After my post a couple of days ago about the blatantly biased nature of the news, there comes this story about the true numbers behind the costs of the President’s state visit to India. Is it really possible that the numbers were so far off and nobody on the right (who had no problem quoting the figures) bothered to fact check this before reporting it? If it is true that the report of $200 million a day was based on a report in the Indian press which itself was based on one, unnamed “official”, this is disturbing. Anderson Cooper did a little fact-checking, and it seems that the real number may be less than $5 million a day, and pretty much in line with what Clinton and Bush spent on such state visits during their tenures. Never heard too much complaint then …

I have no problem with saying that there is waste involved with these trips. There likely is! But let us, please, be honest that whatever waste is going on, has been going on for several presidencies, and was just as wrong for either Bush as it was for Clinton and is for Obama. Let us please cut government waste wherever we can, but pretending that there is so much to cut here, confuses the issue.