The Associated Press has devoted itself to helping the Democratic Party bring down President Trump. The AP’s effort consists mostly of producing multiple negative articles about Trump and his administration every day; these are picked up by hundreds or thousands of newspapers around the country. But that isn’t all: the AP also conducts a rear-guard action, trying to defuse any positive news about Trump and his administration.

Today’s AP story, headlined Stocks are at records, but it’s no longer the ‘Trump trade,’ is a good example. The AP’s article attempts to debunk a single tweet by the president. Apparently someone at the AP is assigned to monitor Trump’s twitter feed, and spring into action if something appears there that might give voters a favorable impression of the president. Here is the tweet:

Stock Market could hit all-time high (again) 22,000 today. Was 18,000 only 6 months ago on Election Day. Mainstream media seldom mentions! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 1, 2017

The tweet exhibits the imprecision of which the president is so often guilty; the election was eight months ago, not six. Nevertheless, Trump’s point is correct. But the AP jumps on Trump’s error:

The 18,000 figure he cited was inaccurate: The Dow closed at 19,890.94 six months ago. It was at 18,332.74 on Election Day, which was nearly nine months ago.

So Trump had the right number for Election Day, but miscounted the months. Big deal! Moreover, the 1,558 point difference between Election Day and “six months ago” is part of the Trump bounce that the president was touting.

The real point is that the AP doesn’t want to give President Trump credit for the stock market’s rebound:

And analysts say it would be inaccurate to give Trump full credit for the market’s recent records.

I am sure they do. But the charts speak for themselves:

The AP can’t resist plugging its favorite president, even though it has nothing to do with the supposed inaccuracy of Trump’s tweet:

The stock market was also setting records under Trump’s predecessor. The Dow Jones industrial average surged nearly 150 percent over Barack Obama’s eight-year presidency. Trump has been in office for a little more than half a year, and the Dow has climbed 11 percent since his January inauguration.

Obviously, the markets rose during Obama’s eight years as president largely because he took office shortly after a massive sell-off that drove the Dow down by more than 50%, from over 14,000 to a low of 6,627.

The AP article goes on and on, but it isn’t worth any more attention. No doubt, as the AP urges at great length, there are factors other than the Trump administration’s policies that help to account for currently strong markets. The real story here is that the AP is lying in wait to try to rebut President Trump when he–“as almost any president would do,” as one of the AP’s sources says–touts a positive economic development. What is mostly on display here is the AP’s nearly hysterical fear that President Trump might somehow, despite the AP’s best efforts, get credit for something.