Paul Ryan’s acceptance speech at the Republican convention contained out right LIES and misleading statements. Delegates cheered as the vice presidential nominee:
- Accused President Obama’s health care law of funneling money away from Medicare “at the expense of the elderly.” In fact, Medicare’s chief actuary says the law “substantially improves” the system’s finances, and Ryan himself has embraced the same savings.
- Accused Obama of doing “exactly nothing” about recommendations of a bipartisan deficit commission — which Ryan himself helped scuttle.
- Claimed the American people were “cut out” of stimulus spending. Actually, more than a quarter of all stimulus dollars went for tax relief for workers.
- Faulted Obama for failing to deliver a 2008 campaign promise to keep a Wisconsin plant open. It closed less than a month before Obama took office.
- Blamed Obama for the loss of a AAA credit rating for the U.S. Actually, Standard & Poor’s blamed the downgrade on the uncompromising stands Republicans..
And when he wasn’t attacking Obama, Ryan was LYING about the record of his running mate, Mitt Romney, on taxes and unemployment.
Note to ReadersOur deputy managing editor, Robert Farley, is on the scene in Tampa at the convention center. This story was written with the help of the entire staff, based in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. Next week, we will dispatch our managing editor, Lori Robertson, to Charlotte, N.C., for the Democratic convention. We intend to vet the major speeches at both conventions for factual accuracy, applying the same standards to both.
Taking Money from Medicare?
Ryan continued the campaign’s false line of attack that Obama had “funneled” money out of Medicare to pay for the federal health care law “at the expense of the elderly.” But that’s contradicted by Medicare’s chief actuary, in a statement at the end of the most recent report of the system’s trustees (our emphasis added):
Medicare Actuary, April 23, 2012: [Obama's] Affordable Care Act makes important changes to the Medicare program and substantially improves its financial outlook …
Medicare’s money isn’t being taken away. The Affordable Care Act calls for slowing the growth in spending, a move that — if successful — would keep the hospital insurance trust fund solvent for longer than if the reductions didn’t happen.
Ryan himself proposed keeping most of these same spending cuts in his most recent “Path to Prosperity” budget. Yet, Ryan criticized Obama’s cuts as “the biggest, coldest power play of all” and suggested seniors would suffer as a result.
Ryan, Aug. 29: And the biggest, coldest power play of all in Obamacare came at the expense of the elderly. … [T]hey just took it all away from Medicare, $716 billion funneled out of Medicare by President Obama.
The Affordable Care Act calls for a $716 billion reduction in the future growth of Medicare spending over 10 years, with most of that — about $415 billion — coming from a reduction in the future growth of payments to hospitals through Medicare Part A. And Medicare Part A’s trust fund, as we’ve explained before, is in trouble financially. It’s set to be insolvent in 2024, even with these spending cuts. Without them, the trust fund wouldn’t be able to fully pay projected benefits in 2016, the Medicare trustees estimate.
Deficit Commission
Ryan accused Obama of doing “exactly nothing” about recommendations from a bipartisan presidential commission to reduce the deficit. But Ryan himself was among a minority of commission members whose opposition scuttled the plan and prevented it from being sent automatically to Congress for action.
Ryan: He created a new bipartisan debt commission. They came back with an urgent report. He thanks them, sent them on their way, and then did exactly nothing. 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.
The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform’s report proposed deep spending cuts in both domestic and military spending, and an overhaul of the tax code that would have lowered rates but raised revenues — all in an attempt to slow the growth of government by $4 trillion over 10 years.
Many Republicans, including Ryan, opposed the military cuts and new tax revenue, while many Democrats opposed changes to Social Security that included raising the full retirement age.
The 18-member commission needed a super majority of 14 votes in order to bring the report to a vote in Congress. But it received the support of just 11 members. Seven members, including Ryan, opposed it, thus blocking congressional action.
In a statement on the final report, Ryan said he “could not support the plan in its entirety,” but said some elements of it were “worthy of further pursuit.”
Ryan opposed the commission’s approach to paying for lower federal income tax rates by taxing capital gains and dividends as ordinary income (see footnote on page 29). In his own latest budget plan, Ryanproposed to keep the current capital gains tax rate, arguing that to do otherwise “could precipitate a flight of capital away from job-creating businesses.”
