President Barack Obama's bid to overhaul the U.S. health care system was in doubt Thursday as lawmakers rejected the quickest route for achieving it in the aftermath of a major Republican political victory.
Defeat for Obama's audacious plan would be a major setback for the president one year into his four-year term. He made health care his most important domestic priority but has seen support for it among the populace dwindling in recent polls, apparently overtaken by public worry over the state of the economy.
That last phrase is interesting. Slipping support for the health "reform" bills in Congress isn’t about taxation, or regulation, or the denial of care by federal bureaucrats. It’s the state of the economy, Babington "apparently" guesses – as if it couldn’t possibly be any flaws in the legislation.
Last March, Brent Bozell found a similar pattern in AP's Obama coverage:
Here’s how Charles Babington of the Associated Press began his analysis: “Breathtaking in its scope and ambition, President Barack Obama's agenda for the economy, health care and energy now goes to a Congress unaccustomed to resolving knotty issues and buffeted by powerful interests that oppose parts of his plan.” Obama is the giant with breathtaking ambition, while members of Congress are mere mortals unaccustomed to accomplishment. Obama’s agenda is not described as liberal. Instead, it’s a plan “to undo major elements of Ronald Reagan's conservative movement.”
His AP colleague Liz Sidoti echoed the meaningless chatter: “Barack Obama is embracing the worst economic conditions in a generation as an opportunity to advance an audacious agenda that, if successful, could reshape the country for decades to come.”
