Paul Ryan Arrives
WASHINGTON – The heir to Ronald Reagan has arrived and he’s being fact checked.
As we learned from Pres. Obama, as well as Pres. Bill Clinton, a deep emotional connection can take a politician a long way. We’ll see if Paul Ryan has what it takes to maintain that tie, because he’s no Sarah Palin.
Taylor Marsh, a veteran political analyst and former Huffington Post contributor, is the author of The Hillary Effect, available at Barnes and Noble and on Amazon. Her new-media blog www.taylormarsh.com covers national politics, women and power.
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Well, he may have a nice six pack, but he doesnt have Palin’s good looks.
Sure Ryan told a bunch of lies…but how many Americans care about fact checking?
I don’t get it. What specifically is he being fact checked on with regard to this speech? The only thing i keep seeing is the GM plant closing, and it’s clear from the transcript that what he said was factual. He wasn’t blaming Obama for closing the plant, he was just pointing out that Obama promised to keep it open but failed on that promise. If that’s weaselly, to run on emotion, than it’s no less so than was Obama making a promise in 2008 that he had no way to keep.
I sort of had the same thought CS. On the Simpson-Bowles commission, the stimulus and Medicare cuts, Ryan is being hypocritical but not really false.
I’m with CS on this, I guess it would be nice to see specifics if he is being accused of inaccurate information or lying.
Well now that i’ve flipped around i see the same list of five talking points showing up on all of the left blog sites, and at best the charge of hypocrisy could be argued, as DaGoat mentions. Even that is arguable, for instance Simpson Bowles….there is a Youtube vid of Erskine Bowles implicating Obama’s lack of support as the critical failure of their commission, not Paul Ryan. That said, I’m sure it wasn’t helpful that the GOP members wouldn’t agree to any tax hikes and I disagreed with them on that stance, but there’s cleary room to criticize Obama for creating a commission and then dismissing their results.
http://www.politifact.com/ is usually a very good source for fact-checks. They go into detail on what they found and why they rate things the way they rate them.
Re Obama on the GM plant closing. It’s ridiculous to hold Obama accountable. Obama said: ‘I believe that if our government is there to support you … this plant will be here for another hundred years.’
The Bush government was not there to support the people so the plant closed. I haven’t heard that Obama promised he would work specifically to keep the plant open as Ryan leads people to believe. And the bigger picture is that Obama supported the auto industry and wanted to keep it going, at the time Republicans were against such support. Obama campaigned on this and he kept his word, battling Republicans to do so. So while the Bush administration was not there for the American people, Obama has been.
I’d say Ryan is wrong for more than the middle class! He’s one of those guys who, when he speaks, one’s first reaction should be to hustle the kids out of the room. The lies (a lot of ‘em) have been catalogued in the media, are easy to find. Probably just google “Ryan lies”.
When even FoxNews goes after him for serial lying, you can figure he’s a pretty hard case!
I agree completely but it seems there are several in this thread that somehow don’t see it that way and are more than eager to defend Mr. Ryan.
Information given that is know to be ‘inaccurate information’ is what a lie is.
People who knowingly give ‘inaccurate information’ are called ‘liars.’
People who knowingly give ‘inaccurate information’ all the time are called ‘pathological liars.’
Several on this thread have a healthy dose of skepticism, including both sides, about what ANY politician says. Both sides will, and do, paint the other side in the worst light they can manufacture. Both sides use rhetoric and accusations of lying except when it is their guy. Fair enough, but the “we are from earth and they are from Mars” attitude, or we are righteous and they are evil attitude is unfortunate.
Actually pinning the blame for the credit downgrade on Obama was the most outrageous. That was PURELY a result of moronic Tea Party BS spearheaded by none other than Ryan himself. All they had to do was approve a debt ceiling to pay for stuff we already spent, its a formality, and they turned it into a showdown that caused the credit downgrade. That’s so unbelievable I just don’t know what to say. I suppose he could top that by trying blame the invasion of Iraq on Obama as well, but that’s about it.
Also, the Simpson-Bowles recommendations were dead in the water as soon as tax hikes were included. With 98% of of the GOP having signed Norquist’s pledge nothing would ever pass them if it included any tax hikes. The GOP has made this abundantly clear.
Norquist, a name that should go down in infamy.
How interesting.
I thought people might click on the link to find the fact checking.
Just cross-posted my column, so you can see it for yourself.
I am little disappointed that our usually excellent, prompt and impartial fact checkers are not all over this story
OK, since no one has stepped up to the fact-checking plate, here is one. I changed the word “lie” to “inaccuracy.”
