Kudos to Chuck Todd. Romney's deliberate tactic of lying throughout this campaign is starting to prove too much for some in the tradmed. Let's hope it's a trend.
Think Progress reports that Iowa Republican Governopr Terry Brandstad was peddling the odious (and racist) welfare lie today in an interview, and Todd finally had enough of the demonstrable lies:
BRANSTAD: We reformed welfare in the 1990s, now the Obama administration’s trying to undo the work requirement.
TODD: Wait a minute, Gov. Branstad, I can’t let that go. They haven’t done that. [Crosstalk] You leveled a charge about the welfare work requirement. It turns out that’s not true. Where did you get your information?
BRANSTAD: It absolutely is. I was one of the governors that helped get it, and when we passed it, it was designed not to be waived. And now the President of the United States has, by executive order in July, weakened that which was very effective.
TODD: The waivers are for state governors. The waivers are for you. [...] If governors weaken it to a certain point, the federal government yanks the waiver. [...] Nothing about this issue, every charge that has been leveled about this welfare reform order that the president signed, every accusation that has been leveled by some Republicans have been proven to be not true.
BRANSTAD: Well, the fact of the matter is that the president did it. He didn’t have to take this action to weaken the strong work requirement that was passed.
TODD: It doesn’t weaken it…The works still there, governor, it’s still there.
Brandstad must have forgotten he was not on FoxNews where they gobble up bullshit like it was a great steak.
All they have is lies and a lot of money to repeat them. We have truth and Barack Obama. They have Mitt The Wimp. I'll take our odds in that fight. :-)
And "Give Em Hell Obama" is going to kick ass on Medicare today:
President Obama To Hit Romney/Ryan On Medicare Today.
A little history:
Whilst in Harrisburg, Illinois, Truman delivered a speech attacking the Republicans. During the speech a supporter yelled out "Give 'em Hell, Harry!". Truman replied, "I don't give them Hell. I just tell the truth about them and they think it's Hell." Subsequently, "Give 'em Hell, Harry!" became a lifetime slogan for Truman supporters.
http://en.wikipedia.org/...!
Listening on the radio this morning to a long excerpt of Obama's speech in Waterloo, Iowa, I heard the sounds of a relaxed man, comfortable with himself and his campaign, the sound of a winner. He was laughing, working the crowd, having fun.
WE ARE WINNING!
FIRED UP AND READY TO GO!
Update I: Full transcript by NWTerriD in a comment below:
TB: We have more people on food stamps than ever before. They've liberalized the rules, and a lot of people think they need to tighten that up, just like we reformed welfare in the 1990's. Now the Obama adminstratiion is trying to undo the work requirement. We think that we need to, instead of trying to put more people on---
CT: Well, wait a minute, Gov Bransted, I can't let that go. They haven't done that! They haven't--- They haven't done that!
TB: Really, that's the biggest cost in the farm bill, and that's the difference.
CT: They haven't undone the work requirement. They haven't!
TB: The biggest cost is the food stamp program.
CT: I'm trying to understand. You went after the work requirement. I'm trying to go back. You leveled a charge about the welfare work requirement. It turns out that's not true. Where did you get your information?
TB: Well, it absolutely is. I was one of the governors that helped get it, and when we passed it, it was designed not to be waived, and now the President of the United States has, by executive order in July, weakened that, which was very effective. We have reduced the number of---
CT: The waivers are for state governors. The waivers are for you.
TB: [unintelligible] by 50%. Governor Tommy Thompson was the leader of this in Wisconsin. He just won the primary yesterday. You're gonna hear more about this, because this President never supported work for welfare, and now he's trying to weaken it.
CT: But again, it was a waiver for governors. He's not doing anything. If governors weaken it to a certain point, the federal government yanks the waiver.
TB: Well, here's our concern is, you've got some liberals that are going to try to use that, but what we think is, the effective welfare reform that we passed on a bipartisan basis, with governors like John Engler and Tommy Thompson and I working for it in the 90's, has worked effectively. Liberals have always hated it. Obama is playing to his liberal base by trying to weaken that. We think that's wrong. We think it's one of the most effective things that's been done in the last two decades, and we need to do similar things with the food stamp program [unintelilgible]
CT: So, when all of the, nothing about, what I don't understand is nothing about this issue has been---
Every charge that has been leveled about this welfare reform order that the President signed, every accusation that has been leveled by some Republicans, have been proven to be not true.
TB: Well, the fact of the matter is the President did it. He didn't have to take this action to weaken the strong work requirement that was passed back in the 90's [unintelligible] when Bill Clinton was President, when I was governor before.
CT: It doesn't weaken it. It gives the states--- yeah, OK, well.
TB: He did it. He did it bec he's never supported the work requirement, and the fact of the matter is [unintelligible].
CT: The work requirement is still there, Governor!
TB: [unintelligible] keep it there.
CT: It's still there!
TB: Well, we don't want to see waivers of this, because once you start waivers, that's how we got to welfare reform, we insisted on having work requirements, and then we got a national law, and we want to keep it in place, not have it weakened.
Give NWTerriD some mojo here for that effort.