Mitt Romney Twists and Turns for His Role in Obamacare

Mitt Romney Twists and Turns for His Role in Obamacare

A Virginia judge's( a conservative appointed by Bush 43) ruling earlier this month that a key provision of President Barack Obama's health care law is unconstitutional was hailed as a major breakthrough for all segments of the Republican Party save, perhaps, one.

Former Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Mass.), whose own successful dalliance with health care reform in Massachusetts is cited as an intellectual model for Obamacare, stands to gain little from this specific policy topic being at the center of political discourse.

At least that's how the conventional wisdom goes. And in the wake of Judge Henry E. Hudson's decision, there was, as expected, another wave of debate over Romney's own role in championing the individual mandate for insurance coverage -- the provision that was ruled unconstitutional.

Whether this pattern persists through the 2012 elections (should Romney run) depends on the whims of legal processes and the vindictiveness of the rest of the Republican presidential field. Romney, after all, was not the first conservative to champion an individual mandate. The Heritage Foundation did so as well. But the former governor tends to get the preponderance of attention when the conversation turns in that direction.

As the scrutiny mounts, Romney has begun to fine-tune his pitch for why his own plan made for sound policy, but Obama's amounted to an "unconstitutional power grab by Washington," as aide Eric Fehrnstrom put it.

For starters, team Romney has begun arguing that the better indication of his policy preference would be the 2008 campaign's white paper, not the Massachusetts model. The former, as Fehrnstrom noted in a pre-Christmas exchange with the Huffington Post, is a reflection of what Romney would do nationally -- a "federalist approach to health care reform." It doesn't have an individual mandate but, rather, encourages states to deregulate their insurance markets.

"Mitt said repeatedly in the 2008 campaign that his plan was not designed for the nation as a whole," said Fehrnstrom. "He said states may want to copy parts of it, and perhaps improve on its features, but he was very explicit in saying the federal government should not impose a one-size-fits-all plan on the entire nation."

Whether that frees Romney from the burdens of his own health care law is another story. The former governor has been unapologetic about the legislation he passed, but always with the caveat that his was a state-tailored solution. There was, however, a time-period when he seemingly championed the plan as a template for the nation as a whole.

"I'm proud of what we've done," Romney said during a speech in Baltimore in February 2007. "If Massachusetts succeeds in implementing it, then that will be a model for the nation."

Here too, Romney's team has refined, or at least, sharpened its message. The former governor, they argue, never preached an approach in which the national government brought the Massachusetts model to each and every state. Rather, he believed, as Fehrnstrom says, that other states should have the chance to "copy" the model "or improve upon its features." On this, even critics of Romneycare concede the point.

"I don't recall him or he ever advocating it as a federal model," said Michael Tanner, a health care policy expert at the Cato Foundation who once predicted that Romneycare would be a "flop." "I don't know if he said it shouldn't be. He talked bout it being a model for the nation but I don't know if he was implying that the federal government should do it."

And yet, for all the line drawing and needle threading with respect to federalist versus national approaches, the fact remains that when Romney had a chance to write the health care script, he chose an individual mandate. There may be legal differences between a state and the federal government forcing people to buy insurance. But the political distinctions are hardly that clear. And while, empirically, the individual mandate worked in Massachusetts -- reducing the percentage of uninsured down to three -- critics will likely never excuse what they see as its philosophical flaws.

"I actually wrote a paper at the time on the individual mandate and I said the problem for the individual mandate is it removes the only market mechanism people had against the providers, which is refusal to buy their product," said Tanner

Mitt probably has little to worry about. When it comes to powers of denial and rationalizing away inconvenient truths, there is no match for the modern right-wing conservative mind. If conservatives started facing facts they'd be Democrats.

Sarah Palin is Glenn Beck's Puppet

Sarah Palin: Winner Of The 2010 Glenn Beck Misinformer Of The Year Award

In selecting the 2010 winner of the Glenn Beck Honorary Award for Excellence in Misinformation, Media Matters weighed the vigor and meticulous detail the 2009 recipient, Glenn Beck, brought to the craft.

Beck's dedication to fabricating facts to smear those he disagrees with is so complete, we at Media Matters for America decided to name the award in his honor. Thus, it is only fitting that the recipient of the first Glenn Beck Misinformer of the Year Award would embody the spirit Glenn Beck brings to lying, distorting, and smearing; someone who regularly promotes the very same lies and extreme rhetoric as Glenn Beck; someone who truly stands with Glenn Beck.

Sarah Palin announced early this year that she would join Beck and become a Fox News contributor. Within days, Palin sat for what Beck called an "eyeball to eyeball" interview. For the rest of the year, Beck and Palin would share talking points and cross-promote each other's violent rhetoric, falsehoods, and distortions -- continuing a pattern that first emerged in 2009.

Palin "Stands With" Beck

Beck Has A Long History Of Violent Rhetoric That Has Resulted In Real-World Consequences. As Media Matters for America has documented, Beck frequently spews violent rhetoric and pushes conspiracy theories about progressives. Byron Williams told journalist John Hamilton that Beck "blew my mind," adding that Beck is "like a schoolteacher on TV." Williams was arrested after being wounded in a shootout with police, and he reportedly told investigators that "his intention was to start a revolution by traveling to San Francisco and killing people of importance at the Tides Foundation and the ACLU."

