I don't think Cokie Roberts is particularly partisan, but she is very much a comfortably ensconced member of the Village. It was she who found vacationing in Hawaii, if not foreign, definitely exotic and off-putting to most Americans.
She also doesn't work very hard to look past tropes for facts in her cushy little opining career. Being a Villager means never actually having to know facts.
As she sought to point out the problems President Obama faces with the growing revelations on NSA surveillance, she propagated one of the biggest falsehoods in partisan politics: President Obama believes in "big government".
Cokie, let me introduce you to Shinola:
You wouldn't know it by listening to the common beltway "wisdom," but under President Obama's tenure in the White House, the federal government has actually gotten smaller.
That's what Rachel Maddow said on her show last night. She demonstrated that thesis with graphs based on information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
According to the data, under the last three Republican presidents, and President Clinton, the number of federal employees increased.
And when there were economic recessions, the federal workforce grew under both Bush's and Reagan.
But then when you look at the graph tracking the number of federal employees under Obama, the graph drops sharply.
Quite obviously, Cokie, you're very familiar with Shinola's counterpart. I'd suggest you work harder to figure out which one you're serving your viewers.
