As Pete points out, Obama’s Osawatomie speech was flagrantly dishonest as to what Republicans stand for. In the president’s view, one is either a big-government liberal or Ebenezer Scrooge.
But presenting a pathetic caricature of his political opponents was not the president’s only venture into the murkier depths of mendacity in that speech. He lied about economic history with abandon, too.
As Investor’s Business Daily writes, “One thing is certainly true about President Obama. No matter how many times people point out the falsehoods in his speeches, he just keeps making them. Case in point: his latest ‘economic fairness’ address.”
Among the shameless whoppers he peddled (IBD points out no fewer than five) was the idea that tax cuts and deregulation have “never worked” to grow the economy. Ummm, exactly what planet was Barack Obama resident on during the Reagan presidency? It saw 1) tax cuts, 2) deregulation (started under that notorious let-’em-eat-cake right-winger Jimmy Carter), and 3) the greatest boom in American history, which would carry the Dow Jones Industrial Average from under 1,000 to over 14,000 in 25 years. There was a net of 21 million jobs created in the 1980s, the greatest time of job creation in American history. We added an economy the size of Germany’s to the one we already had in those years.
He also said there was weak regulation under George W. Bush, with little oversight. Then what, exactly, did the people who made up the 42 percent increase in federal regulatory personnel during the Bush years do, cut out paper dolls, solve crossword puzzles?
I agree with Pete that this is a sign of desperation. All politicians are “parsimonious with the truth” now and then and engage, in Winston Churchill’s wonderful phrase, in “terminological inexactitude.” They don’t say black is white if they have something better to say.
Of course Obama knows the mainstream media will not report the fact that he is lying to the American people. But that doesn’t matter so much with the Internet and YouTube. As Dan Rather discovered to his career-ending chagrin in 2004, lies get exposed pretty quickly and widely these days.
The gloves are off and Obama has decided to hit with bigoted cliche … whodathunk?
John, it it were true that Obama's lies will be exposed by the Internet and YouTube, we would already have seen a rebellion against him, since his lies are frequent, intentional and profound. But this has not happened, which suggests the MSM is much more important, and alternative media much less important, than you seem to think. Obama's lies will go largely unnoticed, as they have thus far. n nIn order to expose his lies, a much, much tougher line needs to be taken against him, but no one is taking it.
Washington Post did give his speech 3 Pinocchios. But MSM will continue, overall, to cover for him by sins of omission for the most part. And unfortunately too many Republicans won't speak out and demand the truth be told. Look at recent RNC decision not to attack BHO personally in the presidential race.
Part of the problem is that most of the Republican establishment, and certainly highly incompetent leaders on Capitol Hill and at the RNC allow the infantile Obama and his hired gun Axelrod to set the public agenda and tone of the discussion. n nThis is part of the reason that I support Newt. We know that Romney will be like Bush and sit back and allow the Dems and their media cohorts to run the campaign agenda again, and Newt will not.