Beck regularly attacks Tides on his show. Williams also said that "Beck is gonna deny everything about violent approach and deny everything about conspiracies, but he'll give you every reason to believe it. He's protecting himself, and you can't blame him for that. So, I understand what he's doing."

David Brock Called On Palin To "Stop This Insanity." In an October 26, 2010, appearance on The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, Media Matters CEO and founder David Brock called on Palin to "stop this insanity." Brock explained that Palin is uniquely poised to help scale back Beck's violent rhetoric. [MSNBC, The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, 10/26/10]

Palin Responded On Beck's Radio Show: "I Stand With You, Glenn." Palin later called in to Beck's radio show to reaffirm her support for Beck. From the show:

PALIN: So, you know, when I speak of your love of our Founding Fathers, and how you are helping to educate Americans about respecting our nation's history so that we don't lose what makes America exceptional, and the far, far left mouthpieces, they're twisting and perverting that message. No, what I do, I go back to what Abraham Lincoln said about standing with anybody who stands right. You stand with him when he stands right, you part with him when he goes wrong. I stand with you, Glenn. [Premiere Radio Networks, The Glenn Beck Program, 10/28/10]

Palin Regularly Promotes Beck's Lies and Extremism

Palin Has Appeared On Beck's Fox News Program Three Times. Beck has hosted Palin on his Fox News program on three occasions: on March 18, 2010, January 13, 2010, and January 19, 2009 (Beck's first broadcast on Fox News).

During his January 13, 2010, interview with Palin, Beck read her an entry from his diary:

Tomorrow, I meet Sarah Palin and family for the first time. I'm actually a little nervous -- as she is one of the only people that I can see that can possibly lead us out of where we are. I don't know yet if she's strong enough, if she's well-enough advised, or if she knows she can no longer trust anyone. I don't know if she can lead and not lose her soul. [Fox News, Glenn Beck, 1/13/10]

Palin Wrote Beck's "Time 100" Article. Palin wrote Beck's article in Time magazine's annual issue profiling the 100 "people who most affect our world." Palin wrote:

Who'd have thought a history buff with a quirky sense of humor and a chalkboard could make for such riveting television? Glenn's like the high school government teacher so many wish they'd had, charting and connecting ideas with chalk-dusted fingers -- kicking it old school -- instead of becoming just another talking-heads show host.

[...]

His love of the Founding Fathers inspires others to learn and respect our nation's history. Best of all, Glenn delights in driving the self-proclaimed powers-that-be crazy. [Time, 4/29/10]

Palin And Beck Hosted 9-11 Event In Alaska. On September 7, 2010, Palin wrote a note on Facebook inviting followers to join her and Beck at a ticketed event on 9-11. Palin wrote:

We can count on Glenn to make the night interesting and inspiring, and I can think of no better way to commemorate 9/11 than to gather with patriots who will "never forget." Hope to see you there! [Facebook, 9/7/10]

Palin Spoke At Beck's "Restoring Honor" Rally On The National Mall. Palin spoke at Beck's August 28, 2010, "Restoring Honor" rally in Washington, D.C:

I must assume that you, too, knowing that, no, we must not fundamentally transform America as some would want, we must restore America and restore her honor. [C-SPAN, 8/28/10]

Palin: "Lamestream Media: Watch Rerun Of Glenn Beck's Show Today." In a September 13, 2010, post to her Twitter account, Palin wrote:

Lamestream media: watch rerun of Glenn Beck's show today. Listen/Learn/Don't underestimate the wisdom of the people. Times,they r a'changin! [Twitter, 9/13/10]

On That Show, Beck Said, "There's A Lot Of Us" Who Think America Isn't Going To "Continue As A Country." On the show that Palin promoted, Beck said:

We have to set things right in this country. We have to continue as a country. Isn't that our goal? Continue as a country, and there's a lot of us that don't think we will very much longer. Did you see the national debt?

We have to ring the bell, but we have to ring it equally, equally, on all issues. No matter who's in office, we have to ring the bell. But it is important to meet on the battlefield of ideas and engage with each other, actually have a dialogue -- not between one personality and another, but American citizens having a dialogue. You wait until I show you what's happening later on the program. [Fox News, Glenn Beck, 9/13/10]

Palin: Beck "Hit The Nail On The Head" In CPAC Speech. On February 20, Palin wrote on her Twitter account: "@GlennBeck hit the nail on the head in his #CPAC speech: USA is the abiding beacon of freedom & we need 'less Marx, more Madison'!" [Twitter, 2/20/10]

In That Speech, Beck Said That A Liberal "Minority" Has "Hijacked" America And "Progressivism Is The Cancer In America." In his February 20 CPAC speech Beck suggested a liberal "minority" has "hijack[ed]" America, and he claimed that "[o]ur government looks at the American people as the bad guy," that "[e]conomic holocaust is coming," and that "[p]rogressivism is the cancer in America and it is eating our Constitution."

Palin Promoted Beck's Documentary Linking Progressives To Atrocities Of Communism. On January 22, Palin wrote on her Twitter account: "Pls watch Glenn Beck's FOX documentary on Friday to learn about 'manufactured crisis'-mode of govt operatives that lead to harmful proposals." [Twitter, 1/22/10]

Beck Used This Special To Link Progressives To Hitler And Other Dictators. In previewing his documentary on communist atrocities, Beck promised to show what "progressives don't want you to know." Beck opened his documentary by citing Che Guevara, Josef Stalin, and Mao Zedong as "left-wing icons." Beck also suggested that Adolf Hitler was a liberal and claimed that Soviet genocide has been "erased" from history books.