1. Inaccuracy: President Obama is the “greatest threat” to Medicare.
Truth: Obama didn’t make any cuts to Medicare benefits; he made cuts to provider reimbursements, to improve cost efficiency and extend the fiscal security of Medicare by eight years. According to the Medicare actuary, “[Obama's] Affordable Care Act makes important changes to the Medicare program and substantially improves its financial outlook.”1
But Ryan actually does want to cut benefits. He proposed dismantling Medicare and replacing it with a voucher system, leaving millions of seniors to come up with more money to pay for care out of pocket.2,3
2. Inaccuracy: President Obama didn’t save a General Motors plant in Wisconsin.
Truth: First, Obama wasn’t even in office when the GM plant closed. Second, Obama never made a promise to save it.4
3. Inaccuracy: President Obama ignored recommendations of a bipartisan debt commission.
Truth: Paul Ryan actually sat on that commission. And he led Republicans in voting down the commission’s own recommendation. So the commission never gave a report to Obama, because Ryan himself voted to kill the report before it could.5
4. Inaccuracy: President Obama is responsible for the downgrading of the U.S. Credit Rating.
Truth: House Republicans, including Paul Ryan, held the full faith and credit of the United States hostage to try to ransom it for trillions of dollars in cuts to social programs without increasing taxes on the wealthy one dime. Standard & Poor’s said specifically, “We have changed our assumption on [revenue] because the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues.” That’s why our nation’s credit rating was downgraded.6,7
5. Inaccuracy: Ryan wants to protect the “weak.”
Truth: Ryan’s biggest feat in his political career was proposing a budget with dramatic cuts to programs benefiting the poor. He’d cut Medicaid by one third, take away health care insurance from 30 million Americans, and cut Pell Grants for 1 million students. All so that he could give more tax breaks to the rich.8
Sources:
1. “Fact check: Paul Ryan at the RNC,” USA Today, August 30, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279602&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=8
2. “Undoing Obama Medicare cuts may backfire on Romney,” The Boston Globe, August 18, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279597&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=9
3. “Romney-Ryan Medicare Plan Would Cost 29-Year-Olds $331,200: Report,” Huffington Post, August 27, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279596&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=10
4. “Paul Ryan Misleads With GM Plant Closure Tale,” Huffington Post, August 29, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279598&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=11
5. “Fact Check: Paul Ryan misleads on debt panel’s spending cut plan,” CNN, August 30, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279608&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=12
6. “Top 5 Fibs In Paul Ryan’s Convention Speech,” Talking Points Memo, August 30, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279595&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=13
7. “Paul Ryan Address: Convention Speech Built On Demonstrably Misleading Assertions,” Huffington Post, August 30, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279604&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=14
8. “4 Ways Paul Ryan’s Budget Would Devastate The Poor,” ThinkProgress, August 17, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=279605&id=50193-7539396-ozSKcex&t=15
DDW, good detective work.
Well if by detective work you mean going to moveon.org and seeing what they have to say, yeah it’s good detective work. There are some good fact checkers out there but I wouldn’t count moveon, thinkprogress and Huffington Post among them. CNN and USA Today do have some credibility.
As DaGoat has chosen to summarily ignore all the valid points Dorian makes because moveon.org did all the work and collected various mainstream stories on Paul Ryan’s LIES
Maybe if it came from FOX News he’d consider it credible and address the issue… Paul Ryan’s LIES
Back to you DaGoat.
I do separate paragraphs with a space but the new upgrade sucks them out of ‘quotes’ making them harder to read… sorry.
Thanks, Steve.
I never understood that comment.
It is not where the facts appear it is where and what the sources are and say.
Hello Dorian, thanks for your efforts too.
I believe that the only way the hard working, family feeding, worried about the mortgage folks on the right can defend the people that they’ve allowed to take over their ‘party’, their ‘voice’ is by trying to distract or segue from the issues.
Most on the right are NOT racists… But they overlook and/or defend those that are.
Most on the right believe women should have control over their bodies and say in their health issues… But they overlook and/or defend those that don’t.
The list goes on but I sure wish the majority on the right would take their party back… But if they automatically keep defending that what is wrong with their side and start paying attention to what is happening to them too this won’t happen.
They seem to think “well you do it too” is somehow a contribution.
Have a great Labor Day everyone… I won’t mention how your parents or grandparents were able to better themselves buy a house instead of rent and otherwise helped by the labor movement if you don’t. You 1%er’s can ignore the last paragraph.
The source can be important. I noted the moveon in DDW’s citation, but chose to let it slide this time because they were fairly accurate. That is not a blanket approval, each case is different. I read the NYT and the WSJ each day and they both slant as do most organizations.
Defending and letting the foxes raid the chicken coop department. Very dramatic stuff and why don’t you clean up my room, you bad boys. Well, Reps do do bad stuff and hate poor people except that they are so many and we can squeeze a few more drops from them so we can build more car elevators.
Meantime, the present course ain’t so great is it. We are being asked to have faith that four more years of the same will cure or ameliorate our fiscal problems. Maybe they will, but around 50% of the potential voters are not so optimistic. If unemployment was at least below 7% or so, that might change some minds (even a hard head with horns, like mine). But you see, you can fool me once with the hopey changey thing (the only legacy Palin left us) but the second time I grab my wallet, cause the tax man is coming and spending restraints are few.
And, YES, the Reps are co-sponsors of this U.S. Titanic, I guess the iceberg.
1%er department: they can ignore paragraphs, true, but their long-term future lies with a prosperous populace on all income levels. No, they are that stupid, that they don’t realize that, except of course in the minds of some liberals they are blood suckers. Peachy.