George Stephanopoulos' interview with Vice President Dick Cheney this weekend demonstrates the tendency of "the Mainstream Media" to NOT ASK THE TOUGH QUESTIONS that any college sophomore would reflexively ask in any journalism, history, or political science class, if that student were not paid millions of dollars per year to AVOID asking the tough questions.
The ABC interview started with a video clip of the Vice President speaking at a military base to a uniformed audience:
VP: "America's cause is right, America's cause is just, and with your efforts, America will prevail."
Stephanopoulos ("ABC") does start his interview with a tough, hard-hitting question:
ABC: "You have said that you believe that the insurgents are trying to determine the outcome of this election.
Do you believe that a win for the Democrats is a victory for the insurgents?"
VP: "When insurgents see what has happened in Conn. with the Democrats PURGING Leiberman, essentially for his support for the President's leadership of the war...
Its a tough war, its very difficult to complete the mission..."
Stephanopolous UTTERLY FAILED to come back with the OBVIOUS tough FOLLOW-UP QUESTION, "WHY ARE YOU GIVING TAX-CUTS to the wealthy, and WHAT KIND OF SACRIFICE have you asked from the American public to win this 'tough, difficult war'?"
Cheney later in the interview made the case that the economy "IS DOING VERY, VERY WELL... BECAUSE OF THE TAX CUTS."
BUT Stephanopoulos FAILED TO EVEN MENTION the huge, budget-busting US BUDGET DEFICITS and TRADE DEFICITS. The economy is, at the moment, enjoying a small boom in market prices, but the Dow average is not even 15% higher than it was in 2000, which is what a six years-times-three-percent inflation rate would demand to just stay even. (6 yrs. x 3%/yr. = 18% JUST TO MAINTAIN PARITY with inflation from where the market was in 2000.)
And, #2. the current boom is to at least some degree based on $2.25 per gallon gas prices.. which NO ONE, ANYWHERE, expects to last long beyond this current election season. When fuel and gas prices again go higher (the oil companies, having tasted $3/gal. fuel prices, are no doubt hungry to get back to them), America's driving-dependent businesses and industries (trucking, farming, airlines, even plumbers and other service workers) will once again be under the hammer of skyrocketing costs that exceed profit margins.
George Stephanopolous just posted a prime-time interview on ABC news with the Vice President, Stephanopoulos leaving _unchallenged_ the Vice President's assertion that the economy is booming. This is like Florida Governor Jeb Bush declaring that the Republican candidate for state treasurer is a "FISCAL CONSERVATIVE", Florida's billion-dollars Jeb-Bush-deficits be left unmentioned and damned.
Especially given that George Stephanopoulos was once a part of the Clinton-Gore "WAR ROOM" that famously declared "IT'S THE ECONOMY STUPID!" as their unofficial motto in 1992, his (Stephanopoulos') FAILURE to bring up BUDGET DEFICITS and the vulnerability of the US economy to energy prices and trade deficits is an especially egregious omission.... and that's not even to MENTION that Stephanopolous failed to contest Dick Cheney's assertion that we are "winning" the Iraq war, when actually America is stuck in a horrificly costly war of attrition that will almost certainly demand MORE TROOPS be sent to Iraq shortly after this election. Mr. Stephanopolous, that is AT LEAST THREE tough FOLLOW-UP questions that YOU REFUSED to follow through with in your trophy, oh-so-deferential interview!
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American commanders in Iraq have privately told the President that ADDITIONAL TROOPS will be needed in Iraq to maintain the current policy there:
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/contributors/529
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