ABC News embarrasses itself
February 05, 2009 1:28 pm ET by Eric Boehlert
Read this, if you must. It's by Scott Mayerowitz and it's painfully, painfully stupid.
Here's a flavor:
America's CEOs are coming under fire these days not just for their hefty salaries but also for their use of private jets, limos with drivers and free trips to posh resorts. But they aren't alone in living this lavish lifestyle -- the president of United States gets all these perks and more.
And unlike some of his Cabinet appointments, he doesn't have to pay taxes on these benefits. It might be a bit of a stretch to compare today's corporate titans with the commander in chief, but some Wall Street bloggers clearly upset with President Obama's attempts to rein in executive pay are doing just that.
"Some accountability needs to be put in place. We won't have them kicking sand in the face of taxpayers any longer," said one private equity worker on Dealbreaker.com, a Wall Street gossip site and blog.
Obama has proposed capping annual compensation at $500,000 for executive at financial firms that receive huge government bailouts. Therefore, ABC News, responding to "Wall Street bloggers," writes up a 'news' story noting that gee, the president gets paid a lot of money, too.
If your head isn't starting to hurt, then by all means click on the article and read the whole thing and read how Mayerowitz completely ignores the fact that some of the CEO's in question were making tens of millions of dollars, while the POTUS makes just $400,000. But yeah, their pay is still analogous.
I realize layoffs in the news biz are rampant, but did ABC News fire all of its editors? Not only is the premise and execution of this article a complete embarrassment (can somebody please explain the article's Steve Ford reference), but it doesn't even make sense. Quite literally. Re-read these two graphs:
It might be a bit of a stretch to compare today's corporate titans with the commander in chief, but some Wall Street bloggers clearly upset with President Obama's attempts to rein in executive pay are doing just that.
"Some accountability needs to be put in place. We won't have them kicking sand in the face of taxpayers any longer," said one private equity worker on Dealbreaker.com, a Wall Street gossip site and blog.
Do you notice how the provided quote--the quote that's supposed to set up the entire premise of the article--makes no sense. How does that quote convey the idea that "some Wall Street bloggers" are comparing POTUS pay to CEO pay? The way I read the mangled quote, the exact opposite was being inferred. (i.e. The CEO's need to be held accountable.) Either way, it literally makes no sense.
Elsewhere Mayerowitz claims "Corporate America quickly pointed out that while the president also only makes $400,000 a year, he gets all sorts of extra perks and doesn't have to pay taxes on them." But the reporter never quotes anybody from corporate America making that claim.
Combine that with the mysterious, incoherent "blogger" quote provided, and it's obvious there's no proof anybody in corporate America or on Wall Street is comparing POTUS pay to CEO pay. Why? Because CEO pocket tens of millions of dollars annual, and the POTUS $400,000.
As we said, just painfully stupid.
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Talk about painfully stupid, this is the second piece of nonesense written by this fellow Boehlert in two days.
Media Matters, do you not have any gatekeepers? Does any piece of crap your folks write get automatically posted?
How, exactly, does ABC News embarass itself with this piece? It's a lighthearted look at the whining some corporate executives are doing in the face of Obama's action on salary caps for their colleagues whose companies receive federal bailout money.
Not only does this story not advocate the executives' position, it makes fun of it, clearly showing how wrongheaded their position is.
Look, MM, if you're going to criticize the media, have at it. But at least assign someone with some news sense to do it. The subjects this fellow chooses to bloviate about really aren't worth the effort.
ABC News has been going down the path of FOX NEWS since at least 2006, when aired that inaccurate television movie about the years before 9/11. Don't forget, ABC is owned by Disney. They need to look after corporate profits as well. Corporate control of media is one the main pillars standing in the way of thing getting better in America.
THANK YOU.
njguy93@yahoo.com
I guess Bill36 never actually read this ABC article. How is this for bad journalism:
It might be a bit of a stretch to compare today's corporate titans with the commander in chief, but some Wall Street bloggers clearly upset with President Obama's attempts to rein in executive pay are doing just that.
He says it might be a stretch then writes a whole article based upon that stretch as his premise. This defies any journalistic logic at all.
Clearly you don't recognize great comedy writing when you see it.
Colbert will be all over this one.
And the ABC (Onion) News article doesn't even mention all the bodyguards that Obama has. Most CEOs have only a few dozen.