CNSNews.com reporter Melanie Arter went into pro-Trump stenography mode once more for a Jan. 29 article:
National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow said Monday that the economy is “very strong” despite the government shutdown and that no “permanent damage” was done.
“I still think the economy is very strong. I know there are some disagreements, sut I think, as the numbers shake out, the Commerce Department is reopening, we’re going to get a GDP report probably next week, we’ll get a jobs report this Friday. So that’ll work out,” he said.
“Based on things we’ve talked about here — unemployment claims, low; industrial production, strong; business investment, strong; holiday sales, very strong — I still think we’re on a three percent trend line growth rate, and I’m proud of that. I think that the program of lower tax rates, and regulatory rollback, and opening up energy and so forth is working and is continuing to work,” Kudlow said, adding that he thinks the optimists “are going to be right.”
Arter is certainly not going to mention — and she doesn’t — Kudlow’s long history of terrible economic predictions, as we’ve documented, even though it’s newsworthy regarding his veracity as an economic adviser. Yet Arter lets Kudlow attack without challenge the economic reports of the Congressional Budget Office, even though he’s frequently wrong in his CBO-bashing. (Though Kudlow has no problem with CBO numbers that align with his political agenda.)
This is what happens when pushing a political agenda becomes more important than reporting the news.