July 8, 2011

In Defense of Michele Bachmann

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/5434897607/">Gage Skidmore</a>/Flickr

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Among all the reactions to June’s abysmal job numbers, Rep. Michele Bachmann delivered what some saw as the most callous.

During a morning interview on CNBC, host Carl Quintanilla asked the congresswoman, “Does it strike you that as the unemployment rate goes up your chances of winning office also go up?” Bachmann started her reply by stumbling on the words, “Well, that could be. Again, I hope so.”

Some in the lefty blogosphere seized upon this, taking those eight words to mean that Bachmann cynically hoped for an economic breakdown that would increase her odds of winning the White House in 2012.

Think Progress wrote:

While it’s of course acceptable for Bachmann to campaign on wanting to turn the economy around, it’s another matter entirely when she actively pursues policies that make the economy worse — while hoping it will help her campaign.

Daily Kos weighed in similarly:

[Y]ou’ve got to give [Bachmann] credit for being honest. Not many Republicans are willing to publicly admit that they hope sabotaging the economy will help them win in the 2012 elections.

AlterNet, The Raw Story, and others ran with the same narrative. But anyone watching the full interview could see that Bachmann hardly comes across as someone hankering for a jobs market implosion. From the footage, it’s clear that what she is “hoping” for is to be president, and to inject her Tea Party philosophy into national economic policy:

I have seen up-close-and-personal how devastating high taxes are on…businesses and families…[I want to] bring my background, skill, and expertise to be able to actually change the economy.

There is plenty of room to criticize Bachmann’s flawed economic thinking and her propensity for saying pretty absurd, nasty stuff (like when she accused the First Family of harboring “anti-American views“). But those arguments can—and should—be made without distorting her message or excising context. However off-the-mark she can be, claiming that this interview shows that Bachmann yearns to see the American economy plummet sounds a lot like Ann Coulter saying that liberals wanted the US to “fail” in Iraq. It’s just not credible.

Here’s the video:

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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