Palin Invited Her "Friends" To Watch Beck Exposé On "Who Is Actually Running The White House." On August 26, 2009, Palin posted a note on Facebook inviting her "friends" to watch Beck. Palin wrote: "FOX News' Glenn Beck is doing an extraordinary job this week walking America behind the scenes of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and outlining who is actually running the White House. Monday night he asked us to invite one friend to watch; tonight I invite all my friends to watch." [Facebook, 8/26/09]

During The Shows Palin Highlighted, Beck Told Viewers They Were "About To Lose [Their] Freedom Of Speech" And Suggested There Could Be A Venezuela-Type "Clampdown." During the week of August 26, 2009, Beck's shows regularly featured violent and paranoid rhetoric:

BECK: Is this America? Is it? Ask yourself that question. These are reasonable questions in apparently unreasonable times.

Is this the way we decide how things happen? Do we have these shadow operations with these new czars or advisers or whatever the hell they want to call them, calling the shots? And doing it with a hidden agenda? Doing it slowly, quietly behind the scenes and then, boom! There it is.

You are about to lose your freedom of speech in this country. If you disagree with that, please contact me and tell me how, because I'd like to live in that world. I'd like to believe that. But with everything else I have shown you this week, and then you see the clampdown by somebody who is extolling the virtues of the revolution in Venezuela, I don't know how you see that.

Could somebody, please -- I mean this sincerely -- please explain to me how this isn't anti-capitalist, revolutionary in nature, and anti-constitutional? How is this -- how does this resemble our republic and our First Amendment at all? Please answer that question. [Fox News, Glenn Beck, 8/26/09]

Beck: An Early Adopter Of Palin's "Death Panels" Lie

In 2009, PolitiFact.com named Palin's claim that health care reform legislation would create "death panels" the 2009 Lie of the Year. Palin popularized the phrase "death panels" in an August 7, 2009, Facebook post. Days later, on August 10, 2009, Beck fully embraced her claim as true.

Palin Introduces "Death Panels" Falsehood. In an August 7, 2009, post on her Facebook page, Palin wrote, "The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil." [Facebook, 8/7/09]

Beck On "Death Panels": "I Believe It To Be True." On his radio show, Beck fully embraced Palin's claim that health care reform would establish death panels:

GLENN BECK: So, why is there no more discussion than there is on Sarah Palin and what she said over the weekend that there would be death -- what did she call it? -- a death squad? Or a death --

STEVE "STU" BURGUIERE (executive producer): Death panel.

BECK: A death panel for her son Trig. That's quite a statement. I believe it to be true, but that's quite a statement. She also called health care this -- Obama health care -- "evil." [Premiere Radio Networks, The Glenn Beck Program, 8/10/09]

Palin And Beck's Brazilian Oil Conspiracy Theory

Beck and Palin falsely accused the Obama administration of lending $2 billion to Brazil to benefit foreign oil interests at the expense of the U.S. economy. In fact, Bush appointees to the Export-Import Bank -- not the Obama administration -- unanimously approved the loan, and the funds must be used to purchase U.S. goods and services. Beck falsely claimed the loan was part of a conspiracy by the Obama administration to enrich George Soros. Byron Williams cited this conspiracy theory in an interview discussing his plan to target the Tides Foundation.

Palin: The Obama White House Is "Prepared To Send More Than Two Billion Of Your Hard-Earned Tax Dollars To Brazil So That The Nation's State-Owned Oil Company, Petrobras, Can Drill Off Shore." In August 2009, Palin wrote, "So why is it that during these tough times, when we have great needs at home, the Obama White House is prepared to send more than two billion of your hard-earned tax dollars to Brazil so that the nation's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, can drill off shore and create jobs developing its own resources?" [Facebook, 8/19/09]

Beck: Loan Intended To Help Soros Get Rich While The American People Are "Getting Screwed." Beck advanced the conspiracy theory that the Obama White House was giving money to Petrobras in order to enrich Soros:

BECK: I'm not sure if [Soros] knew that the administration would be making a $2 billion preliminary commitment for Petrobras, for Petrobras, for exploration, just days after he strengthened his investment. Isn't that weird? You see, he's got some connections here, but I'm sure he had no idea what was coming on the other side of the circle? No. It's probably just another one of those bad luck situations for Obama, because this doesn't seem to pass the smell test at all. No. Billionaire investor dumps money into a state-controlled Brazilian oil company; days later the American administration dumps $2 billion into the exact same company. What are the odds, Gilligan?

Let's go here. George Soros starts the Center for American Process with John Podesta. John Podesta, Center for American Progress, selects the Obama transition team. Soros buys $900 million in gasoline powered bras. Then, in a completely unrelated story, BP has their oil spill. But wait a minute, who's this guy? John Podesta. John Podesta is the guy who does all the lobbying for BP? Certainly -- I'm sorry, Tony Podesta -- certainly no relation to John Podesta, other than they're brothers. We'll have to come back to that one later in the show. So then Center for American Progress starts to make Obama policy. This one, we'll show you, laid out by Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal. One of the policies: cap and trade, which goes right to Crime Inc. and all of the Obama friends with the Climate Exchange in Chicago. That's weird.

