On today's 3:00 pm edition of CNN Newsroom, anchor Brooke Baldwin teased her next segment:

BALDWIN: Coming up next, House Republicans they want to cut billions of dollars in food stamps. We will talk about who exactly in terms of numbers this would impact and why my next guest calls this whole suggestion appalling -- back in 60 seconds.

Baldwin interviewed Edward Cooney, executive director of the Congressional Hunger Center.  She didn't note that, despite its official-sounding name, the center is just another 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization taking money from companies such as Walmart, Kraft, and Archer Daniel Midland, as well public funding for fellowships.  Nor that Cooney had worked at the Department of Agriculture during the Clinton administration.  Nor that Cooney has made political contributions to Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) and ActBlue, which characterizes itself as "the online clearing house for Democratic action."

Given that, it was to be expected that Cooney is less than sympathetic to GOP efforts to reduce the skyrocketing costs of food stamps, also referred to as SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program):

COONEY: I think I should also point out though that tomorrow morning, they're going to cut an additional $33 billion that has not gotten the press this other cut has. And they indicated that there will be no harm involved. No one will be hurt because these are technical cuts. I would just like to say to you if you hear that expression from Congress, no one will be
harmed, that's your first notice that you should be running for cover.

BALDWIN: Well, when you mentioned millions of people would be affected, I imagine in that millions we're talking millions of children.

And you do have, as we talk millions, record numbers of people who are in the SNAP, the food stamp program. The numbers they began spiking -- when you look back here, they spiked during the great recession. Then you look from 2007 to today, we have seen the food stamp rolls go from 27
million to 47 million.

Doubtless the recession has had a significant impact on the number of recipients.  But the Department of Agriculture  itself
reported:

The historical relationship between unemployment and SNAP caseloads diverged in the middle of the decade, however. As the unemployment rate fell 1.4 percentage points between 2003 and 2007, SNAP caseloads increased
22 percent, or by 4.8 million participants.

The cost of food stamps has increased from under $18 billion in 2001 to $76 billion now.  As part of President Obama's stimulus, states received additional funding for signing up more participants.  Little wonder food-stamp expenditures have doubled in the past four years.  According to an Associated Press story on ABCNews's Web site:

Many of the immediate (GOP) cuts would return benefit levels to where they would be had Democrats not temporarily increased them in the stimulus measure.  Democrats themselves tapped the benefit increases in 2010 to pay for earlier legislation.

So the GOP's proposed reduction may not be as appalling as opponents contend.  Moreover, the Government Accountability Office states that in Fiscal Year 2011 SNAP had an improper payment rate of 3.8%, costing taxpayers an estimated $2.5 billion.  And that probably doesn't include lottery winners.

Baldwin could have alerted viewers to her guest's background so they could take that into account while hearing his views.  But perhaps that's too much to expect from the self-styled "Most Trusted Name in News."    

Think that the fledgling Coffee Party movement wants bigger government, more social welfare programs and the higher taxes that inevitably accompany them?  Well, think again.  On CNN Sunday Morning yesterday, we learned that simply isn't accurate.  Anchors T.J. Holmes and Brooke Baldwin set up a report from one Coffee Party:

HOLMES: All right. TEA party might have some competition out there. This time yesterday we were telling you about the national kickoff of a new political movement calling themselves the Coffee party.

BALDWIN: Well, they were heading out to coffee shops across the country yesterday. And apparently the turnout was pretty strong, but still we are asking, what is this group really about? Who are these people? These coffee drinkers?

CNN's Pat St. Claire (ph) takes a look at why some activists prefer their politics with a jolt of java.

After a couple of participants at the event identified themselves:

PAT ST. CLAIRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The folks gathered at this Washington coffee house Saturday came for more than just a cup of Joe.

Enter the Coffee party. A new organization that also says it wants smaller government and lower taxes, but builds itself as a more civil alternative to the better known TEA party movement, a group known for it's boisterous rallies.

D.C. area documentary filmmaker, Annabel Park, started the group on Facebook.

The report continued with a comment by Park and mention of her working for Barack Obama's election.

This isn't the first time the media have asserted the Coffee Party favors smaller government and lower taxes.  That's belied in part by Annabel Park's own statement during a February 26, 2010 Washington Post online discussion:

Many of the people who have found refuge in the Coffee Party community are among the 53% of America who supported candidate Obama's vision for our nation's future. They are disconcerted by the vision that is being expressed through some of the Tea Party activities and some of their leaders' statements.

I don't know of many people who voted for Obama because he supported the concept of smaller government.  And people "disconcerted by the vision" of Tea Parties don't sound like folks eagerly embracing lower taxes.

In a Saturday Christian Science Monitor piece, staff writer Patrik Jonsson noted this difference between the activist groups:

Even if the messages sound the same, the two movements differ in substantive ways. Tea partyers tend to berate the federal government as a whole (or most of it). Coffee partyers seem to be more in favor of government involvement – as in envisioning a greater role for government in the future of healthcare – but denounce the "corporatocracy" that holds sway in Washington.         

And what of anchor Brooke Baldwin's statement that "apparently the turnout was pretty strong" at Saturday's coffee parties?  That's vague; all she needed do was toss in an "allegedly."  But what does "pretty strong" mean?  In Peoria, Illinois, six people showed up at the coffee party there.  The Pocatello, Idaho event "drew more than a dozen citizens."  In Naples, Florida, it was a "small group that met at Burkett’s vitamin store."  According to The Daily Caller, one meeting in Washington, D.C. drew five activists.  Coffee parties attracted "about 40" people in Charlottesville, Virginia, Decatur, Georgia, and Kansas City, Missouri.  A  New York City participant was disappointed to arrive and find only five people - one was a reporter - there.  Thankfully, others arrived although fashionably late and they ended up with about 25 in attendance.  A picture of an event in Stowe, Massachusetts features only three people, with the comment "Small gathering given rain, last minute call, and busy lives."

Looks like some of the folks at CNN have something new to drink.  In addition to the usual Kool-Aid, they're favoring some steaming hot coffee these days.