Like Ryan, Obama thanked the commission in a Dec. 3, 2010, statement that promised to “study closely” its proposals for possible inclusion in his own budget plans. Nine months later, Obama submitted adeficit reduction plan to the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction that was designed to reduce the deficit by $3.6 trillion over 10 years through a package of spending cuts and tax hikes.
Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican, tried to work out a so-called “Grand Bargain” that would have reduced the deficit through a mix of tax hikes and spending cuts — and even changes to Social Security. The New York Times reported that the Grand Bargain would have raised the retirement age and changed the formula for calculating benefits. But, as the Times reported, the deal fell through as members of Boehner’s caucus objected to raising taxes.
In short, both Ryan and Obama have proposed deficit-reduction plans — and each opposed the other’s plan.
Stimulus Deceit
Ryan falsely claimed that the stimulus failed to help taxpayers and that it “cut out” the American people. Actually, more than 25 percent of stimulus dollars went to provide tax relief for workers.
Ryan: [The stimulus] cost $831 billion. The largest one-time expenditure ever by our federal government. … You, the American people of this country, were cut out of the deal.
The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation calculated that about $230 billion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act provided tax relief. Much of that money, about $116 billion, funded theMaking Work Pay tax credit for workers. In 2009 and 2010, the credit gave up to $400 to individuals earning up to $75,000, and gave up to $800 to couples earning up to $150,000.
Janesville Plant Closing
Ryan cited the closing of a GM plant in his hometown of Janesville, Wis., as evidence of Obama’s failing to deliver on promises made in the 2008 presidential campaign. But as it happens, the plant closed before Obama even took office.
Ryan: My own 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. And that’s how it is in so many towns today, where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight.
Here’s what Obama told workers during a campaign stop at the struggling GM plant in Janesville back in 2008:
Obama, Feb. 13, 2008: And I believe that if our government is there to support you, and give you the assistance you need to re-tool and make this transition, that this plant will be here for another hundred years. The question is not whether a clean energy economy is in our future, it’s where it will thrive. I want it to thrive …
It’s true that the plant didn’t last another year, as Ryan said. In fact, the Business Journal in Milwaukeewrote that the assembly plant shut down on Dec. 23, 2008, at the tail end of the Bush administration, a victim of the financial crisis and dwindling demand for the SUVs produced at the plant. That’s nearly one month before Obama was sworn into office.
About 100 workers were kept on in 2009 to finish a truck order and help shut down the plant, according to the Associated Press.
‘Downgraded America’
Ryan faulted Obama for a credit downgrade for which Ryan’s own party shares equal responsibility. Ryan said that “a presidency that began with such anticipation now comes to such a disappointing close,” adding:
Ryan, Aug. 29: [Obama's presidency] began with a perfect AAA credit rating for the United States; it ends with the downgraded America.
Ryan refers to the decision of Standard & Poor’s, the credit rating agency, to downgrade its score for U.S. Treasury obligations from AAA to AA+ on Aug. 5, 2011. That took place just four days afterCongress voted to raise the federal debt ceiling, following lengthy negotiations in which House Republicans sought to force concessions from Obama and Senate Democrats as the price for raising the ceiling and averting the first default on Treasury debt payments in U.S. history.
In its report, Standard & Poor’s blamed both Republicans and Democrats for failing to come to agreement on spending cuts or revenue increases sufficient to reduce U.S. deficits significantly. It said:
S&P, Aug. 5, 2011: 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 statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy. …Republicans and Democrats have only been able to agree to relatively modest savings on discretionary spending while delegating to the Select Committee [of Congress] decisions on more comprehensive measures. It appears that for now, new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options.
Ryan, of course, is among those Republicans opposed to any “new revenues” from tax increases.
Puffing Up Romney’s Record
Running through Romney’s credentials, Ryan boasted about Romney’s fiscal and jobs record as governor of Massachusetts. But there’s a bit less there than Ryan lets on.
Ryan: He was the Republican governor of a state where almost nine in 10 legislators are Democrats, and yet he balanced the budget without raising taxes. Unemployment went down, household incomes went up, and Massachusetts, under Gov. Mitt Romney, saw its credit rating upgraded.
