“Where is the mainstream media on this?” Steve Hayes of The Weekly Standard pleaded on Tuesday’s Special Report with Bret Baier in reference to President Obama’s latest decision to change the ObamaCare law. “Can you imagine if this were George W. Bush? I mean, we would be talking about a constitutional crisis, front page New York Times splashed above the fold, ‘George W. Bush: Dictator President.’ You’re seeing none of that.”
Just before Hayes spoke, panelist Charles Krauthammer called out liberals and the media as “unbelievably hypocritical,” recalling “when Republicans were trying to change the law, legally and constitutionally, in Congress they were accused of being terrorists, taking the country hostage, when they were saying let’s amend the law as written.”
Yet now, Obama “is amending the law without any constitutional legal way to do it, by the fiat issue, by the executive, which is completely lawless.”
Audio: MP3 clip [1]
From the February 11 Special Report with Bret Baier on FNC:
Charles Krauthammer:
It’s unbelievably hypocritical. Remember when Republicans were trying to change the law, legally and constitutionally, in Congress? They were accused of being terrorists, taking the country hostage, when they were saying let’s amend the law as written. And then instead, what the Democrats are doing is amending the law without any constitutional legal way to do it, by the fiat issue, by the executive, which is completely lawless.
Steve Hayes:
The final point I’ll make is, where is the mainstream media on this? Where’s the establishment media on this? We say this all the time, and we sometimes get tired of making the point. Can you imagine if this were George W. Bush? I mean, we would be talking about a constitutional crisis, front page New York Times splashed above the fold, “George W. Bush: Dictator President.” You’re seeing none of that. Now, it’s just a shrug of the shoulder. The thing that was most striking about what the President said today was that he didn’t really feel like he needed to explain it much. It was a shrug of the shoulders, a couple sentences, oh, by the way, I’m changing the law again. Well, it’s a big deal when you change the law. It should be a big deal, it should be treated as a big deal by the media.
Monday night: “Networks Ignore Controversy of Obama’s Extending Another Employer Mandate Delay [2]”
Last week: “George Will: Obama Knows He Has Media Covering for Him on IRS [3]”
— Brent Baker is the Steven P.J. Wood Senior Fellow and Vice President for Research and Publications at the Media Research Center. Follow Brent Baker on Twitter. [4]