Convention
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Here's the Washington Post fact check of his speech:
It was Paul Ryan’s big moment in Tampa tonight, and he sure didn’t lack for passion. But do the claims he made hold up? Wonkblog went about sorting the true from the misleading and the downright false.
TRUE
Obama cut Medicare - Ryan blasted the cuts to Medicare reimbursements and Medicare advantage included in the Affordable Care Act. “They just took it all away from Medicare,” Ryan declared. “Seven hundred and sixteen billion dollars, funneled out of Medicare by President Obama.” That much is correct – the Affordable Care Act contained over $700 billion in cuts to Medicare reimbursement rates and Medicare advantage. The Obama administration insists the cuts will not hurt quality and are necessary to control costs, while the Romney-Ryan campaign disputes this, but the underlying claim is correct.
Obama didn’t fix the housing crisis – Ryan claimed Obama’s presidency, “began with a housing crisis they alone didn’t cause; it ends with a housing crisis they didn’t correct.” It is true that Obama did not cause the financial crisis and true that it has still not fully recovered almost four years later, as Ezra detailed in a recent column.
FALSE
A GM plant in Ryan’s district shut down on Obama’s watch – From Ryan’s speech:
My home state voted for President Obama. When he talked about change, many people liked the sound of it, especially in Janesville, where we were about to lose a major factory.
A lot of guys I went to high school with worked at that GM plant. Right there at that plant, candidate Obama said: “I believe that if our government is there to support you … this plant will be here for another hundred years.” That’s what he said in 2008.
Well, as it turned out, that plant didn’t last another year. It is locked up and empty to this day.
The decision to close the plant was made in June 2008, when George W. Bush was president. Ryan says that Janesville was “about to” lose the factory at the time of the election, and Obama failed to prevent this. This is false, as Ryan knew in 2008 when he issued a statement bemoaning the plant’s impending closing.
The stimulus was the biggest expenditure in government history – The stimulus, Paul Ryan writes, “cost $831 billion – the largest one-time expenditure ever by our federal government.” This is false any way you cut it. By comparison, the Congressional Research Service estimates (pdf) that World War II cost $4.1 trillion in 2011 dollars. That was the biggest one-time expenditure ever, not the stimulus. Ryan is simply incorrect.
The Affordable Care Act increases taxes on millions of small businesses – Paul Ryan declared that the Affordable Care Act would impose “new taxes on nearly a million small businesses.” The Act changes taxes for small businesses in three ways. It provides a tax credit (pdf) to subsidize insurance coverage for which between 1.4 and 4 million small businesses are eligible. It imposes a tax on medical device manufacturers, of which there were only 5,300 (pdf) in the United States in 2007. Finally, it imposes an employer mandate on businesses that do not provide coverage, which will not affect (pdf) businesses with under 50 employees. Most small businesses, then, get a tax cut, and the number of small businesses facing tax increases is about five thousand, far under a million. Ryan’s claim is just false.
The stimulus was full of fraud – “The stimulus was a case of political patronage, corporate welfare, and cronyism at their worst,” Ryan boomed. No it wasn’t. According to TIME’s Michael Grunwald, whose new book The New New Deal is the definitive history of the stimulus, only 0.0001 percent of stimulus funds were wasted on fraud. Grunwald quotes the stimulus’s head watchdog, Earl Devaney: “We don’t get involved in politics, but whether you’re a Democrat, Republican, communist, whatever, you’ve got to appreciate that the serious fraud just hasn’t happened.” Even in the notorious case of Solyndra, House Republican investigation chair Darrel Issa found no evidence of undue political influence. Ryan is wrong to say that the stimulus was unusually corrupt or devoted to political patronage.