It’s true that Romney balanced the state budget every year — as Massachusetts’ Constitution requires — and Romney never raised personal income taxes. But as we have noted whenever this claim has arisen — which has been frequently — Romney did hike government fees by hundreds of millions of dollars, and he also closed loopholes on some corporate taxes.
Ryan also said that under Romney, “unemployment went down.” That’s true. According to unemployment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate in Massachusetts went from 5.6 percent when Romney took office in January 2003 to 4.6 percent when he left office in January 2007.
But when considered in light of an improving national economy, Romney’s record on unemployment is a bit less impressive. Massachusetts’ unemployment rate was slightly lower than the national rate when Romney took office, and it was roughly the same as the national rate when he left.
– Robert Farley, with Brooks Jackson, Eugene Kiely, Lori Robertson and Ben Finley
POSTED BY BROOKS JACKSON ON THURSDAY, AUGUST 30, 2012 AT 1:42 AM FILED UNDER THE FACTCHECK WIRE. TAGGED WITH DEFICIT, MEDICARE, PAUL RYAN, STIMULUS.
Watching that speech by Paul Ryan was like staring at a carnival mirror: it's warped and full of distortions, but we can tell that what we’re seeing just isn’t right.
How can it be right, according to Ryan, that we can’t afford to keep our promises to seniors on Medicare, but we can afford to give a $4 trillion tax break for the rich? How can it be right to tell more than a million middle class families that we’ll no longer help them pay for their kids’ college, but we will help pay to ship their jobs overseas?
Rep. Paul Ryan's speech to the Republican Convention tonight wasn't grounded in reality.
He leveled false attack after false attack against the President, while neglecting to give a single idea for how to move our country forward.
He also didn't mention that the Romney-Ryan plan would turn Medicare into a voucher program to pay for tax cuts for millionaires, or that their promise to repeal Obamacare would take away access to health care for 32 million Americans. And don't even get me started on how they want to end a woman's right to make her own health care decisions.
Here are the top five examples:
Ryan forged his reputation in large part by drafting and advancing an unpopular plan to dramatically cut and privatize Medicare. Though he didn’t mention that plan once on Wednesday, he included it in his last two budgets, both of which preserved the Affordable Care Acts cuts to Medicare — taken mostly from overpayments to private insurers and hospitals.
Instead, Ryan once again dubiously accused President Obama of being the true threat to Medicare.
“You see, even with all the hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover, even with new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the planners in Washington still didn’t have enough money. They needed more. They needed hundreds of billions more. So, they just took it all away from Medicare. Seven hundred and sixteen billion dollars, funneled out of Medicare by President Obama. An obligation we have to our parents and grandparents is being sacrificed, all to pay for a new entitlement we didn’t even ask for. The greatest threat to Medicare is Obamacare, and we’re going to stop it.”
Obama did use those Medicare savings — in the form of targeted cuts in payments to providers, not in benefits to seniors — to pay for the health care law. Ryan’s budget calls for using them to finance tax cuts for wealthy Americans, and deficit reduction. But by now calling to restore that spending commitment to Medicare, Ryan and Romney are pledging to hasten Medicare’s insolvency by many years.
Ryan said the Obama presidency, “began with a perfect Triple-A credit rating for the United States; it ends with a downgraded America.”
Standard & Poors downgraded the country’s sovereign debt rating in 2011 because congressional Republicans, of which Ryan is a key leader, threatened not to increase the country’s borrowing authority — risking a default on the debt — unless Democrats agreed to slash trillions of dollars from domestic social programs and investments. Ryan even briefly toyed with the idea that the country’s creditors would forgive default for “a day or two or three or four” as long as Democrats ultimately agreed to GOP demands.
- Janesville GM PlantRyan criticized Obama for — yes — not using government funds to prop up an auto plant in his district.“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,’” Ryan recalled. “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.”Ignoring the inconsistency of a Republican chastising Obama for not bailing out more auto manufacturers, the plant in question closed before Obama’s inauguration in 2009.
- Bowles-Simpson Debt CommissionRyan chastised 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.”Ryan sat on that commission. He voted against it. Following his lead, so did the panel’s other House Republicans.
