Obama’s Kansas Speech Fails The Fact Check Test

I wrote yesterday about President Obama’s speech in Osawatomie, Kansas that repeated many of the themes of “fairness” that he’s been hitting for nearly a year now. The Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler took a look at many of the factual assertions the President made in the speech and found them, well, not very factual at all.

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Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. Hey Norm says:

    From the article linked to:

    “… it is correct that most of the benefits of the tax cuts flowed to the wealthy…But he should not suggest that the Bush tax cuts were aimed only at the wealthy, since that is not correct…”

    Right….the wealthy got the majority of the benefit…but it wasn’t aimed at them. Well dammit…maybe we should aim the tax cuts at the wealthy and then the middle-class will benefit. The logic just f’ing astounds me.
    The President said: “…“Some billionaires have a tax rate as low as 1 percent — 1 percent. That is the height of unfairness…” The Post responds”…The most recent data that we can find on the top 400 taxpayers — all billionaires — show that in 2008, 30 billionaires paid an average tax rate of between zero and 10 percent…” Isn’t 1% somewhere between zero and 10 percent. And somehow there is a lie in there?
    In fact the Bush Tax Cuts are the biggest driver of the deficits in the out-years. http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3490

    I don’t know what’s more pathetic…the WaPo nit-picking a speech…or you linking to it to satisfy your blind hatred of Obama (you should probably read SLT’s post on Erik Erickson from earlier today) The most important point is that none of the “scare-quote” LIES “un-scare-quote” undermine the core message of the speech.

    Don’t you have some drum-circle posts to write?

  2. Hey Norm says:

    Is Glenn Kessler the same guy that said Paul Ryans “Path to Prosperity” preserves Medicare because even though the proposed program is fundamentally different…it is still called Medicare…so Medicare is preserved???

  3. anjin-san says:

    Another day, another cut and paste from Drum Circle Doug…

  4. Davebo says:

    Hilarious Doug.

    Now go read the Washington Times to fulfill the 8 posts of inanity per day requirement!

    Toss in some links to the Heritage Foundation and you’ll be golden.

  5. LarryM9 says:

    I surely miss the days when the Washington Post was a real newspaper.