Greg Sargent wants to know why the media is giving Republicans a huge pass on their various “jobs plans”:
Obama and the Senate GOP have both introduced jobs plans. In reporting on the Senate plan, many news organizations described it as a “GOP jobs plan.” And that’s fine — Rand Paul said it would create five million of them. But few if any of the same news orgs that amplified the GOP offering of a jobs plan are making any serious effort to determine whether independent experts think there’s anything to it. And independent experts don’t think there’s anything to it — they think the GOP jobs plan would not create any jobs in the near term, and could even hurt the economy. By contrast, they do think the Obama plan would create jobs and lead to growth.
Why aren’t these facts in every single news story about the ongoing jobs debate? Why aren’t they being broadcast far and wide?
I’m trying to think of the reasons for this….[One] possible reason: Reporters and editors don’t take the GOP jobs plan seriously enough to have it evaluated by independent experts. But if this is the case, isn’t this something readers and viewers should know about? News consumers who read or view stories about the GOP jobs plan without being told this vital information risk coming away thinking that both sides are making an equally serious contribution to the debate. If reporters and editors don’t believe this, isn’t that pertinent info for their customers?
I plucked out that last reason (Greg actually tosses out three possibilities) because it rings the truest to me. I suspect that reporters are simply so used to Republicans embracing nonsense that they evaluate it on a whole different plane than they do “serious” proposals. GOP campaign plans are treated more as optics than as actual policy, as ways to signal a candidate’s conservative bona fides more than as blueprints for actual legislation.
But Greg is right: this should stop. There’s no reason to give these guys a pass on their laughable jobs plans that virtually no one thinks will create any actual jobs. It won’t be easy, since most of the candidates (with good reason) refuse to release enough detail to make it easy to assess their plans, but it’s still doable. And the press should do it.