The Affordable Care Act was a government takeover – ”We got a long, divisive, all-or-nothing attempt to put the federal government in charge of health care,” Ryan stated. Nope. The Affordable Care Act greatly expands private insurance rather than implementing a truly government-run insurance system, like those in Canada and Australia, or a government-run hospital system, like that in the United Kingdom. As Jonathan Oberlander, a health policy expert at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, put it, “The label ‘government takeover’ has no basis in reality, but instead reflects a political dynamic where conservatives label any increase in government authority in health care as a ‘takeover.’”
Obama doesn’t have a debt plan - On the debt, Ryan says, “Republicans stepped up with good-faith reforms and solutions equal to the problems. How did the president respond? By doing nothing – nothing except to dodge and demagogue the issue.” Wrong again. President Obama has released a comprehensive debt reduction plan (pdf), in response to the brewing debate in Congress. You don’t have to like it but Ryan is incorrect in stating it doesn’t exist.
MISLEADING
Obama didn’t support Bowles-Simpson’s report – “[Obama] created a bipartisan debt commission. They came back with an urgent report,” Ryan stated. “He thanked them, sent them on their way, and then did exactly nothing.” But the bipartisan debt commission itself didn’t come back with a report. There were not enough votes to agree upon recommendations, in part due to opposition from committee member, er, Paul Ryan. The statement misleads viewers by implying that Ryan supports the proposal, when he aggressively opposed it, and by using the third person to avoid noting that Ryan was on the commission and voted no.
Obama caused the debt downgrade – Paul Ryan said in his speech that Obama’s presidency “began with a perfect Triple-A credit rating for the United States; it ends with a downgraded America.” This implies that Obama was responsible for Standard and Poor’s downgrading of U.S. debt. That is false. In its report announcing the downgrade, S&P was clear that blame rested with House Republicans for making the debt ceiling increase conditional on deficit reduction. “The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective,and less predictable than what we previously believed,” the report reads. “The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy.” It also faults Congressional Republicans for “continu[ing] to resist any measure that would raise revenues.”
Obama added more to the deficit than any other president – “President Obama has added more debt than any other president before him,” Ryan stated. As Ezra has explained, the vast majority of this debt was due either to the Bush tax cuts or the Iraq war, and only a tiny sliver due to the stimulus and other recovery measures. It is misleading to imply that Obama’s policies are primarily responsible for the size of the deficit.
Here's the Washington Post fact check of his speech:
It was Paul Ryan’s big moment in Tampa tonight, and he sure didn’t lack for passion. But do the claims he made hold up? Wonkblog went about sorting the true from the misleading and the downright false.
TRUE
Obama cut Medicare - Ryan blasted the cuts to Medicare reimbursements and Medicare advantage included in the Affordable Care Act. “They just took it all away from Medicare,” Ryan declared. “Seven hundred and sixteen billion dollars, funneled out of Medicare by President Obama.” That much is correct – the Affordable Care Act contained over $700 billion in cuts to Medicare reimbursement rates and Medicare advantage. The Obama administration insists the cuts will not hurt quality and are necessary to control costs, while the Romney-Ryan campaign disputes this, but the underlying claim is correct.
Obama didn’t fix the housing crisis – Ryan claimed Obama’s presidency, “began with a housing crisis they alone didn’t cause; it ends with a housing crisis they didn’t correct.” It is true that Obama did not cause the financial crisis and true that it has still not fully recovered almost four years later, as Ezra detailed in a recent column.
FALSE
A GM plant in Ryan’s district shut down on Obama’s watch – From Ryan’s speech:
My home state voted for President Obama. When he talked about change, many people liked the sound of it, especially in Janesville, where we were about to lose a major factory.
A lot of guys I went to high school with worked at that GM plant. Right there at that plant, candidate Obama said: “I believe that if our government is there to support you … this plant will be here for another hundred years.” That’s what he said in 2008.
Well, as it turned out, that plant didn’t last another year. It is locked up and empty to this day.
The decision to close the plant was made in June 2008, when George W. Bush was president. Ryan says that Janesville was “about to” lose the factory at the time of the election, and Obama failed to prevent this. This is false, as Ryan knew in 2008 when he issued a statement bemoaning the plant’s impending closing.
