The Crap That Passes for Reporting

This AP story on the Social Security disability program. This paragraph says it all:

New congressional estimates say the trust fund that supports Social Security disability will run out of money by 2017, leaving the program unable to pay full benefits, unless Congress acts. About two decades later, Social Security's much larger retirement fund is projected to run dry as well.

Point 1: If if it runs out of money by 2017, that means it can't pay any benefits. If it's paying partial benefits, that means there's still money.

POint 2: No, the retirement fund is not projected to run dry -- there will be shortfalls in 25 years is Congress doesn't do something to fix it. With this Congress, of course, that means handing Social Security's assets over to Wall Street. We've seen how well Wall Street does with other people's money.

Of course, the other thing that Congress could do is to jump-start the economy, like by creating jobs. Don't hold your breath. (I know, the president has shifted his rhetoric to job creation. Any odds on whether he decides that jobs in India and China count?)

The appalling thing is that people read crap like this and just accept it as though it were fact. It's not fact -- it's spin.

Has anyone else noticed that AP has developed a distinct corporatist slant to its "reporting"?