Then Obama suspends the deepwater drilling at 1,500 meters. He says "Hey, hey, that's dangerous! Fifteen hundred meters, that's crazy." Petrobras is drilling at 2,777 meters. Obama knows it and loans $2 billion to Petrobras. Last stop, Petrobras shareholders get rich. Oh my gosh, we're back at the beginning: shareholder, Petrobras. Getting rich. You getting screwed. You see how this works? [Fox News, Glenn Beck, 6/21/10]

Bush Appointees At Export-Import Bank -- Not Obama -- Unanimously Approved Loan To Brazil. FactCheck.org called the claim "bogus," noting that the Export-Import Bank of the United States approved a "preliminary commitment" to Brazil to finance "their purchases of U.S. equipment, products and services." At the time, "the Bank's Board consisted of three Republicans and two Democrats, all of whom were appointed by George W. Bush." [FactCheck.org, 9/18/09]

Palin would like the U.S.A. to think she has a mind of her own. On the contrary there seems to be a chain of bizarre revisionist history, kookiness and conservative fascist-lite extremism. First there are Beck's crazy visions, those visions come out of his mouth as pretend truth and then Palin parrots them.

Republicans Block Brilliant Economist From Helping With Recession

Republicans Block Brilliant Economists From Helping With Recession

As productive as the 111th Congress was at passing large, important pieces of legislation, it was also a Congress that witnessed “more procedural obstruction under both parties than at any previous time in the past century.” One of the greatest victims of Republican obstruction has been the nominations process. A whole host of President Obama’s qualified nominees have been stalled for inexplicable reasons. Yesterday, the White House announced it would renominate one key member from that list:

President Barack Obama will renominate Peter Diamond to the U.S. Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, a White House official said Thursday, a day after the Senate left town without voting on the nomination.

But when the next Congress convenes in 2011, Mr. Diamond could find it even harder to win backing from the Senate, where Republicans will have five more seats than they do now.

Peter Diamond, a 70-year old MIT Professor of Economics, is of course notable because, subsequent to his nomination, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics. Republicans, led by Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), have ludicrously argued that Diamond isn’t qualified to sit on the Fed Board.

After Diamond was awarded the Nobel, the Senate Banking Committee approved his nomination for a second time, but Shelby continued to object, forcing Diamond’s nomination to languish at the close of this last Congress.The Senate’s inaction leaves one opening on the Fed and “deprives Chairman Ben S. Bernanke of intellectual support in Fed debates over his efforts to reduce unemployment through an expansion of record monetary stimulus.”

The absurdity surrounding Diamond’s process highlights the urgent need for reform of Senate rules and procedure. As ThinkProgress’ Ian Millhiser wrote, “The reason for this [obstruction] is because dissenting senators can force the Senate to waste hours or even days effectively doing nothing in order to pass a single bill or confirm a single nominee.”

Fortunately, the entire returning Democratic caucus has signed onto an effort to make the Senate procedural process more responsive and efficient. “Such a move could come at the start of next Congress, shortly after the Senate returns on January 5th.” The success of Diamond’s nomination may hinge on what happens on that day.

It is more than possible Republicans are intimidated by Professor Peter Diamond. For the last forty years conservatives have created the biggest wage disparity in our nation's history. The wealthiest people in America earn more than forty times what the average workers does - shouldn't such high wages mean they are doing most of the work. Republicans during the Reagan and Bush 43 administrations ran up record deficits - now they claim deficits are a threat to the country. Those same conservatives feel that Professor Diamond might stop just a little of the crazy economic policies that helped cause the Great Recession.

Black and White City on the Bay wallpaper

Fox Has Another Record Year In Disinformation

Off The Rails: The Year In Fox News Misinformation

As the year comes to a close, Media Matters offers a month-by-month look back at Fox News' most outrageous and factually challenged moments of 2010.
January

Hume Counsels Tiger Woods To Ditch Buddhism To "Make A Total Recovery." On the January 3 edition of Fox News Sunday, Brit Hume commented on the scandal surrounding golfer Tiger Woods: "He is said to be a Buddhist. I don't think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption offered by the Christian faith. So my message to Tiger would be, 'Tiger, turn your faith -- turn to the Christian faith, and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world.' " Hume's attack on Buddhism was criticized by religious leaders, but endorsed by Hume's Fox News colleagues Tucker Carlson and Fred Barnes. Hume stood by his comments despite the criticism.

Fox Hires Palin As A Contributor. On January 11, The New York Times reported that Fox News had hired former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as a contributor who "would appear on the network's programming on a regular basis as part of a multiyear deal." Her well-established record of pushing falsehoods notwithstanding, Palin said that she would provide "the fair and the balanced reporting and analysis that voters in this country deserve." One of her first Fox News appearances was an hour-long interview with Glenn Beck on January 13 in which the two misled on the Federal Reserve, and Beck read to Palin from his diary.

