I’m not sure what CNBC’s Mary Thompson was trying to say in this piece. At first, she suggests CNBC was among General Electric’s media properties criticized by shareholders for being too liberal! CNBC? Liberal? But then she is asked about this by Maria Bartiromo and Thompson’s answer is muddled. I think what she’s suggesting is that Jeff Immelt, GE’s CEO, was criticized by shareholders for telling his media outlets that they were too hard on Obama. Well, we know he couldn’t haven’t been talking about MSNBC. Maybe you can figure out what she’s saying.
And it is impossible to think that, if he was criticized for telling his media outlets they were too hard on Obama, he was talking about CNBC. Listen to the report below which followed the one above. It’s about corporate tax rates of U.S. companies operating abroad. The conservative argument is invariably that to tax them as they would be taxed in the U.S. would mean the loss of U.S. jobs because these companies would move their HQ abroad. Listen carefully for Maria Bartiromo’s editorial comments during the interview.
After Greg Valliere, who is opposed to corporate taxes, makes his comments, Bartiromo says, “You make a good point.” And then she says in a accusatory manner to the hapless woman on the progressive side of this argument, “You said [Obama] should go ahead and do this!”
When Valliere criticizes tax equality, his ridiculous argument that people move from state to state to avoid taxes goes unchallenged by Bartiromo (or the hapless progressive — Nicole Tichon, of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group — for that matter; I think CNBC tries to find the most feckless progressives to represent the side CNBC hates.)
When Valliere makes the other well-worn canard that our corporate tax rates are the highest in the world, Bartiromo laughs. Then when Tichon (now regaining her legs) says that’s debatable. Bartiromo says “Whoa, Whoa, why is that debatable?”
Tichon gives a halting but accurate answer, and then Valliere changes the subject, saying that companies won’t be able to create jobs, Bartiromo says, “Right, Yep, Yep.”
Bartiromo wouldn’t know a journalistic ethic if hit her on her collagen inflated lips.