Opinion

The Republicans' factory of lies

MARTY MOORE
Suncoast News columnist
Published: September 19, 2012

When I set out to do this column I checked with my editor but he explained there was no way to expand this edition by 50 pages, so you'll have to settle for only five lies.

1. "President Obama has saddled the nation with exorbitant deficits and debt."

Fact: The Congressional Budget Office has allocated responsibility for the current trillion dollar deficits this way: loss of revenue caused by recession and higher borrowing rates, 37 percent; policies enacted by George W. Bush, 33 percent; policies enacted by Bush and extended by Obama like tax cuts, 20 percent; new Obama policies, 10 percent.

According to MarketWatch, spending under Obama has grown only 1.4 percent per year over his term, one-fifth the rate of that under Ronald Reagan and Bush 43 who averaged 6.8 and 7.7 percent respectively.

2. "Sequestration is Obama's responsibility and will devastate defense spending."

Fact: Sequestration was never Obama's idea. It was the tea party Republicans' method of hostage taking to force a trillion dollars in budget cuts in return for their votes to approve last year's debt ceiling increase. More than 70 percent of House Republicans voted for the measure; Paul Ryan, the Budget Committee chairman, calling it "reasonable and responsible." When the Super Committee failed to act, sequestration cut in effective this January.

The administration's position from the outset has been the reductions threaten to undermine America's military.

3. "Obama has stolen $716 billion from Medicare to finance ObamaCare."

Fact: Not one dollar comes from recipients' benefits. It comes from reduced future payments to hospitals, drug companies and medical device manufacturers extending Medicare viability by eight years to 2024 and which Mitt Romney would retract. It is the same amount Ryan initially included in his own budget.

4. "Obama's actions gut 'welfare to work' rules."

Fact: The administration is permitting states, at the long standing behest of governors including Romney in 2004, to propose pilot programs permitting more flexibility in meeting requirements as long as they move 20 percent more people from welfare to work.

5. "You didn't build that."

Fact: In a July 13 speech, Obama said: "Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you've got a business – you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen." Although he was clearly referring to the framework like education and infrastructure, through deceptive editing Republicans are accusing the president of demeaning entrepreneurship and small business.

Ironically, the forum in which Republicans held their convention boasting "We Built It" was constructed using 62 percent taxpayer financing.

Marty Moore is a freelance writer living in New Port Richey.