- Protecting the PoorNear the end of his speech, Ryan claimed the campaign’s top priority is protecting the poor. “We have responsibilities, one to another — we do not each face the world alone,” he said. “And the greatest of all responsibilities, is that of the strong to protect the weak.”Just under two thirds of the dramatic spending cuts in Ryan’s budget target programs that benefit low-income people. That plan also calls for large tax cuts for high-income earners.
Lying to Obscure the Greed
In a move seemingly designed to taunt fact-checkers, Ryan reprised his claim that Obama broke a promise made during the 2008 presidential campaign to keep a General Motors plant open in Ryan's hometown of Janesville, Wis., but instead was ultimately responsible for its closing. But the plant closed while George W. Bush was in office, and Obama never made such a promise. (As I write, PolitiFact has already rated this part of Ryan's speech as false.)
Here's a taste of just how blatant the lying got, from the prepared text of Ryan's speech:
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. And that’s how it is in so many towns today, where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight.
Ryan also repeated the $716 billion lie by the Romney camp, debunked here by AlterNet's Joshua Holland, which recasts the Medicare budget savings built into the Affordable Care Act as a "raid" on the treasured program.
Then there were those deceptions based on sins of ommision, such as Ryan's purported proof of Obama's unwillingness to rein in the budget: the vice presidential candidate dared to speak of the Bowles-Simpson debt-reduction commission as if it was something he supported, when, in fact, it was Ryan who led Republicans on the commission to vote against its final recommendations. Likewise, Ryan failed to note that his own budget plan would trim $700 million from Medicare.
(The New Republic's Jonathan Cohn and the Washington Post's Jonathan Bernstein have excellent assessments of the fact #fail in Ryan's speech, hereand here.)
Ayn Rand, the Great Awakening and the Founding Fathers
The cognitive dissonance that clanged throughout Ryan's speech also extended to philosophical and theological references that would seem to cancel each other out, but have nonetheless come to characterize the philosophical pastiche that characterizes the talking points at Americans For Prosperity events. You've got your Ayn Rand -- an atheist and Ryan's favorite philosopher -- present in Ryan's casting of Obamacare as the work of "central planners." You've got your Great Awakening in his assertion that our rights come from God, not government. (On this point, the comic Elon James White, who is African American, tweeted that if this is the case, God was a little slow.) You've got your Enlightenment-influenced Founding Fathers in Ryan's tracing of our rights to nature.
Add ire and stir, and you've got the Kochian prescription for rallying resentful white people to view government as the enemy, even though its dimunition would ultimately harm the very people enlisted as foot-soldiers in the anti-government cause, and further enrich the likes of Charles and David Koch.
Morals versus religion
Ryan is frequently depicted as pious Catholic, despite his denial of a preferential option for the poor -- a staple of Catholic doctrine, In one sign of the mainstreaming of Catholicism into the body of conservative Christian denominations, Ryan was also enlisted to vouch for Romney as a moral and pious man -- even if he is a Mormon, a member of a faith that both the evangelical Protestants and conservative Catholics who make up the Republican white-people coalition view with some suspicion.
In coded language, Ryan assured convention delegates and television viewers that the morals that mattered most to them were among those most dearly held by Romney: opposition to same-sex marriage and abortion. From the text of Ryan's speech:
Mitt and I also go to different churches. But in any church, the best kind of preaching is done by example. And I’ve been watching that example. The man who will accept your nomination tomorrow is prayerful and faithful and honorable. Not only a defender of marriage, he offers an example of marriage at its best. Not only a fine businessman, he’s a fine man, worthy of leading this optimistic and good-hearted country.Our different faiths come together in the same moral creed. We believe that in every life there is goodness; for every person, there is hope. Each one of us was made for a reason, bearing the image and likeness of the Lord of Life.
Lies, delivery and the post-fact society
The gamble the Romney campaign has made throughout this campaign, and most obviously in this year's Republican National Convention, is that the truth no longer matters, and that facts are irrelevant to the voting process. There's probably less risk to that gamble than one might think.
It has long been proven that people vote based on their emotions and their self-determined cultural identity. Because the narrative offered by Ryan and Romney feeds on the resentment already felt by so many middle-class whites -- a sense that they are somehow being shortchanged while others advance from their previously restricted positions -- it resonates. And for the Republican voter, that's all the "truth" that matters, the "truth" that vindicates his or her rage. Facts be damned -- damned to hell.
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