Almost any impartial organization researching the quality of the news coverage in the 2008 and 2012 elections has noticed that the coverage of Barack Obama as a candidate in 2008 and as the incumbent in 2012 has been overwhelmingly positive. Conversely, the coverage of Republican nominee John McCain was extremely negative in 2008 and the coverage of the 2012 presumptive Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, has also been negative.
Last week, President Obama held his first news conference in months. Despite their dearth of opportunities to ask him questions in recent months, the reporters attending this news conference seemingly could not think of tough questions to ask a President who has presided over the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression and over an economy in which 23 million Americans are out of work, underemployed or have simply given up looking for a job.
Amazing.
I know that they're busy, so I thought I would help them out by suggesting a few questions that they might ask the President at their next opportunity. Here are just a few that I believe the American people would like answered:
- Mr. President, while answering a question about the tone of your campaign in your recent news conference, you said that no one had called Mitt Romney a felon. However, your own deputy campaign director, Stephanie Clutter, strongly insinuated that Governor Romney had committed a felony? Would you like to clarify your position?
- Mr. President, a super PAC headed by former members of your staff and administration have run an advertisement strongly suggesting that Governor Romney was responsible for a woman's cancer death. However, after checking into the facts, one learns that Governor Romney had left Bain Capital before the company in question went bankrupt and that the woman had her own health insurance anyway, which she lost after an accident at her work. Considering the misleading nature of this advertisement, and although your campaign didn't pay for it, would you like to repudiate this advertisement as false and/or misleading?
- Mr. President, over the past three and a half years, you have presided over the economy, yet the vast majority of economic indicators have not improved. Considering that what you have tried so far hasn't created the type of results you predicted, what would you do differently in a second term to revive the economy?
- Mr. President, you and your campaign have criticized Governor Romney and Representative Paul Ryan for their plans to address the growth of entitlement programs, yet you have not offered your own plan. What is your plan to slow the growth of entitlement programs so that they not only cover today's seniors, but also are available to the next generation of Americans?
- Mr. President, your campaign has run advertisements indicating that Representative Ryan's plan to address the rising cost of Medicare would end the current program for seniors. Mr. Ryan's current plan does not change the existing Medicare program for anyone 55 and over. Isn't it misleading to scare the American people by telling them that Representative Ryan would end Medicare for today's seniors?
- Mr. President, you have called Governor Romney and Representative Ryan "radicals" and "extremists" for their plans to cut the growth of entitlement programs and to cut the federal budget so that America's debt can be reduced. What is your plan to cut the federal budget and to reduce America's debt?
- Mr. President, America has not operated under a budget passed by Congress since the last budget of the Bush Administration. What would you tell the average American who has to live within his or her budget, but realizes that our leaders haven't passed a budget in over three years and essentially are operating with an open checkbook?
- Mr. President, your campaign is running an advertisement in Ohio and Pennsylvania touting your support of the coal industry, yet your own EPA has proposed new regulations that according to experts would mean there would be no new coal-fired power stations built in the U.S. after those currently in the works are completed. Can you explain your position and record on coal?
- Mr. President, with dozens of coal-fired power stations closing because of EPA regulations, experts are predicting that electricity rates will increase dramatically for customers across the U.S. In fact, you said while campaigning in 2008 that electricity rates would "necessarily skyrocket" based on what you planned to do with coal. What do you tell the American family that is having trouble making ends meet, but will soon be facing even higher electric bills?
- Mr. President, according to some sources, your Harvard yearbook cites you as being "Kenyan-born," and the biography used by your book publisher indicated for over a decade that you were "Kenyan-born." Did you claim on your college entrance paperwork that you were foreign born in order to take advantage of scholarship and entrance opportunites that would not have been afforded to you if you had indicated you were American-born? Would you mind authorizing Harvard, Occidental or Columbia to release those documents?
- Mr. President, your deputy campaign manager, Stephanie Clutter, recently said that more jobs have been created in the past 27 months than following the recessions faced by President Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush. Numerous experts researching the facts have said that this is incorrect, that 200,000 more jobs were created during the Bush Administration and that nearly twice as many jobs were created during the Reagan Administration. Would you like to clarify comments made by Ms. Clutter?
- Mr. President, you and members of your staff continue to tout the fact that 4.5 million jobs have been created during your administration. However, fewer Americans are working today than in 2000, although our population has grown by 31 million and our labor force has increased by over 11 million. Isn't it misleading to continue to publicize the number of jobs created, when we're clearly losing ground and not enough jobs are being created month after month to meet the needs of our growing population?
- Mr. President, you have blamed your predecessor much of your first term for the state of the eocnomy. At what point does the economy becomes yours and you take full responsibility for its results?
- Mr. President, you promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of your first term, and you also said that if you were unable to turn around this economy that your Presidency would be a one-term proposition. Mr. President, do you deserve to be reelected, given you have not met the level of expectations you set for yourself in order to be elected to a second term?
- Mr. President, what is the difference between a venture capitalist such as Bain Capital investing in companies and the government investing in companies like Solyndra?
- You often criticize Governor Romney and Bain Capital for trying to make a profit. What is wrong with a private company working to make a profit? If Bain Capital were unable to make a profit, wouldn't it put all the companies they owned and managed in jeopardy, putting hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk?
- Mr. President, when campaigning for the Affordable Care Act, you told Americans that they would see their health care premiums decrease by $2,500, and that they would be able to keep their same doctor and their same health care plan. Instead, Americans have seen their health care premiums increase by $2,500 in the past year, businesses are no longer sponsoring health care insurance because it will be cheaper to pay the penalty than to purchase insurance, and patients are having to switch doctors because of the health care plans to which they are being switched. What would you say to the American people about these changes in their health care coverage that they did not anticipate -- that you apparently did not anticipate?
Maybe the mainstream new media aren't as informed as they would like us to think they are, or perhaps the media is so far in the President's corner that they are unwilling to ask any question of substance. I sincerely believe it's more of the latter than the former, given their biased coverage of the candidates in 2008 and 2012.
This should disgust any American. Americans expect the Fourth Estate to play a vital role in keeping the three branches of government honest by asking tough questions the American people want answered and by investigating the words and deeds of our government.
Clearly, the Fourth Estate hasn't been doing its job. Americans deserve better.
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