Fox Campaigns For Scott Brown. In the run-up to the January 19 special Senate election in Massachusetts, Fox News hosted Republican candidate Scott Brown several times for softball interviews and provided a forum for Brown to raise funds. Fox News personalities like Dick Morris made explicit appeals on Brown's behalf, telling viewers to "please, please help" Brown. Stuart Varney claimed that "your 401(k) could do well" in response to a Brown victory, and Bret Baier compared Brown's candidacy to the "Miracle on Ice."
February

Fox Campaign Season Heats Up. Following Scott Brown's victory in Massachusetts, Fox began promoting more Republican Senate candidates, like Illinois' Mark Kirk and Florida's Marco Rubio. Several Fox News personalitieslikened Kirk to Brown; Fox repeatedly aired a National Republican Senatorial Committee attack ad on Kirk's Democratic opponent, Alexi Giannoulias; and the network gave Kirk a platform to attack Giannoulias. Fox alsoheavily promoted "political star" Rubio, reporting extensively on his fundraising appeals and speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference. On the February 1 edition of Hannity, Dick Morris solicited GOP candidatesfor Senate, which precipitated Republican Ron Johnson's campaign in Wisconsin.

Fearmongering Over Health Care Reconciliation. Reacting to reports that Senate Democrats were considering using the budget reconciliation process to pass the health care reform bill and circumvent a Republican filibuster, Fox News adopted the GOP framing of reconciliation as a violation of Senate rules, undemocratic, and contrary to thewill of the people. Fox also falsely characterized reconciliation as the "nuclear option" to wrongly accuse Democrats of hypocrisy.
March

Open Activism Against Health Care Reform. As the health care reform bill moved toward passage, Fox News' opinion and news personalities engaged in open opposition to the bill. Fox news anchors agreed that the bill was unconstitutional and said they would vote against it, while the network's opinion-makers lobbied for the bill's defeat. Commentators like Dick Morris, Glenn Beck, and Mike Huckabee encouraged viewers to contact members of Congress and urge them to oppose the bill, and the network helped to publicize anti-health reform rallies.

Fearmongering was rampant as Fox News compared the bill to a tumor and a nuclear weapon. Fox News also pushed misinformation and falsehoods about health care reform, falsely claiming the bill provided increased federal funding for abortion, promoting a non-scientific "survey" of doctors claiming they would leave medicine if reform passed, accusing Democrats of making "special deals" and offering "bribes" to ensure passage, andattacking the Congressional Budget Office's scoring of the bill.

Glenn Beck's Fiascoes Multiply. Beck devoted his entire March 9 program to an interview with former Rep. Eric Massa (D-NY) after Massa claimed -- without any evidence -- that the Democrats had forced him out of the House because he refused to vote for health care reform. The hour-long interview did not produce any evidence of Democratic wrongdoing -- instead, Massa acknowledged that he resigned under allegations of sexual harassment. Beck concluded the program by apologizing to his viewers: "I have wasted an hour of your time."

Later in the month, Beck went on a tirade against Democratic leaders, like Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), who "wanted to compare themselves to the civil rights activists" as they walked arm-in-arm to the House health care vote. Beck screamed at them: "How dare you!" Lewis is, of course, an icon of the civil rights movement who marched, arm-in-arm, with a group including Martin Luther King Jr. at the Selma Civil Rights March.
April

Hannity's Tea Party Appearance Canceled. Of the many Fox News personalities appearing at tea party events coinciding with Tax Day, Sean Hannity drew additional scrutiny for the fact that he was set to tape an episode of his Fox News program at an April 15 Cincinnati Tea Party event and charge audience members for tickets, with proceeds going to the tea party group. Hannity's plan was criticized by veteran journalists as crossing ethical lines, and reportedly "furious" Fox News executives yanked Hannity from the event at the last minute. Earlier in the month, Rupert Murdoch, chairman of Fox News parent company News Corp., said that Fox News "shouldn't be supporting the Tea Party."

O'Reilly's Fox News Defense Fails Spectacularly. Responding to Sen. Tom Coburn's (R-OK) suggestion that Fox News perpetuated the falsehood that individuals without health insurance can be sent to prison under the new health care reform legislation, Bill O'Reilly said on April 13: "[W]e researched to find out if anybody had ever said you are going to jail if you don't buy health insurance. Nobody has ever said it. What it seems to me is you used Fox News as a whipping boy when we didn't qualify there." In fact, that very falsehood had been repeated countless times across Fox News' many platforms, including on O'Reilly's own show.

Dick Morris Invents, And Then Retracts, Clinton-Reno-Waco Story. On the April 19 edition of Hannity, Dick Morris claimed that Bill Clinton had told him that he had retained Janet Reno as attorney general because she threatened to "tell the truth about Waco." Morris explained that this story "had never been said before." The next day, Rush Limbaugh picked up Morris' story, claiming that "Reno's appointment to a second term as attorney general was to keep her quiet about the Waco invasion." One day later, Morris appeared on Fox & Friends to walk back the false story, claiming to separate "the facts" from his "conjecture based on the facts."

There is more documentation at the link. Unfortunately Fox has no incentive to change their behavior because their viewers eat up the lies, distortions and raid right-wing conservative spin like pigs at the trough.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) Like Many Republicans is One of the Bestest Human Beings

Coburn Will Block 9/11 First Responders Bill, Potentially Killing Its Chance Of Passage

Pressure has been mounting on Republicans to relax their opposition to a bill to would provide health benefits to 9/11 first responders after Senate Republicans unanimously filibustered it earlier this month, but Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) told Politico yesterday that he will likely block the measure yet again. Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said last night that the Senate must act immediately to complete the bill in order to allow enough time for the House to pass the same version before Congress recesses for Christmas. “[I]if you’re going to send us anything that we need to deal with, send it, frankly, by [Tuesday],” Hoyer told The Hill.

