“It was, by any reasonable standards, a staggering, staggering lie”

[bigtree]

from Jonathan Bernstein at WaPo's Plum Line: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/paul-ryan-fails----the-truth/2012/08/29/bbfe1eac-f254-11e1-b74c-84ed55e0300b_blog.html


It was, by any reasonable standards, a staggering, staggering lie. Here's Paul Ryan about Barack Obama:

He created a bipartisan debt commission. They came back with an urgent report. He thanked them, sent them on their way, and then did exactly nothing.

“They.” “Them.” “Them.” Those words are lies. Because Paul Ryan was on that commission. “Came back with an urgent report.” That is a lie. The commission never made any recommendations for Barack Obama to support or oppose. Why not? Because the commission voted down its own recommendations. Why? Because Paul Ryan, a member of the commission, voted it down and successfully convinced the other House Republicans on the commission to vote it down.

That wasn’t the only bit of mendacity – lazy mendacity, incredibly lazy mendacity – in Ryan’s speech. Twitter lit up as soon as he started telling the story of the Janesville auto plant that Barack Obama didn’t save – a plant that, it turns out, closed before Obama was president. And of course there’s the infamous cuts to Medicare that Ryan lambasted Obama for without happening to mention that those very same cuts were in Paul Ryan’s own budget. Yes: absolutely everything in Obamacare is an abomination, says Paul Ryan, except for (as he forgets to mention) the cuts to Medicare that he supports – and yet he still singles that part out to use as an attack.

It isn’t even true in some symbolic or abstract way. The real truth is that Paul Ryan completely rejects the approach of that commission – because it includes tax increases along with spending cuts – while Barack Obama has, while not endorsing the exact plan that Ryan shot down, basically endorsed the commission’s approach. Nor was this a side point; Ryan's complaint about Obama on the deficit was absolutely central to his case against the president . . .


read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/paul-ryan-fails----the-truth/2012/08/29/bbfe1eac-f254-11e1-b74c-84ed55e0300b_blog.html



related:

The Post Editorial Board: Ryan takes liberties with facts
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mr-ryans-speech-effective-maybe-but-definitely-misleading/2012/08/30/a9b4e690-f227-11e1-adc6-87dfa8eff430_story.html

James Downie: Ryan’s breathtakingly dishonest speech
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/paul-ryans-dishonest-speech/2012/08/30/16bb62d8-f24f-11e1-adc6-87dfa8eff430_blog.html

[calimary]

1. WOW.

I'm glad this is coming out.

My favorite part: "Twitter lit up..."

That's something the "news" anchors of the world, and the reporters, and the bloggers, cannot ignore.

[Fla Dem]

2. Finally! It's good to see the MSM BEGIN to call out these thugs.

For too long they have gotten away with bald faced lies and half truths. Nobody did anything. They were not called to account for their falsehoods, so they have become more bold. They now feel they call throw any shit out there and no one will react. Let's hope this is the beginning of a new era in political reporting.

[BarackTheVote]

10. I love this!

It's like the opening narration for a Conan movie--I can just hear this being read by a deep baritoned voice as epic music swells over grandiose, sprawling landscapes!

[Fla Dem]

12. LOL. n/t

[SomethingFishy]

3. Even Fox News is calling him on his bullshit...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021233536

[Ninga]

4. LOOK AT HIS PHOTO>>hiding his mouth and face are huge signs of

LYING, LYING AND MORE LYING!!!

[redqueen]

5. Breathtaking mendacity.

Even for a politician, and that's saying something.

[bigtree]

6. it's the laziness of the lies which sparked so many of the press to snap back, redqueen

I took note of this about 2 weeks ago when some conservative reporter made a surprising call on a Romney lie. It insults folks' intelligence to throw out stuff that grade-school children can spot as lies; all of the truth readily available with a click of a mouse. Moreover, they're throwing out lies which have been debunked long ago and accepted by most folks who observe and write about these things as resolved. It just makes smart folks' efforts to get the story right impossible to fathom when clouded by including these obvious lies in their narrative.

[redqueen]

7. I don't know how much smartness I can credit the press with,

after decades of stuff like babies in incubators, uranium tubes, etc.

I suppose perhaps those things took more than the click of a mouse to debunk, granted, but still.

[bigtree]

9. I think the Romney/Ryan approach is so inane and base

. . . that it does eventually succeed in insulting and alienating even those writers who possess just a modicum of intelligence and integrity.

[Zoeisright]

8. About fucking time the MSM started using the word LIE.

I'm fucking sick of the other slimy little phrases they use to excuse the fucking repuke LIES.

[Cha]

11. Paul Ryan gave a Big Fuck you to the

intelligence of the American People last night and expects by all actions to get away with it.