Matt Drudge's favorite new source, Bloomberg News, recently reported that because Republicans are attacking Obama over the AIG bonus story it “may” damage the White House.

Then again, it may not. But that doesn't get you linked to Drudge.

Written by Hans Nichols, the Bloomberg piece claimed [emphasis added]:

President Barack Obama's attempt to harness public anger over bonuses paid by American International Group Inc. may backfire on him as Republicans try to redirect that anger toward his administration.

First, how is Obama trying to “harness public anger” over the bonus story? I'm not even sure what that means. I realize Obama has expressed his own outrage, as has virtually every politicians inside the Beltway in the last 48 hours. But how is Obama trying to “harness” the anger? Bloomberg never explains.

Second, how would the public anger “backfire” on Obama? This picks up on that dreadful WashPost article we highlighted on Monday which announced that Obama's entire agenda was in danger of collapsing because “the public” was so angry about the AIG bonus story and was blaming the White House. Except that the Post didn't provide any evidence that the public was blaming the White House. Republican politicians? Yes, they were blaming Obama. The public? No proof.

Same with Bloomberg News. The entire article is built around the idea that public anger “may” target the White House, but all the story included was predictable partisan GOP anger targeting the White House.

The article also includes a couple of unfortunate quotes, like this one:

Obama, 47, must now “play defense on economic populism,” said pollster John Zogby. That can be a “deadly” posture in American politics, Zogby said. “We are not a hate-the-rich country,” he said. “There's got to be a fine line here between going after the rich versus going after the venal greedy.”

Is Obama engaged in any “hate-the-rich” rhetoric? Is Obama just mindlessly going after “the rich”? Of course not. So why is Zogby being quoted to that effect?