When the President or any prominent politician makes an absurd statement, the media have an obligation to all public attention to it. Is the person either completely uninformed about the topic or are they just lying to advance their agenda. This is how the media should have reported the assertion by President Bush, reported in the NYT this morning, that plans by Senators Obama and Clinton to renegotiate NAFTA if elected president could "shut down trade" (NYT words, not necessarily Bush words). While Mexico and Canada may be unhappy over any efforts to renegotiate NAFTA, it is absurd to think that they would stop their trade with the United States in response. Such a halt would be devastating to their economies. The NYT should have sought to press President Bush or his press staff to determine whether he really believes something so ridiculous or whether he was just making up a scare story to score political points.
--Dean Baker
