By Kevin Drum?

Am I mistaken, or did it used to say "By Steve Benen" up there?

I'm not surprised. CNN's talent and bosses are just a little more than self serving here. Much like Dr Gupta's fake stats takedown on Michael Moore's Sicko.

Apparently Wolf disagrees with Barkley about the few hundred thousand here or there. Wolf wants to keep his, and is not being shy about his methodology.

But airing an accurate report on taxes on an early morning in June, and then airing a misleading report on taxes during the Democratic convention, doesn't amount to quality reporting.

That's true, but that statement only matters to CNN if it considers its job to be quality reporting. Available evidence suggests CNN's agenda is other than that.

McCNN---the McCain [Broken] Condom News Network. Talk about "unsafe...."

I agree about the stats they showed, but I think it was actually great to have a rich and famous (is he?) athlete say how grateful he is for what he has and then to point out that a couple hundred thousand dollars here or there is not going to hurt. My favorite line was "If you're rich, you're always going to be rich." If not for the list of stats, the interview could be accused of being a "liberal-media" setup question. Not sure if Wolf knew what they guy was going to say ahead of time, but I'm actually glad he had the opportunity to say it.

Damn you Steve, didn't you hear that the middle class is anyone earning under $5m a year?

I mean Wolf has swallowed all the other McCain campaign talking points, so why should this one be any different?

Wolf didn't include those making less that $161K because he, and everyone he knows, makes more than that. But hey, those of us in the middle class should trust him and his liberal bias, right?

I am sure that by Blitzer's standards, $161k+ IS middle class. And I am sure that he cannot fathom people making $20k or $40k.

Point of reference. And his sucks.

Barkley also said that Democrats will do more for "the poor." Although that's not really in debate, it's also not the point.

The signs all read "STRONG MIDDLE CLASS".

Barkley should go back to throwing dwarves through windows.
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Could anyone be fooled by that? People know how much they make. Is CNN hoping Joe Lunchpail will assume that if the top 5% are getting hosed, then everyone else must be, too?

PJ is right: "If you're rich, you're always going to be rich" is a good line. I wonder, is there anyone in America who has been taxed into poverty? Will that person be a special guest at the GOP convention?

It is after all the Corporate News Network; the money talks and the middle class walks. With any luck this will be held to term against CNN and their excursion/opinion based hackery when news organizations actually start reporting news again..

someday....

Good for Barkley for what it's worth.

Why the hell is Wolf Blitzer interviewing Charles Barkley about the candidates' tax proposals in the first place? Next thing you know he'll be interviewing Bernanke about the NBA draft.

Steve Benen wrote: "But airing an accurate report on taxes on an early morning in June, and then airing a misleading report on taxes during the Democratic convention, doesn't amount to quality reporting."

"Quality reporting" is not the job of CNN and the rest of the corporate-owned mass media.

Their job is to propagandize on behalf of America's Ultra-Rich Ruling Class, Inc. and their ruthless class war against everyone else.

Specifically, for the next two months, their job is to get John McCain close enough to steal the election with voter disenfranchisement and fraud.

They are doing a heck of a job.

Blitzer's chart left out the entire middle-class, and just as importantly, the fact that those making $112,000 or less would actually get a bigger break from Obama than McCain. Given that McCain is running mendacious ads about Obama's desire to "raise taxes," it seems like the kind of detail a news network might want to mention, so the public will have all the facts.

CNN hasn't been a news network since Fox first threatened them in ratings and they decided that trying to copy Fox by being a right-wing mouthpiece was the best way to keep a consistent demographic glued to the tube and sell advertising, which is, after all, what commercial TV is all about.

Commercial media serves the interests of advertisers, who are its paying customers. Viewers are the product being sold, not the customers being served.

What's left out of the charts is that while taxes may be "raised" on these upper income groups, through sharp accountants, tax shelters and loopholes, the rich folks will still find ways to pay less taxes than the rest of us. These numbers are meaningless because they don't reflect what these groups will actually pay. Once you get down to the real middle class, then tax increase numbers will actually reflect the pain someone will feel on April 15th.

Good for Charles Barkley. I'm glad to see someone with some wealth saying they don't mind contributing to their country, rather than acting like the uber rich who will scam their way out of paying anything while using their connections to siphon of public funds to their advantage.

This is interesting because Charles Barkley and Rush Limbaugh used to consider themselves buddies, and Barkley actually once talked about running for governor of Alabama - as a Republican. Recently however, Barkley seems to have turned on the Republicans probably because of living through the Bush-Cheney regime. This is a very positive sign when somebody (anybody) rich admits that they have it made, and higher taxes aren't going to kill them.

The Washington Post has a better chart.

"Well, I think that if you're rich -- I thank God I've been very successful -- if you're rich, you're always going to be rich. If we pay more in taxes, I got no problem with that. If you're making that kind of money, a couple hundred thousand dollars here or there are not going to change your life."

Barkley understands something that useful idiots like Blitzer don't -- namely, marginal utility. Which, applied to taxes, tells us that the pain of paying taxes goes down as your income or wealth go up, which in turn means that a fair tax system, in the sense of inflicting equal pain on everyone, must be a progressive tax system.

Something by the way which has been understood since at least John Stuart Mill's time roughly 200 years ago.

Blitzer's chart left out the entire middle class because CNN wants advertisers to believe that the CNN audience consists only of people making more than $161,000 per year. Much more.

If a couple of hundred thousand doesn't mean that much to Barkley then why doesn't he voluntarily double what he gives to the government and help out the little guy?

Why don't all of the progressives just agree to send in 10% more than the government requires? If this country is becoming more progressive then that amount should be rising every year.

Somehow I think progressives do not trust their own people to be so generous.

"Well, I think that if you're rich -- I thank God I've been very successful -- if you're rich, you're always going to be rich. If we pay more in taxes, I got no problem with that. If you're making that kind of money, a couple hundred thousand dollars here or there are not going to change your life."

Barkley understands something that useful idiots like Blitzer don't -- namely, marginal utility. Which, applied to taxes, tells us that the pain of paying taxes goes down as your income or wealth go up, which in turn means that a fair tax system, in the sense of inflicting equal pain on everyone, must be a progressive tax system.

He's not the only celebrity to praise his tax rate. Seventy years ago this month, a legendary film star earned some of the best reviews of her career for making similar comments.

In August 1938, publicist Russell Birdwell was privately chatting with client Carole Lombard in her dressing room. A well-known (and well-paid) director had recently complained publicly about a recent increase in the income tax rate. This angered Carole, and Birdwell immediately stopped her and called a United Press reporter. He let her resume her harangue when the UP writer was taking notes on the other end of the line.

Lombard, whose salary was one of the highest in the film industry, was quoted as saying: "I gave the federal government 65 percent of my wages last year, and I was glad to do it, too...Income tax money all goes into improvement and protection of the country...I really think I got my money's worth."

A few hours later, the UP story was sent to hundreds of newspapers, and Carole received many plaudits for her egalitarian comments, including a piece from liberal columnist Heywood Broun, who wrote: "The United States Chamber of Commerce [which had railed against the tax increases] might well profit by a little lecture from Miss Carole Lombard." President Franklin D. Roosevelt sent Lombard a letter praising her support; they would meet two years later when Carole visited Washington. Several years later, writer Alva Johnston noted that "probably no other news item ever did so much to increase the popularity of a star."

Carole Lombard would have liked Charles Barkley.

There's a reason why it's the Cretins' News Network.