The stimulus was the biggest expenditure in government history – The stimulus, Paul Ryan writes, “cost $831 billion – the largest one-time expenditure ever by our federal government.” This is false any way you cut it. By comparison, the Congressional Research Service estimates (pdf) that World War II cost $4.1 trillion in 2011 dollars. That was the biggest one-time expenditure ever, not the stimulus. Ryan is simply incorrect.
The Affordable Care Act increases taxes on millions of small businesses – Paul Ryan declared that the Affordable Care Act would impose “new taxes on nearly a million small businesses.” The Act changes taxes for small businesses in three ways. It provides a tax credit (pdf) to subsidize insurance coverage for which between 1.4 and 4 million small businesses are eligible. It imposes a tax on medical device manufacturers, of which there were only 5,300 (pdf) in the United States in 2007. Finally, it imposes an employer mandate on businesses that do not provide coverage, which will not affect (pdf) businesses with under 50 employees. Most small businesses, then, get a tax cut, and the number of small businesses facing tax increases is about five thousand, far under a million. Ryan’s claim is just false.
The stimulus was full of fraud – “The stimulus was a case of political patronage, corporate welfare, and cronyism at their worst,” Ryan boomed. No it wasn’t. According to TIME’s Michael Grunwald, whose new book The New New Deal is the definitive history of the stimulus, only 0.0001 percent of stimulus funds were wasted on fraud. Grunwald quotes the stimulus’s head watchdog, Earl Devaney: “We don’t get involved in politics, but whether you’re a Democrat, Republican, communist, whatever, you’ve got to appreciate that the serious fraud just hasn’t happened.” Even in the notorious case of Solyndra, House Republican investigation chair Darrel Issa found no evidence of undue political influence. Ryan is wrong to say that the stimulus was unusually corrupt or devoted to political patronage.
The Affordable Care Act was a government takeover – ”We got a long, divisive, all-or-nothing attempt to put the federal government in charge of health care,” Ryan stated. Nope. The Affordable Care Act greatly expands private insurance rather than implementing a truly government-run insurance system, like those in Canada and Australia, or a government-run hospital system, like that in the United Kingdom. As Jonathan Oberlander, a health policy expert at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, put it, “The label ‘government takeover’ has no basis in reality, but instead reflects a political dynamic where conservatives label any increase in government authority in health care as a ‘takeover.’”
Obama doesn’t have a debt plan - On the debt, Ryan says, “Republicans stepped up with good-faith reforms and solutions equal to the problems. How did the president respond? By doing nothing – nothing except to dodge and demagogue the issue.” Wrong again. President Obama has released a comprehensive debt reduction plan (pdf), in response to the brewing debate in Congress. You don’t have to like it but Ryan is incorrect in stating it doesn’t exist.
MISLEADING
Obama didn’t support Bowles-Simpson’s report – “[Obama] created a bipartisan debt commission. They came back with an urgent report,” Ryan stated. “He thanked them, sent them on their way, and then did exactly nothing.” But the bipartisan debt commission itself didn’t come back with a report. There were not enough votes to agree upon recommendations, in part due to opposition from committee member, er, Paul Ryan. The statement misleads viewers by implying that Ryan supports the proposal, when he aggressively opposed it, and by using the third person to avoid noting that Ryan was on the commission and voted no.
Obama caused the debt downgrade – Paul Ryan said in his speech that Obama’s presidency “began with a perfect Triple-A credit rating for the United States; it ends with a downgraded America.” This implies that Obama was responsible for Standard and Poor’s downgrading of U.S. debt. That is false. In its report announcing the downgrade, S&P was clear that blame rested with House Republicans for making the debt ceiling increase conditional on deficit reduction. “The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective,and less predictable than what we previously believed,” the report reads. “The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy.” It also faults Congressional Republicans for “continu[ing] to resist any measure that would raise revenues.”
