The Associated Press' Calvin Woodward seems intent on making a name for himself performing these post-presser "fact-checks" on Obama's claims. Today's is the third, I think, in the eventual Pullet Surprise winning series. And while it's not AS BIG a steaming pile as the first two, it's still pretty stank.
If you're not from the dirty south, "stank" can be a pretty tough word to pin down. Fortunately, Woodward comes through with a series that does the term justice. Here's an example:
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama turned the page on 100 days in office with an iffy boast about job creation and claims of fiscal prudence that are hard to square with his spending.
Hard to square, huh? Where have you been for the last 8 years?
I should start by noting that my hometown newspaper is putting this editorial crap right on the front page, rather than on the Op-Ed page, because, you know, it's part of the liberal media.
His assertion that his proposed budget "will cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term" is an eyeball-roller for many economists, given the uncharted terrain of trillion-dollar deficits the government is negotiating.
He promised vast savings from increased spending on preventive health care in the face of doubts that such an effort, however laudable it might be for public welfare, can pay for itself, let alone yield huge savings.
"Many economists...in the face of doubts..."
Whose doubts? His? "Many?" Woodward deals in weasel words and insinuendo, as he must, having set out to attempt to debunk President Obama's every claim. Sure, some people have doubts about his health care policy. Some other people (okay, some of the same people) have doubts about global warming, evolution and other observations of rational science. Some big-shot Congressmen even have doubts about volcano monitoring, health emergency readiness and such craziness as that.
Until that formula is announced – probably in the coming week or so – there’s no way to assess its accuracy.
Until you name the doubters and many economists to whom you alluded, there's no way to assess your accuracy. Not that that's your aim. I understand that you're content to sow the seeds of future twisted claims by Michelle Bachmann. Eventually, we'll find out (and maybe you can break the story when Ms. Bachmann finally steps off into the deep end) that the formula for counting jobs is simply part of Obama's plan to determine, via the census, how many Mexicans might each American be expected to quarter or something.
OBAMA: "Number one, we inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit. ... That wasn’t me." – in Missouri.
THE FACTS: Congress, under Democratic control in 2007 and 2008, held the purse strings that led to the deficit Obama inherited. A Republican president, George W. Bush, had a role too: He signed the legislation.
Got that? Congress' purse strings led to the deficit. Not the off-budget spending of thousands of billions of dollars on the war or the pissing away of America's good name in the world and the effect of that on the dollar. Bush only had a functionary role in it. Congress was in COMPLETE CONTROL for the last two years under Bush.
The Democratic budget plan that Congress passed Wednesday gives Democrats the option of denying Republicans the normal right to block health care with a Senate filibuster.
The bastards.
Much of what Woodward has to say is along these lines: "Obama said this, but look, Congress did that, so that proves OBAMA IS A LIAR."
A few weeks ago, he took Obama to task for lying about not increasing taxes on the poor because he supports an increase in the cigarette tax. Because if you're poor, well, you have to pay that.
What the hell is wrong with the Associated Press?
(Note that I'm neither linking to the AP story or quoting more than a small fraction of it. You can find it in any newspaper that peddles grade-school sniveling as news.)