But appearing on Fox News this morning, Coburn defended his decision to obstruct the bill, saying he is upset with the process, and claiming that the bill was never considered by a congressional committee, and that there was never a hearing on it. Watch it:

Despite Coburn’s claim, the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions committee did in fact hold a hearing on the bill in June — and Coburn should know as he sits on that committee.

Last night on Fox’s Red Eye, former Republican Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee urged the Senate to pass the bill immediately, telling the moving story of a friend of his from Texas who volunteered to come to New York City after 9/11, spent a year working there, and is now dying from cancer he contracted while on the job. “There are people who need medical care right now, and frankly, the clock is running out on them. Their lives are fading away, even as we sit here talking about it,” Huckabee said.

Coburn is happy to hold 9/11 responders hostage for one reason - to deal Democrats a legislative defeat. Coburn is one of those conservative Republicans with the kind of values America has come to know - and not have much respect for.

Health Care Reform Lie Of The Year Is One Of Fox's Favorite Health Care Lies

Health Care Reform Lie Of The Year Is One Of Fox's Favorite Health Care Lies

PolitiFact recently named "a government takeover of health care" as its 2010 "Lie of the Year" -- a lie that Fox News hosts and contributors have repeatedly promoted.
PolitiFact: "Government Takeover Of Health Care" Is The "Lie Of The Year"

PolitiFact: "Government Takeover Of Health Care" Is The "Lie Of The Year." In its article declaring "a government takeover of health care" the Lie of the Year, PolitiFact wrote:

"Government takeover" conjures a European approach where the government owns the hospitals and the doctors are public employees. But the law Congress passed, parts of which have already gone into effect, relies largely on the free market:

· Employers will continue to provide health insurance to the majority of Americans through private insurance companies.

· Contrary to the claim, more people will get private health coverage. The law sets up "exchanges" where private insurers will compete to provide coverage to people who don't have it.

· The government will not seize control of hospitals or nationalize doctors.

· The law does not include the public option, a government-run insurance plan that would have competed with private insurers.

· The law gives tax credits to people who have difficulty affording insurance, so they can buy their coverage from private providers on the exchange. But here too, the approach relies on a free market with regulations, not socialized medicine.

PolitiFact reporters have studied the 906-page bill and interviewed independent health care experts. We have concluded it is inaccurate to call the plan a government takeover because it relies largely on the existing system of health coverage provided by employers.

It's true that the law does significantly increase government regulation of health insurers. But it is, at its heart, a system that relies on private companies and the free market.

Republicans who maintain the Democratic plan is a government takeover say that characterization is justified because the plan increases federal regulation and will require Americans to buy health insurance.

But while those provisions are real, the majority of Americans will continue to get coverage from private insurers. And it will bring new business for the insurance industry: People who don"t currently have coverage will get it, for the most part, from private insurance companies. [PolitiFact, 12/16/10]

Fox News' Sammon Directed Fox Reporters To Use "Government Option" Instead Of Public Option

Fox News Boss Ordered Reporters To Use Term "Government Option." As Media Matters reported, at the height of the health care reform debate last fall, Bill Sammon, Fox News' Washington managing editor, sent a memo directing his network's journalists not to use the phrase "public option." Instead, Sammon wrote, Fox's reporters should use "government option" and similar phrases -- wording that a top Republican pollster Frank Luntz had recommended in order to turn public opinion against Democrats' reform efforts. Two months prior to Sammon's 2009 memo, Luntz appeared on Sean Hannity's August 18 Fox News program. Luntz scolded Hannity for referring to the "public option" and encouraged Hannity to use "government option" instead. [Media Matters, 12/9/10]
Fox News Has Repeatedly Promoted The "Government Takeover" Lie

Cameron Uncritically Advances The "Government Takeover" Lie. On the August 12, 2009, edition of Fox News' America's Newsroom, correspondent Carl Cameron reported that protesters at a health care town hall forum held by Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) were "angry that Grassley is participating in the negotiations with Democrats out of fear that he might give away the store and let what critics say is a liberal big government takeover of health care advance unabated." [Fox News' America's Newsroom, 8/12/09]

O'Reilly: "If The Government Takes Over Health Care ... More People Will Be Harmed." On the August 19, 2009, edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly stated during a discussion of health care reform: "If the government takes over health care ... and begins to tell people when they can live and when they can die and the country goes bankrupt in the process ... more people will be harmed, including poor people." [Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, 8/19/09]

Fox & Friends: Public Option Is A "Government Takeover"; "Should Technically Be" "Government-Run Health Care." On the October 27, 2009, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, co-host Gretchen Carlson said that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi "wants to kick in ... a new name for the public option, which is really government-run health care. That's what the name should technically be." Co-host Steve Doocy added, "Government takeover." [Fox News' Fox & Friends, 10/27/09]

Carlson: "Shouldn't What We Really Call [The Public Option] Is A Government Takeover Of Health Care?" On October 28, 2009, Fox & Friends hosted Frank Luntz to criticize Pelosi's "rebranding" of the public option as the "consumer option." During the discussion, Carlson asked Luntz: "Now we have Nancy Pelosi not wanting to call it the public option. Shouldn't what we really call it is a government takeover of health care? Is that why she now wants to call it the consumer option, to kind of shield that?" [Fox & Friends, 10/28/09]

If a civil modern democracy in which people act out of knowledge and wisdom is only possible if all the people - Fox, right-wing pundits and politicians - adhere to certain standards of behavior, than conservatives Republicans are the opposite of patriotic.

