This morning I got wise and watched Soledad O’Brian on CNN’s Starting Point instead of the propaganda-filled Morning Jo(k)e on MSNBC. I tuned in just in time to hear O’Brian doing her job as a journalist, questioning Romney’s Senior Advisor Tara Wall on the total disconnect between what he said to a group of big-money donors in that now-infamous 47% speech and what was in his prepared statements for later this morning in a Romney speech on foreign policy concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
As O’Brien pointed out, in the surreptitiously-recorded video, Romney voiced one pretty messed-up opinion on the Palestinian plight:
“I’m torn by two perspectives in this regard. One is the one which I’ve had for some time, which is that the Palestinians have no interest whatsoever in establishing peace, and that the pathway to peace is almost unthinkable to accomplish… I look at the Palestinians not wanting to see peace anyway, for political purposes, committed to the destruction and elimination of Israel, and these thorny issues, and I say, “There’s just no way.” And so what you do is you say, “You move things along the best way you can.” You hope for some degree of stability, but you recognize that this is going to remain an unsolved problem.”
She contrasted that with the text she had received of Romney’s prepared speech to be delivered this morning a few hours later:
“Finally, I will recommit America to the goal of a Democratic, prosperous Palestinian state living side-by-side in peace and security with the Jewish state of Israel.”
After playing the audio of the first statement and reading the statement above, O’Brian asked her guest, “Those are completely contradictory. Which one is true?” That’s a pretty straightforward question that deserved a direct answer. Instead, Wall answered thus: “The fact is, it’s the president who’s failed in the negotiation process. He’s the leader right now of this country, and he has failed …” at which time O’Brian interrupted and said “Tara, that’s an excellent shift, but answer for me about Gov. Romney!” Wall said “That is my answer” and then went on to say she disagrees with the premise of the question.
How anyone can be allowed to get away with that kind of prevarication is beyond me. To her credit, Soledad O’Brian didn’t allow it, and ended the interview. More of that please!
On the show this morning, I was joined by Howie Klein (Blue America PAC, Down With Tyranny) to talk about the important Senate races, closeted gays in government, and more…. And Nicole Belle joined in from Crooks and Liars for our weekly Fools on the Hill segment, recapping the Sunday talking heads shows. Here’s what she brought us today:
Welcome to post-fact America. Facts have now become something that can be categorized as partisan and therefore disregarded. Where lying has no consequence and no pundit is ever held accountable to for being wrong.
So Mary Matalin—she of the White House Iraq Group, whose job it was to sell the American people on the Iraqi invasion—can go ballistic and tell Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman that he is lying about Ryan proposing vouchers for Medicare. There’s definitely a liar here, but it ain’t Krugman. Matalin also insisted that she was telling the truth that there has been no real recovery.
And poor Paul Krugman must have felt besieged on This Week, because he also got an earful from Peggy Noonan when she insisted that Romney ‘nailed’ Obama on his inability to work across the aisle.
Chris Wallace also had trouble with facts, telling Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley that it wasn’t true that Romney proposed a $5 trillion tax cut. Are you sure about that, Chris?
Now we know that Gov. Romney’s tax plan does not call for a $5 trillion tax cut. Which means that we now officially know nothing at all about Mitt Romney’s tax plan.
Previously, Governor Romney has said that his tax plan would cut all individual income tax rates by 20%, eliminate the AMT, eliminate the estate tax, and eliminate taxes on investment income for low- and middle-income taxpayers. He would also extend all of the Bush-era tax cuts that are scheduled to expire at the end of 2012.
Those tax cuts would reduce federal revenues by $480 billion in 2015 over and above the cost of extending the Bush tax cuts. Allow for some growth in income, and the total comes to over $5 trillion over ten years.
It’s true that Romney has been very coy about specifics of his tax plan. But if we are to believe what he said, at least this week, then those pesky liberal facts allow us to extrapolate exactly what those tax cuts amount to. No wonder Republicans want to defund education.
There is probably no greater example of post-fact America than when Jack Welch was given multiple national media outlets to cast doubts on the latest job report. So naturally, David Gregory quite considerately gave Newt Gingrich an opportunity to amplify the nutty conspiracy, which sent Chuck Todd off the deep end, bemoaning the lack of trust in our institutions and how people like Jack Welch and Donald Trump can spout off any kind of craziness. Well, Chuck, I hate to break it to you, but Jack and the Donald can exercise their free speech rights anytime they want. The problem lies when people like you give them the airtime to do it nationally and not call them out for it.
