Media On The Obama Economy: “That Was Then…”

Investor’s Business Daily has noted a sudden shift in media coverage of the economy:

Little noticed in President Obama’s "fiscal cliff" plan is a demand for a huge new stimulus package. Wait! Wasn’t he and everyone in the press telling us just before the election how the economy was gathering steam?

Remember headlines like these?

In fact, one month before the election, the Times ran a story touting all the "signs of growing economic strength" and boasting how the country was in the midst of a "steadier recovery than previously thought."

That same day, a USA Today story prominently quoted a source as saying "the economy is finally beginning to build some momentum."

Then there was our own Boston Globe-Democrat who, in the weeks before the election, highlighted the “recovery,” and “growth.”  My favorite was the story defending the worst-ever recovery of Obama’s as normal:

Slow economic recovery fits post-crisis pattern

As anyone who remembers the Reagan recovery knows, this is utterly untrue. But it was part of the Globe’s “the economy isn’t as bad as you think!” story line.

Today? Massachusetts’ has a major budget problem because the economy is sagging and so are revenues. And President Obama needs another stimulus because the national economy is “sputtering.”

To anyone paying attention, the economy was sputtering in October, too. But people reading the papers never would have known.