Republicans Never Lie About Taxes and Spending

Republicans Never Lie About Taxes and Spending

It’s difficult to know where to begin deconstructing conservative rhetoric on taxes and spending. It's such a central part of their worldview, and yet it's a view informed by a whole slew of falsehoods that have been repeated again and again during this year's debates over the Bush tax cuts, public spending and the deficit. What follows are nine of the biggest fact-free whoppers that conservatives insist are true.

1. Cutting Taxes Leads to More Money for the Government

Conservatives can't say they oppose popular programs on ideological grounds, and they can't admit they're happy to run up huge budget deficits, so they've come up with the fiction that cutting taxes actually brings in more revenues to finance the public sector.

What's especially brazen about this is that it's usually preceded by debate-stifling phrases such as “as everyone knows,” “history shows us” or “every single time taxes have been cut.”

In 2007, Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said, “Tax cuts, starting with Kennedy, as we all know, increase revenues”; Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson, R-Texas, claimed that “Every major tax cut we've had in history has created more revenue," and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY said earlier this year that the myth represented “the view of virtually every Republican on that subject."

It's also complete nonsense, and it's worth noting that only conservative politicians and pundits make the claim -- economists across the ideological spectrum agree that the argument is cursed by voodoo math.

As Time Magazine's Justin Fox noted in 2007, "Every economics Ph.D. who has worked in a prominent role in the Bush administration acknowledges that the tax cuts enacted during the past six years have not paid for themselves—and were never intended to.” Harvard professor Greg Mankiw, a former chairman of Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, dedicated a whole section of his economics textbook to debunking the claim.

And in an opinion column in the Wall Street Journal responding to Bush's claim that "You cut taxes, and the tax revenues increase," Andrew Samwick, who served as chief economist on Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, wrote, “You are smart people....You know that the tax cuts have not fueled record revenues... You know that the first order effect of cutting taxes is to lower tax revenues.”

2. Conservatives' Favorite Economist Proves the Point

As I note in my book, The Fifteen Biggest Lies About the Economy, that falsehood is based in large part on an abuse of “Laffer’s curve,” the conservative media’s favorite economic theorem. The idea, first scribbled on a cocktail napkin by economist George Laffer (according to lore), is pretty simple. It holds that you can raise income taxes to a degree, but when the top tax rate exceeds a certain point, people will go to such extraordinary lengths to avoid paying the piper that the government will actually end up collecting less revenue.

When Dylan Thomas asked a number of experts where the Laffer Curve “bends” for the Washington Post, the economists (he asked some conservative opinion columnists as well) all agreed that a top rate of 50 percent – several went as high as 70 percent – would still fall below the curve. That's important to keep in kind as we debate the merits of letting the top rate return to the 39 percent that prevailed during the Clinton years.

Each time taxes have been cut in the past few decades, it's led to a drop in revenues, which is why people like McCain like to go back to the Kennedy era, when cutting the top rate did spur growth and bring more money into the government's coffers. What they don't mention is that Kennedy cut the top rate from 91 percent to 70 percent, which has no bearing on the debate we're having today.*

3. Taxes on the Rich Keep 'Wealth Producers' from 'Creating Jobs'

We're all familiar with this one. In a New York Post column last week, Fox Business columnist Charles Gasparino claimed that businesses have "been hoarding cash instead of hiring" because of "the likelihood for higher taxes.” Media Matters responded by citing the CBO's finding that "[I]ncreasing the after-tax income of businesses typically does not create much incentive" to hire.

What's noteworthy about the narrative is the degree to which it defies simple common sense. It shouldn't be a matter of debate that only one thing creates jobs, and that's demand for companies' goods and services. The idea that a business that was booming would refuse to hire people and forego expansion because top tax rates might nudge upward is as silly as the idea that a business that has no customers would add new employees because its owners expect taxes to be low.

4. The Opposite: Tax Cuts for Upper Earners Spur Job Growth

Demand creates jobs, and U.S. Demand is way down because American households lost around $15 trillion dollars in wealth during the downturn. So it's important to note that research has shown that when you give a tax break to high-earners, they bank it, and when you give relief to working people, they spend it, increasing demand.

Like other types of public spending, giving cuts to those at the top does stimulate the economy, but very, very badly. According Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's, a dollar in tax cuts on capital gains adds .38 cents of economic growth and a dollar in corporate tax cuts brings us just .30 cents worth of stimulus, but a dollar in unemployment benefits gives the economy a boost of $1.63 and a buck worth of food stamps adds $1.73 in stimulus (PDF).

5. Only Half of American Families Pay Taxes

Rush Limbaugh put it this way: “The bottom 50 percent is paying a tiny bit of the taxes.... Remember this the next time you hear the ‘tax cuts for the rich’ business. Understand that the so-called rich are about the only ones paying taxes anymore.”

