up until the 5th paragraph. But let that slide.
What is really unconscionable is giving free air time to Bush's personal campaign ("The system is broken, and promises are being made that Social Security cannot keep," in the 2nd graf, for example), presenting his cronies' slanted statistics ("A policy brief prepared by the agency says those benefit cuts "would double the poverty rate of Social Security beneficiaries aged 64 to 78," increasing the number of indigent people in that age bracket to 1.8 million, from 875,000") and even throwing in some weird innuendo ("Social Security employees denied that their concerns were motivated by a bureaucratic mentality, a fear of change or a desire to protect their jobs") all before getting to this, like, utterly decisive fact buried at the end of the article:
Other analysts, including the Congressional Budget Office, have reached a different conclusion. They say the combination of benefits from the trust fund and individual accounts is likely to be less than actual benefits under the current system.
Oh. So you mean the premier bipartisan overseer of our nation's economy has analyzed the problem and thinks privatization is a bad idea? And all this 'balance' over the Social Security "crisis" is actually concealing the fact that serious analysts don't think there is a crisis and even if there were, privatization isn't the answer? Alright, then. Good to know. But, why didn't you tell me that above the fold? In fact, come to think of it, why wasn't that the headline?
Why indeed.
posted by Benjamin Lessing at 9:43 PM
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