If You Tell A Big Lie…

During the campaign, Mitt was a robot trying to be a human.  During his concession speech, he was a human trying to be a robot, to hide his raging feelings and just get through the damn thing and get off the stage.

Meanwhile, I was trying to feel sorry for him, but I just couldn’t do it.

I kept thinking of all the lies he’d told during the campaign, from his very first ad where he showed Obama quoting McCain, but making it look as if they were Obama’s own words, not a quote.  Then we had lies like saying Obama’s welfare reforms eliminated the work requirement and all the “You didn’t build it” crap.  Finally, he ended with the false claim that Jeep was shipping American jobs to China, intended to help Mitt win Ohio.

Mitt’s campaign clearly believed that if you tell a big lie often enough, people will come to believe it.   But Mitt’s big loss shows that if you tell a big lie often enough, people will come to believe you are a liar.

GM, Chrysler Hit Back at Lyin’ King Mitt

Both GM and Chrysler are hitting back at Mitt’s lies about the auto bailout in general and about Jeep moving U. S. jobs to China in particular.

GM says the Romney campaign is in a “parallel universe.”

It’s fine with me if he becomes president in that parallel universe, just not this one.

I can’t remember private companies calling out campaign ads for their lies in a presidential race before.

Mitt Was Warned about Lyin’ Ryan

From “Romney ignored warnings about Ryan’s history of lies, exaggerations,” Capitol Hill Blue:

“Campaign professionals vetting Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan as a potential Republican vice presidential candidate warned Mitt Romney’s strategists that the Congressman had a ‘history of exaggeration and prevarication’  that could become a campaign issue and distraction but the GOP presidential nominee’s team ignored the warnings.

“Romney campaign insiders tell Capitol Hill Blue that an intense internal battle raged inside the campaign over Ryan’s history of blatant lies, factual misstatements and exaggerations.

“Campaign insiders say Romney was so determined to capture support of the tea party that reveres Ryan that he was ‘more than willing’ to overlook the Congressman’s casual relationship with the truth.

“’Paul Ryan is a loose cannon.  He’s Mitt Romney’s Sarah Palin and his involvement with the campaign will sink the Republican Party in this election,’ said another GOP pro, who also asked to remain anonymous.”

Mitt really would sell his soul to the Devil to win.  Maybe he already has.

Quote of the Day

“Paul Ryan, what he did in his speech, I think, so stretched the truth, and I like Paul Ryan, I have a lot of great respect for Paul Ryan, but [what] he said about closing the GM plant, which closed before Barack Obama took president, about the Simpson-Bowles bill which — Simpson-Bowles, which he opposed, and then all of a sudden you see faults Barack Obama for. At some point the truth should matter. ”

Matthew Dowd, Republican strategist, on ABC’s This Week

So patently insincere Mitt puts this shameless liar on his ticket.  Yeah, that’ll help.

Lyin’ Ryan

From “Facts Took a Beating In Ryan’s Speech,” Michael Cooper, NYT:

“But an interesting question unfolding is whether there is a tipping point at which a candidate becomes so associated with falsehoods that it becomes part of his public persona — which hampered Vice President Al Gore during his run for president in 2000, when his misstatements on the campaign trail were used to stoke the perception that he could not be trusted in general.

“In the case of Mr. Ryan’s speech, the jury is still out.  It was received rapturously by the Republican Party faithful, but his many questionable assertions ensured that much of the analysis on Thursday focused on his accuracy more than his acumen.”

I think Ryan, who was a media favorite even among those who didn’t agree with his budget and his Medicare vouchers, has hurt himself badly.  He’s perceived differently and more warily now, and it will be reflected in the reporting and punditry about him. 

 

Ryan Threw Away His Carefully-Cultivated Reputation with That Speech

I’ve been reading so many excellent take-downs of Paul Ryan’s speech last night.  But I especially like this one.

From “Paul Ryan fails — the truth,” Jonathan Bernstein, The Plum Line, Washington Post:

 

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.

And then there’s the logic of the whole thing. As Seth Masket said, it all comes down to arguing “we must cut entitlements! Obama cutting entitlements is un-American.”  There’s also, as many were pointing out, the plain fact that until January 2009 Paul Ryan faithfully supported all the tax cuts and spending increases which created the deficit problem he’s been so concerned about since January 2009.

But really, the proper response to a speech like this isn’t to carefully analyze the logic, or to find instances of hypocrisy; it’s to call the speaker out for telling flat-out lies to the American people. Paul Ryan has had what I’ve long thought was an undeserved good reputation among many in the press and in Washington. It shouldn’t survive tonight’s speech. 

Italics in original; emphasis added.

Ryan’s “Factual Shortcuts”

From “Departure From Usual:  Traditional Media Call Out Ryan For Factually Dubious Speech,” Sahil Kapur, Talking Points Memo:

“But the Wisconsin congressman’s speech strained facts on multiple occasions.  And that has rankled more than just the usual suspects.  Several mainstream outlets that have praised him in the past pointedly went after his misleading portrayals of critical issues at stake in this election.

“The Associated Press took on Ryan’s misleading assertions in an article headlined,’FACT CHECK:  Ryan takes factual shortcuts in speech,’ which included a point-by-point refutation of various claims he made.

“The AP article took on his claims about Medicare, the stimulus package, an auto plant in his home state and the Bowles-Simpson fiscal commission, among others.

“Other takedowns of the House budget chief’s claims were published in CNN and ABC News.

“The pushback could damage Ryan’s reputation for sincerity among members of the media establishment, which has been key to his identity as a reformer.  It might also escalate tensions with reporters who are already pressing the Romney campaign for its inaccurate attacks on Obama’s welfare policy, and his remarks about entrepreneurship, that the GOP has taken out of context.”

I think the fact that Mitt has gotten away with the untrue welfare and “You didn’t build that” stuff emboldened his campaign to have Ryan keep the whoppers coming.  I was taken aback by all the flat-out lies in his speech.  

There’s garden-variety spinning, and then there’s jaw-dropping shameful.  Ryan was the latter.