Healthcare

The Lies of Mike Pence

Yglesias on Mike Pence's MSNBC lies:

Politicians engage in a volume of misrepresentation that is, at first, quite shocking. Then you realize it’s not shocking. Politicians wouldn’t lie of lying was likely to generate newspaper headlines like “Pence Lies About Health Insurance” or got bookers to say things like “sorry, Senator, you can’t come on our network anymore since you were so dishonest or ill-informed in your two previous segments.” But nobody does business that way so why not lie? It’s easier to campaign against $1 trillion in new taxes than $540 billion in new taxes.

That headline, “Pence Lies About Health Insurance”, almost seems surreal. What would it take for a corporate media source to print such a thing? I can't imagine it. And that's sad.

In the case of Mike Pence's dual appearances on MSNBC this week in which he obviously mislead viewers about the taxes attached to one of the healthcare reform bills, the press has a duty to report this, at least on MSNBC where this deception occurred. Maybe Rachel or Keith or Shuster, but this isn't a matter of opinion. This is hard news. Pence lied about taxes on national television -- twice. And there ought to be headlines and hard reporting about it.

Then again, if he were exposed in the corporate press as the flimflam artist he is and if MSNBC banned him, they would be stuck having to fill that extra nine hours of airtime each day normally occupied by The Mike Pence Show.