{"id":6366,"date":"2012-02-09T10:59:54","date_gmt":"2012-02-09T18:59:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6366"},"modified":"2012-02-09T10:59:54","modified_gmt":"2012-02-09T18:59:54","slug":"fox-nation-vs-reality-the-obama-downgrade-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6366","title":{"rendered":"Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Obama Downgrade Threat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once again Fox News has twisted the facts of a breaking story beyond all recognition. The headline on their Fox Nation blog reads: S&P Threatens Obama With Another Downgrade.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Fox<\/center>
\n<\/p>\n

The Fox Nationalists link to an article on Zero Hedge<\/a> where the original headline says: S&P Threatens US With Another Downgrade.<\/em> That is an obviously more accurate representation of the opinion expressed by S&P’s John Chambers, who was not threatening Obama at all. The prospect of another credit rating downgrade was directed at the United States, not the White House. Furthermore, its impact will be felt by the nation as a whole, not by the President as an individual.<\/p>\n

If anything, the threat was aimed more at Congress<\/a>, because that is where the budget is drafted, and it is where S&P has previously laid the blame for the downgrade. In their decision last August to drop the U.S. from AAA to AA+, S&P hammered at the disfunctionality of the Tea Party purists in the House who seemed to hunger for an American default:<\/p>\n

[T]he downgrade reflects our view that the effectiveness, stability, and predictability of American policymaking and political institutions<\/strong> have weakened at a time of ongoing fiscal and economic challenges […] The political brinksmanship<\/strong> of recent months highlights what we see as America\u2019s governance and policymaking<\/strong> becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips<\/strong> in the debate over fiscal policy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"TeaChambers noted in his latest comments that the “political brinkmanship hasn’t gone away. That simply doesn’t happen in other AAA economies.”<\/em> Indeed, the same intransigent Tea Party extremists are presently attempting to welch on prior agreements on payroll tax cuts and budget reductions stipulated by the failure of the so-called Super Committee to arrive at a compromise spending bill.<\/p>\n

The absurdity of Fox Nation trying to suggest that S&P is threatening Obama makes more sense when you recognize that the mission of Fox News is to disparage the President at every conceivable opportunity. They don’t care whether or not the criticism is factual. The only thing they are concerned with is their obsession with personalizing every negative event as being solely attributable to Obama in particular and Democrats in general. That agenda is not only dishonest, but it is also harmful in that it distracts from the real concerns presented by potential occurrences that will affect the entire nation and every citizen in it.<\/p>\n

Fox News doesn’t care about the harm it produces. It only cares about harming Obama and running him out of Washington. Never mind that even if they were successful it wouldn’t change the S&P analysis one bit since it is Congress who is responsible for the budget. The determination of Fox News to harm the country is evident everyday. It is evident in their lamenting of lower unemployment rates, which they dismiss as contrived. And it is evident in their disdain for improvements in American manufacturing in auto and other industries. If there is one thing that is clear about Fox News it is that they revel in bad news for America and they are willing to hurt the country in order to achieve their rightist political goals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once again Fox News has twisted the facts of a breaking story beyond all recognition. The headline on their Fox Nation blog reads: S&P Threatens Obama With Another Downgrade. The Fox Nationalists link to an article on Zero Hedge where the original headline says: S&P Threatens US With Another Downgrade. That is an obviously more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[219,1],"tags":[183,527,33,534],"class_list":["post-6366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","category-general","tag-barack-obama","tag-fox-nation","tag-fox-news","tag-tea-party"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-1EG","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4867,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=4867","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":0},"title":"Fox Nation vs. Reality: On The Debt Ceiling","author":"Mark NC","date":"7\/12\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Fox Nation has posted another item that grossly misrepresents reality. Their featured story this morning concerns an interview that President Obama gave to CBS News. Notice the headline from the Reuters article to which the Fox Nationalists linked: Obama: Seniors could be hurt without debt deal. The article quotes Obama\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5114,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=5114","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":1},"title":"S&P Downgrades United States Congress: Thank You Tea Party","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/6\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Standard & Poor's on Friday downgraded the United States Congress. You may have heard media reports that it was the country's credit rating that was downgraded, but the statement issued by the S&P is unambiguous with regard to their reasons for the downgrade and whom they hold responsible: [T]he downgrade\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Economy"","block_context":{"text":"Economy","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=219"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":20081,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=20081","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":2},"title":"Fox Nation vs. Reality: On Abandoning Israel – Who Says Obama Has Been “Terrific”","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/3\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"OK, first of all this is not an article about the tragic conflict in the Middle East that has been raging for decades. There will be no taking of sides or opinionating on blame. This is about how Fox News purposefully contorts their coverage to make President Obama look bad.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"Fox Nation","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-reality-netanyahu.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-reality-netanyahu.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-reality-netanyahu.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":5419,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=5419","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":3},"title":"Fox Nation vs. Reality: On Abolishing The Debt Ceiling","author":"Mark NC","date":"9\/17\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Anyone with a functioning brain stem already knows that Fox News will distort issues to advance their rightist agenda. But the worst part of their activist pseudo-journalism is when they deliberately present material that is so obviously false that it is an insult to their audience. Lucky for them their\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Economy"","block_context":{"text":"Economy","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=219"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9612,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=9612","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":4},"title":"Benghazi-Gate: The Feverish Fixation Of Fox News On Finishing Off Obama","author":"Mark NC","date":"5\/8\/2013","format":false,"excerpt":"The compulsive, gnawing yearning is palpable. Fox News is so obsessed with terminating the presidency of Barack Obama that they are veritably bursting at the seams of their shrunken skulls. They are dripping with flop-sweat over the self-manufactured prospect of evicting from the White House the man they failed twice\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":20167,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=20167","url_meta":{"origin":6366,"position":5},"title":"Fox Nation Outrage: Obama Vacations With White People – And Other Lies And Delusions","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/10\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The Fox News community website, Fox Nation, is a non-stop parade of deliberate misinformation, biased reporting, and promotion of notoriously disreputable purveyors of propaganda and conspiracy theories like Alex Jones and Breitbart News. [For more documented proof of Fox Nation's lies, read Fox Nation vs. Reality] This morning that penchant\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"Fox Nation","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-lies-delusion-racism.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-lies-delusion-racism.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnation-lies-delusion-racism.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6366"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6369,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6366\/revisions\/6369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}