Obama added more to the deficit than any other president – “President Obama has added more debt than any other president before him,” Ryan stated. As Ezra has explained, the vast majority of this debt was due either to the Bush tax cuts or the Iraq war, and only a tiny sliver due to the stimulus and other recovery measures. It is misleading to imply that Obama’s policies are primarily responsible for the size of the deficit.
The Washington Posts fact check? LMAO.
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Like I said, most people in that audience don't care about what's true.
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The only thing I've seen re: the Rep Con has been that incredible gawker post of the "greatest dance moves"
http://gawker.com/5939003/the-best-republican-convention-dance-moves-set-to-my-neck-my-back
very, very NSFW, but funny as hell. Probably want to even have headphones on when you get home and listen/watch.
Bonus points if you spot *ahem* Waldo
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Well played, sir.
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Pretty song though.
WSS
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Heck your boring. And your butt buddy Legacy came back to assist you, how cute.
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By the way about Falls point number 1, the plant closing: did candidate Obama say it would be open another 100 years or not?
WSS
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The Affordable Care Act actually will raise lots and lots of taxes.
the only way Obama dodged the unconstitutionality bullet was to have it declared a tax.
WSS
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But the stimulus most certainly included patronage and cronyism.
The word fraud was inserted by the author defending the president.
Unless it appears somewhere else which was not quoted.
WSS
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By the way about Falls point number 1, the plant closing: did candidate Obama say it would be open another 100 years or not?
WSS
By the way about Falls point number 1, the plant closing: did candidate Obama say it would be open another 100 years or not?
WSS
Yep. What's your point?
The point is that he's suggesting that Obama failed to keep it open despite suggesting that it could be saved. He gave it as an example of a broken promise. This is not something the Obama administration could effect in anyway, as the decisions were all made before he took office. It's deceptive and dishonest at best. Much like if I blamed the way you moderate the board for all the crazies taking over.
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By the way about Falls point number 1, the plant closing: did candidate Obama say it would be open another 100 years or not?
WSS
Yep. What's your point?
The point is that he's suggesting that Obama failed to keep it open despite suggesting that it could be saved. He gave it as an example of a broken promise. This is not something the Obama administration could effect in anyway, as the decisions were all made before he took office. It's deceptive and dishonest at best. Much like if I blamed the way you moderate the board for all the crazies taking over.
Yep. What's your point?
The point is that he's suggesting that Obama failed to keep it open despite suggesting that it could be saved. He gave it as an example of a broken promise. This is not something the Obama administration could effect in anyway, as the decisions were all made before he took office. It's deceptive and dishonest at best. Much like if I blamed the way you moderate the board for all the crazies taking over.
Do you expect the democratic side to be honest in their speeches? I can't see either side being too honest. They don't put a strong emphasis on it in politics in general.
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More than that, yes.
Of course, these are convention speeches and they're not meant to be taken as policy speeches. But you don't get passes or points for lying, or being dishonest. The number of straw men thrown up in the last few days has been remarkable. That stuff should be pointed out, and on both sides.
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As usual, Heck is cherry picking and partisan attacking.
Want some real truth?
Don't listen to Heck repeating lies.
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As usual, Heck is cherry picking and partisan attacking.
Want some real truth?
Don't listen to Heck repeating lies.
As usual, Heck is cherry picking and partisan attacking.
Want some real truth?
Don't listen to Heck repeating lies.
Well I think it's more a straw man than cherry picking.
the post, or any other organization dedicated to carrying the Presidents water, have a tendency to redefine the bullet points and then argue against them.
Heck does it to me and accuses me of doing it to him.
For example I don't believe Ryan accused anyone off illegality with the stimulus.
Still that money was doled out freely to those who support the president, especially unions, large contributors and other fellow travelers.
It's obvious with the latest calls for more stimulus slated for teachers police and firefighters unions.
So there was nothing untrue about that statement.