That's an entirely false narrative that emerges from some rather transparent sleight-of-hand. You have to look at the federal income tax in isolation and then pretend that it represents the government’s entire take. But the reality is that the government isn't financed from federal income taxes alone – far from it. Payroll taxes, for example, represent the biggest tax bite for the average worker.

When you add it all up—state and local taxes, federal taxes, sales taxes and excise fees—it turns out that the rich, the poor, and those in between all end up with about the same tax rate. That’s the conclusion of a 2007 study by Boston University economists Laurence J. Kotlikoff and David Rapson. They summarized, “The average marginal tax rate on incomes between $20,000 and $500,000 is 40.3%, the median tax rate is 41.8%, and the standard deviation of all of those rates is 5.3 percentage points. Basically, most of us pay about 40%, plus or minus 5.3 percentage points.”

6. Americans Are Taxed to Death

This is one of those claims made so frequently that it becomes a matter of faith. But faith doesn't rely on fact, and this one is totally untrue.

In 2008, we ranked 26th out of the 30 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in terms of our overall tax burden -- the share of our economy we fork over to the government. The U.S.came in almost 9 percentage points below the average of the group of wealthy nations, and some 20 percentage points below highly taxed countries like Denmark.

7. We're Being Killed by Runaway Government Spending

Public spending has increased with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and, temporarily, with the stimulus package. And it will rise in the future as more baby boomers retire. But beyond that, it's important to understand how “limited” our government really is relative to other wealthy countries.

Sabina Dewan and Michael Ettlinger of the Center for American Progress crunched the data and found that between 2004 and 2007, the U.S. ranked 24th out of 26 OECD countries in overall government spending as a share of our economic output. Only Ireland and South Korea, both relative newcomers to the club, had a more “limited government” than we did during that span. Again, we came in around 7 percentage points of GDP below the OECD average -- and almost 20 percentage points beneath that of big spenders like France

8. Conservatives Favor Low Taxes and Limited Government

The Right loves “Big Government” as long as it's pursuing their preferred agenda. What they don't like are the government's most popular functions – assuring a social safety net, protecting consumers and the environment, subsidizing education, etc. They don't want to debate priorities, so they claim an ideological preference for a smaller government while showering tons of money on the military, law-enforcement, corporate subsidies, etc.

That's why the share of the economy represented by government spending (at the local, state, and federal levels combined) has been remarkably consistent during the last 40 years or so, regardless of which party controlled the White House or Congress.

In the two years that Gerald Ford presented budgets, government spending as a share of GDP averaged 31.4 percent; in ultra-liberal Jimmy Carter’s four years, it dropped to 30.7 percent; Ronald Reagan, the patron saint of fiscal conservatism, came into office, and it rose to 32.2 percent. It nudged slightly higher during the first George Bush’s term in office, then dropped to an almost Nixonian 30.3 percent during the Clinton years, before rising to 31.6 percent during the second Bush administration.

Looking at the other side of the ledger, overall government revenues have also remained relatively stable, but the pattern is reversed. The government’s take, as a share of GDP, dropped during the Ford era, rose again under Carter, and fell again under Reagan. Revenues rose by almost 2 percent under Clinton and fell by a percent and a half under George W. Bush. (The only exception: government revenues rose from 27.3 percent of GDP during the Reagan years to 27.6 percent under George Herbert Walker Bush – that was the “peace dividend.”)

Although the government taxes and spends at fairly similar rates, under Republican leadership the nation shells out a bit more for government services and takes in just a bit less in taxes. With a $15 trillion economy, those little differences add up to pretty big deficits, and this, rather than hot school lunches for poor kids, is responsible for a large chunk of our federal debt.

Given that reality, it's a wonder that conservatives have managed to convince the mainstream media and much of the country that they’re the fiscally responsible ones who are always ready to step in and clean up the nation’s budgetary mess.

9. Taxes on Top Earners Are Actually Taxes on 'Small Businesses'

For years, Republicans have pushed the spin that most of the Bush cuts for the highest earners were going to “small business owners,” the proverbial lifeblood of Small Town U.S.A. Then Republican national committee chair Ed Gillespie launched the meme in a 2003 speech, saying that “80% of the tax relief for upper income filers goes to small businesses.”

Fact-check.org, the nonpartisan campaign watchdog, looked at the claim, which was cooked up by GOP staffers on the House Economic Committee, and concluded that “it’s untrue—and a classic example of a statistical distortion gone amok.” The lie is pretty simple: around 80 percent of the wealthiest Americans report some business income on their tax returns, either from private partnerships (think big law firms) or from “hobby” businesses. And the GOP committee counted everyone who reported even a dollar on Schedule C of their returns as a “small business owner.”

The reality? Less than 2 percent of tax returns reporting small-business income are filed by people in the top two income brackets. As a Washington Post analysis concluded, “If the objective is to help small businesses, continuing the Bush tax cuts on high-income taxpayers isn't the way to go -- it would miss more than 98 percent of small-business owners and would primarily help people who don't make most of their money off those businesses.”

*The "Kennedy tax cuts" were signed into law by Johnson, a year after JFK's assassination.

Joshua Holland is an editor and senior writer at AlterNet. He is the author of The 15 Biggest Lies About the Economy (and Everything else the Right Doesn't Want You to Know About Taxes, Jobs and Corporate America).

This should be considered a truth break from all the conservative nonsense that is rammed down America's throat daily by the mainstream corporate media and AM radio morons.