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Episode 225: How US Media Frames Democracy that Actually Helps People as "Buying Votes"

Added 2025-07-23 13:51:35 +0000 UTC

"Student loan forgiveness is a bribe for young voters," shouted Newsweek in 2022. "Harris's call for price controls on groceries is more pandering than policy," declared The Hill in 2024. "Free for all: Democratic socialist’s policy pitches face tough fiscal reality in New York," warned Politico this year.

Every time an elected official or political candidate proposes a policy with even the slightest hint of actual populism, U.S. pundits, analysts and alleged experts line up to tell us that it’s just a scheme to "buy votes." Offering student-debt relief is just cheating. Lowering grocery costs is simply pandering. Eliminating public-transit fares is merely bribing voters. These initiatives aren't developed in good faith in order to improve the lives of the public; they're cynical ploys to help a given politician get ahead.

We know that some policymakers make promises that they'll never fulfill, or chisel away at robust and universal proposals, or backtrack on bold and transformative ideas. This happens all the time. But all too often, media’s default position is to assert that even the most modest of economically populist proposals are mere strategies to buy votes, revealing grim truths about what our media class seems to think the responsibilities of lawmakers and governments are.

On this episode, we examine the media tendency to assume that anything remotely close to populism is somehow cheating, playing the game on "god mode" or "democracy game genie," and ought to be discouraged by Serious People, putting a sinister spin on what is simply Doing Things People Want.

Our guest is FAIR's Janine Jackson.

Guest

Janine Jackson is program director at Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting and the producer and host of FAIR’s syndicated weekly radio show CounterSpin.

Show Notes

Media Did Their Best to Scare Voters Away From Zohran Mamdani

Ari Paul | June 27, 2025 | FAIR

Media Throw Everything But the Facts Against Harris’s ‘Price Control’ Proposal

Paul Hedreen | September 23, 2024 | FAIR

Stop Calling Kamala Harris’ Anti-Price-Gouging Proposal Price Controls

Zephyr Teachout | September 9, 2024 | Washington Monthly

Vox’s Student Loan ‘Expert’ Is Paid by Debt Collectors

Luca Goldmansour | August 11, 2023 | FAIR

Majority in U.S. Still Say Gov't Should Ensure Healthcare

Megan Brenan | January 23, 2023 | Gallup

‘It’s Not Just About Sanders and Warren, It’s About the Issues They Represent’

Janine Jackson and Julie Hollar | December 13, 2019 | FAIR

Clinton Blames Bernie, Delusional “Bernie Bros” for Losing 2016

Bess Levin | September 5, 2017 | Vanity Fair

Why Aren’t Big Bankers in Jail?

Janine Jackson | January 1, 2014 | FAIR

Most Americans can’t afford life anymore — and they just don’t matter to the economy like they once did

Venessa Wong and Jeffry Bartash | March 7, 2025 | MarketWatch

Harris’s Plan Is Economically Dumb but Politically Smart

Josh Barro | August 16, 2024 | The Atlantic

The Election That Broke the Spell of Chávez

Javier Corrales | December 8, 2015 | Foreign Policy

Banks aren’t the bad guys

Charles Lane | November 18, 2013 | The Washington Post

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Transcript

For a full transcript of this episode go here. You can also find transcripts of past episodes, live shows, Beg-a-Thons, Interviews and News Briefs here.

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