More than a few viewers were caught off-guard Wednesday night when Lou Dobbs announced the broadcast would be his last on CNN. The self-described “defender of the working man” has been a vocal critic of Hispanic immigration and international trade since 9/11. Instead of informed analysis, Dobbs’ commentaries often reverted to racism and showed an abiding ignorance of economics. What follows is a list of some of Mr. Dobbs more outrageous antics:
1) In 2005, Dobbs claimed that Hispanic immigration was responsible for the spread of more than 7,000 cases of leprosy in America. When experts pointed out 7,000 was the total registered cases of leprosy in the US over the previous three decades Dobbs labeled his critics “commies”, “fascists”, and a “wackjob.” Wackjob, you say?
2) Dobbs repeatedly argued that NAFTA resulted in the loss of American jobs. This isn’t a new charge, in fact it was a pillar of Ross Perot’s 1992 presidential bid (see “Giant sucking sound”). Intuitive logic—in this case, the lower wages paid in Mexico—makes for a shoddy conclusion. Talk of job “loss” ignores the reality that the Federal Reserve manages the unemployment rate in the United States through its monetary policies. Now the data: in the decade after NAFTA’s passage the unemployment rate averaged about 5%, the lowest rate of any period in US history. Furthermore, NAFTA bashing overlooks the fact that the downsizing of United States’ manufacturing sector was underway decades before NAFTA became law in 1994.
3) Car plants in Mexico killed Detroit. Actually, total employment in automobile manufacturing has remained surprisingly high in the US over the past two decades. It’s just that high labor costs, primarily due to sagging productivity, aging pensioners, and union contracts have killed Detroit. Car factories in Alabama, Indiana, South Carolina, and elsewhere are doing quite well.
4) Dobbs liked to claim “a third of our prison population” are illegal aliens. The US DOJ asserts roughly 6% of state and federal inmates are non-citizens. As an ethnic population, Hispanics are less likely to break the law than Caucasians.
5) Dobbs’ criticism or America’s “broken borders” has involved guests with ties to White supremacist groups and utilized similar groups for data.
Having said that, Dobbs deserves kudos on one accord. To his credit, Dobbs was a trenchant advocate of the US border patrol officers who were imprisoned for shooting a known drug trafficker as he tried to cross the border. Their sentences were commuted as President Bush left office in January 2009. For three years Dobbs kept the story alive, mentioning their plight several hundred times. Well done. This still makes him right less often than my catatonic, Chinese-made Timex.
I doubt Dobbs will stay off the set for long. He quit CNN once already, only to return a year later. This time around, I suspect Dobbs will pop-up on another major media outlet—Fox News. In following the Glen Beck formula (shameless embrace of hysteria= higher ratings), don’t be surprised when Dobbs resurfaces, less governed by fact than ever.