But the post claims Ryan accused the president of fraud, which he did not.
Remember the presidents flacks engage in political theater too.
WSS
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So I had to play last night hence I've missed both the Browns game and the Romney speech.
I'm assuming the latter was wildly inspirational and or an evil pack of lies.
WSS
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As usual, Heck is cherry picking and partisan attacking.
Want some real truth?
Don't listen to Heck repeating lies.
Well I think it's more a straw man than cherry picking.
the post, or any other organization dedicated to carrying the Presidents water, have a tendency to redefine the bullet points and then argue against them.
Heck does it to me and accuses me of doing it to him.
For example I don't believe Ryan accused anyone off illegality with the stimulus.
Still that money was doled out freely to those who support the president, especially unions, large contributors and other fellow travelers.
It's obvious with the latest calls for more stimulus slated for teachers police and firefighters unions.
So there was nothing untrue about that statement.
But the post claims Ryan accused the president of fraud, which he did not.
Remember the presidents flacks engage in political theater too.
WSS
Well I think it's more a straw man than cherry picking.
the post, or any other organization dedicated to carrying the Presidents water, have a tendency to redefine the bullet points and then argue against them.
Heck does it to me and accuses me of doing it to him.
For example I don't believe Ryan accused anyone off illegality with the stimulus.
Still that money was doled out freely to those who support the president, especially unions, large contributors and other fellow travelers.
It's obvious with the latest calls for more stimulus slated for teachers police and firefighters unions.
So there was nothing untrue about that statement.
But the post claims Ryan accused the president of fraud, which he did not.
Remember the presidents flacks engage in political theater too.
WSS
Steve is right that Ryan never used the word "fraud" so the Post is wrong to attack him for that. What Steve and Ryan are wrong about is that the stimulus was used as some sort of payback for political support and rife with cronyism. It's just not true. You can subscribe to the economic theory that says that counter-cyclical spending in a recession is wise or you can not subscribe to it (I don't know many economists who don't - the difference lies in degree and type), but to dismiss any spending that went to public employees as money "doled out freely to those who support the president" is just a load of shit, what Steve would call "flacking" for Romney. It's also a little odd considering the amount of job loss we've seen in the public sector.
If Romney were faced with the same economic crisis he would have done largely the same thing. Remember, back then Romney was calling for stimulus spending too: "Well, I frankly wish that the last Congress (had) dealt with the stimulus issue and that the president could have signed that before leaving office. I think there is need for economic stimulus. Americans have lost about $11 trillion in net worth. That translates into about $400 billion a year less spending that they'll be doing, and that's net of additional government programs like Medicaid and unemployment insurance. And government can help make that up in a very difficult time. And that's one of the reasons why I think a stimulus program is needed."
His may have differed somewhat, but I have little doubt that he would have used some of the money to shore up state budgets and prevent waves of layoffs as the recession deepened.
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Or Steve, take a look at what Ben Bernanke said this morning when he talked about the economy's headwinds. The first thing he noted was the continued drag of the struggling housing market.
Here's the second thing he noted:
"Second, fiscal policy, at both the federal and state and local levels, has become an important headwind for the pace of economic growth. Notwithstanding some recent improvement in tax revenues, state and local governments still face tight budget situations and continue to cut real spending and employment."
In short, it's the same thing he's been saying for a while: you idiots should quit dicking around and spend some government money that puts people to work doing productive things. And that's not because Bernanke is flacking for the president, or in bed with the unions. It's because he wants to help get the economy out of the rut it's in.
Obama's economic team was trying to do the same thing.
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So, aren't you the one buying the campaign spin, my brother?
Maybe the best way forward as we start the new year is to stop accusing anyone who defends Obama against unfair criticism of being a flack. Unless you somehow imagine that all the stuff posted in here (often by clueless nutjobs) is right on point, I'd say there's more than enough room to defend the president's policies from mischaracterizations, or outright lies.
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