AP back to being All Partisan

Briefly the extreme bias of the facts overwhelmed the Associated Press's quest for Ballance.


Now JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS and DAVID ESPO
write

In one small sign of progress, House Republicans dispatched their second-ranking leader, Rep. Roy Blunt of Missouri, to join the talks after their objections to an emerging compromise had brought negotiations to a standstill the day before. They also demanded "serious consideration" for a plan of their own, involving less government intrusion and lower cost to the taxpayers than the $700 billion that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has been seeking.

So how do they know that the House Republicans' plan will cost taxpayers less ? Why the House Republicans said so, so it must be true. I think it is obvious that it will cost much more than the Dodd-Frank plan *and* create new risks for the financial system.

The AP has gone back to stating completely unsupported partisan assertions as facts, so long as the partisans are Republicans who don't know anything about the issues (Matt Yglesias has the goods but the thinkprogress hamster is tired)

Alarmingly and unsurprisingly the Democrats are caving and proposing a totally crazy dog's lunch compromise "Democrats and Bush officials said the insurance proposal was acceptable as an option but not as a replacement for the administration's more sweeping approach." That is, OK we'll give bankers and capital gains tax payers more public money, if you just let us give them the 700 billion the way we want to.

Of course the insane compromise will have the advantage of showing that partisan bickering is always good for the partisan bickerers and making it clear that one is a grown up is always punished in Washington.