Liberal Media Bias: NYT Finally Covers Obama's Gutting Welfare Law, Spins It to Bash GOP

Vocal Minority ^ | 7/18/12 | EricTheRed

[EricTheRed_VocalMinority]

It boggles the mind the pro-Obama/Democrat anti-Republican propaganda that poses for news. With each new day the DBF* media seems to outdo itself. Today was no exception.

The Obama administration is ostensibly nervous about not winning the election even after having secured the votes of blacks, Jews who cherish liberalism more than they treasure Judaism and Israel, single sexually active women who think Republican men want them back in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant, illegal aliens and their sympathizers, and the dead in Florida and other states that have been prohibited by Obama’s DOJ from purging illegitimate names off the voting rolls. So last week, with virtually no DBF media coverage, Obama has bought the vote of another large swath of the American public: welfare recipients.

If you get your news from mainstream news outlets like the NY Times, you probably didn’t even know that last week President Hope&Change illegally sidestepped Congress again by yet again declaring a piece of legislation pratically null and void. With yet another unconstitutional swipe of the president’s magic wand, the work requirement for welfare recipients has been rescinded. Isn’t that nice? Bill Clinton’s signature 1996 welfare reform bill, which weaned millions of Americans off welfare and into jobs, completely gutted.

(You know, after everything Barack Obama has done to put his boot on the throat of the U.S. economy and stifle job growth, it would have been nearly impossible to think of any other way to make the situation even worse. So you got to hand it to him: He actually met that challenge with flying colors. Allowing welfare recipients to keep getting their government handouts without being required to look for work. Nice job, Mr. President. Nice job.)

Now, after several days of hardly a mention in the mainstream news, the NY Times finally had a piece on it yesterday. Except the piece is spun in a way so as to protect Obama and to paint objecting Republicans in a bad light [h/t Clay Waters at TimesWatch].

Some liberal hack posing as a journalist by the name of Rebecca Berg writes what is essentially an Obama press release:

Shift in Welfare Policy Draws G.O.P. Protests

A move by the Obama administration to give states more latitude in running federal welfare-to-work programs has set off a firestorm among Republicans, who say it undercuts the work requirements set forth in the 1996 overhaul of welfare policy.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced last week that it would grant states waivers to experiment with how they administer the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which distributes aid to the poorest Americans while they look for work.

The directive results from a broader effort by the Obama administration to peel back unnecessary layers of bureaucracy and allow states to spend federal money more efficiently. But Republicans, who characterize the move as a power grab by the executive branch, have criticized the waivers, saying they prove that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work.

Note that every Democrat talking point is conveyed as straight objective fact, while straight objective facts are tainted with phrases like “Republicans say …”. It’s a subtle but very effective weapon in the liberal media bias arsenal. By wrapping certain points as words uttered by Republicans, the author is essentially telling her reader: “Don’t pay attention to this point. It’s being made by a hateful, bigoted, racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic Republican!”

From the very title, the piece is infected with this bias: “Shift in Welfare Policy Draws G.O.P. Protests.” Note that the focus is not on the so-called shift in welfare policy—which is where it should be—but rather on “draws G.O.P. protests”. The subliminal message is: “Something Obama did has tied Republicans’ panties in a wad.” To which the reader is expected to respond, “Good! Whatever it is, I agree with it!” 

And what’s up with the choice of the sanitized word “shift”. It’s not a shift, it’s an obliteration! What a complete whitewash. To consider how inane the wording of that title is, imagine on December 8, 1941 the Times publishes: “Shift in Pearl Harbor Layout Draws Republican Protests.” or September 12, 2001: “Shift in Lower Manhattan Draws Republican Protests.” 

Incidentally, an earlier working title read Welfare-to-Work Shift Angers Republicans. (Did someone at the Times think specifying “welfare-to-work” was too detrimental to Obama so they cut  it out?) You can see this in the article's URL. Busted!

Just looking at the first few paragraphs of the body and you can tell this is going to be a doozy. Essentially, Democrat talking points are delivered as mere unquestionable fact. Consider the first paragraph: “Move to give the states more latitude in running federal welfare-to-work programs?” What a load of B.S. is an unfounded talking point (or at the very least the biased opinion of the author—but certainly not fact) that Obama’s unlawful dictatorial tampering of the welfare law does any such thing. Does Ms. Berg believe for one second that an administration that has constantly crapped on the Tenth Amendment gives a frog’s fat rear end about states’ latitude in running anything??

Berg does it again in the third paragraph: “The directive results from a broader effort by the Obama administration to peel back unnecessary layers of bureaucracy and allow states to spend federal money more efficiently”?? Again, this is not presented as quotation by some administration member but as straight fact. But who in their right mind would believe this, given that the Obama administration’s entire legacy is that it has created unnecessary layers of bureaucracy (ever heard of ObamaCare???) and to oversee the most egregiously inefficient spending of federal money (by states or otherwise)??

Now let’s get to the underhanded “Republicans say X, so just dismiss it outright because they’re … well, Republicans!” bias trick:

First paragraph: “set off a firestorm among Republicans, who say it undercuts the work requirements set forth in the 1996 overhaul of welfare policy.” First of all, the issue is not that Republicans say it undercuts the work requirements set forth in the 1996 overhaul of welfare policy, but that it by all accounts does undercut the work requirements of the policy!

Next paragraph: “But Republicans, who characterize the move as a power grab by the executive branch, have criticized the waivers, saying they prove that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work.”

Again, the issue is neither that Republicans are charactarizing the move as a power grab by the executive branch, nor that Republicans have criticized the waivers, nor that Republicans are saying they prove that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work! It is obvious to any sentient human being that the move is a power grab by the executive branch (and definitely not the first!), that the waivers are worthy of criticism, and that they do prove that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work!

Thus, a NY Times written by an objective journalist, rather than a mouthpiece for the Obama administration, would have read something like this:

Obama Sidesteps Congress, Unilaterally Enacts Shift in Welfare Policy

A move that the Obama administration claims gives states more latitude in running federal welfare-to-work programs undercuts the work requirements set forth in the 1996 overhaul of welfare policy.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced last week that it would grant states waivers to experiment with how they administer the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which distributes aid to the poorest Americans while they look for work.

The directive, the Obama administration explains, results from a broader effort to peel back unnecessary layers of bureaucracy and allow states to spend federal money more efficiently. But the move is a power grab by the executive branch, and the waivers suggest that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work.

There, much better. And if some of you are thinking that now it’s too biased in my direction, then sue me!

* DBF = Democrat b*tt-f**king