(Tony Sifert, Headline USA) Citing a recent Congressional Budget Office report which showed that the Left’s shiny new Inflation Reduction Act won’t actually reduce inflation, ABC’s Jonathan Karl broke ranks from his corporate media peers during an interview with White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
After grooving fastballs throughout their interview, Karl finally threw a changeup to the blinking communications expert, asking whether it was “Orwellian” to name a piece of legislation that won’t reduce inflation the “Inflation Reduction Act.”
“But let me ask you, it’s called the Inflation Reduction Act but the Congressional Budget Act Office, which is nonpartisan, said that there would be a negligible impact on inflation this year and barely impact inflation at all next year,” Karl said. “I mean, isn’t it almost Orwellian?”
Unmoored from her binder of narrative facts, Jean-Pierre’s response was as incomprehensible as veterans of the White House briefing room have come to expect.
After denying that the bill’s name is Orwellian and thanking Karl for his question to gain time, Jean-Pierre desperately cast about for firm ground from which to launch her response.
“We’ve actually addressed this, the CBO,” she said. “It was the top line number, there’s more in there that shows that it will have the money from, remember how we’re doing this, too, it’s making sure that billionaires in corporate America are paying their fair share.”
Jean-Pierre then turned to an argument from authority.
“We have 126 economists, both Republicans, both Democrats who have said it’s going to fight inflation,” she pleaded. “It has — we — it has been proven, it has been said by economists across the board on the Republican side and the Democrat — on the Democrat side.”
Karl’s question provoked a few ironic cheers from conservatives.
“Karl acted almost like a journalist here,” wrote a writer at Legal Insurrection.
“When you’ve lost Jonathan Karl . . .,” wrote IT Guy.
When you've lost Jonathan Karl… https://t.co/dewypDhWNE
— IT Guy (@ITGuy1959) August 14, 2022
