FACT CHECK: Obama disowns deficit he helped shapeApr 29, 5:55 PM (ET), By CALVIN WOODWARD
WASHINGTON (AP) - "That wasn't me," President Barack Obama said on his 100th day in office, disclaiming responsibility for the huge budget deficit waiting for him on Day One.
It actually was him - and the other Democrats controlling Congress the previous two years - who shaped a budget so out of balance.
And as a presidential candidate and president-elect, he backed the twilight Bush-era stimulus plan that made the deficit deeper, all before he took over and promoted spending plans that have made it much deeper still.
Obama met citizens at an Arnold, Mo., high school Wednesday in advance of his prime-time news conference. Both forums were a platform to review his progress at the 100-day mark and look ahead.
At various times, he brought an air of certainty to ambitions that are far from cast in stone.
His assertion that his proposed budget "will cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term" is an eyeball-roller among many economists, given the uncharted terrain of trillion-dollar deficits and economic calamity that the government is negotiating.
He promised vast savings from increased spending on preventive health care in the face of doubts that such an effort, however laudable it might be for public welfare, can pay for itself, let alone yield huge savings.
A look at some of his claims Wednesday:
OBAMA: "Number one, we inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit.... That wasn't me. Number two, there is almost uniform consensus among economists that in the middle of the biggest crisis, financial crisis, since the Great Depression, we had to take extraordinary steps. So you've got a lot of Republican economists who agree that we had to do a stimulus package and we had to do something about the banks. Those are one-time charges, and they're big, and they'll make our deficits go up over the next two years." - in Missouri.
THE FACTS:
Congress controls the purse strings, not the president, and it was under Democratic control for Obama's last two years as Illinois senator. Obama supported the emergency bailout package in President George W. Bush's final months - a package Democratic leaders wanted to make bigger.
To be sure, Obama opposed the Iraq war, a drain on federal coffers for six years before he became president. But with one major exception, he voted in support of Iraq war spending.
The economy has worsened under Obama, though from forces surely in play before he became president, and he can credibly claim to have inherited a grim situation.
Still, his response to the crisis goes well beyond "one-time charges."
He's persuaded Congress to expand children's health insurance, education spending, health information technology and more. He's moving ahead on a variety of big-ticket items on health care, the environment, energy and transportation that, if achieved, will be more enduring than bank bailouts and aid for homeowners.
The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimated his policy proposals would add a net $428 billion to the deficit over four years, even accounting for his spending reduction goals. Now, the deficit is nearly quadrupling to $1.75 trillion. ---
OBAMA: "I think one basic principle that we know is that the more we do on the (disease) prevention side, the more we can obtain serious savings down the road. ... If we're making those investments, we will save huge amounts of money in the long term." - in Missouri.
THE FACTS: It sounds believable that preventing illness should be cheaper than treating it, and indeed that's the case with steps like preventing smoking and improving diets and exercise. But during the 2008 campaign, when Obama and other presidential candidates were touting a focus on preventive care, the New England Journal of Medicine cautioned that "sweeping statements about the cost-saving potential of prevention, however, are overreaching." It said that "although some preventive measures do save money, the vast majority reviewed in the health economics literature do not."
And a study released in December by the Congressional Budget Office found that increasing preventive care "could improve people's health but would probably generate either modest reductions in the overall costs of health care or increases in such spending within a 10-year budgetary time frame." ---
OBAMA: "You could cut (Social Security) benefits. You could raise the tax on everybody so everybody's payroll tax goes up a little bit. Or you can do what I think is probably the best solution, which is you can raise the cap on the payroll tax." - in Missouri.
THE FACTS: Obama's proposal would reduce the Social Security trust fund's deficit by less than half, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.
That means he would still have to cut benefits, raise the payroll tax rate, raise the retirement age or some combination to deal with the program's long-term imbalance.
Workers currently pay 6.2 percent and their employers pay an equal rate - for a total of 12.4 percent - on annual wages of up to $106,800, after which no more payroll tax is collected.
Obama wants workers making more than $250,000 to pay payroll tax on their income over that amount. That would still protect workers making under $250,000 from an additional burden. But it would raise much less money than removing the cap completely. ---
Associated Press writers Kevin Freking and Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.
Let’s wait and see what happens to them...
Obama Repeats Leftist Blogger Myth on Churchill and "Torture"RUSH: President Obama, in his press conference last night -- all of a sudden, and for the first time -- cited a world leader with respect.
Threatening to hang somebody, are you gonna call it torture or not? They may not have beat them, but they used drugs. The Brits used drugs. After claiming he wasn't calling Bush a torturer, he essentially did call Bush a torturer last night in that press conference. But after all that, he likes Churchill now. It's amazing to watch this. The country has fallen head over heels in love with Barack Obama. It's blind love, not his policies, but with him.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: One thing about Obama last night, all of a sudden singling out Churchill as some moral guidepost for not torturing or being cruel or mean or whatever you have to do to get information from prisoners, don't forget the reason that Barack Obama gave back the Churchill statue. His grandfather lived in Kenya during the colonial days when Britain ran it, and the Brits, I think it was during Churchill's second premiership or prime minister-ship put down the Mau Mau rebellion, and Obama's grandfather, Odingo Obama Oyendo, whatever, was either killed or severely wounded. And that's why the animus toward Churchill and the Brits in the first place. So this was all just made up last night, stolen, used, you know, some left-wing blogger.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: From the Telegraph of India, December 2008: "Churchill 'Tortured' Obama's Grandfather." Churchill also wouldn't mind if Gandhi starved to death, by the way.
RUSH: Just a couple more details here, Steve Gilbert at Sweetness-Light.com points out a story from the UK Times online, December 3rd, 2008: "'Beatings and Abuse Made Barack Obama's Grandfather Loathe the British.' -- The President-elect's relatives have told how the family was a victim of the Mau Mau revolt. Barack Obama's grandfather was imprisoned and brutally tortured by the British during the violent struggle for Kenyan independence, according to the Kenyan family of the US President-elect. Hussein Onyango Obama, Mr Obama's paternal grandfather, became involved in the Kenyan independence movement while working as a cook for a British army officer after the war. He was arrested in 1949 and jailed for two years in a high-security prison where, according to his family, he was subjected to horrific violence to extract information about the growing insurgency."
So I mention this only because Obama last night said, (paraphrasing) "We can't torture cause Churchill didn't torture, Churchill didn't torture anybody, didn't torture any West German, East German spies, any German spies period during World War II." That's not true. The Brits threatened captured spies with hanging, and they used drugs on them unless they cooperated and turned traitor against their own country, Germany. And now the Obama family says that Barack's grandfather tortured by the Brits during Churchill's second prime ministership, and then, from Telegraph of India.com, this is from January 1st of 2006: "The shocking disclosure that Winston Churchill was willing to allow Mahatma Gandhi to die in prison if the latter persisted with a hunger strike is made in British war cabinet documents from 1942 released yesterday." So this is three years ago, this news. "Rush, why are you bringing this up, why?" Because, folks, look, if you just landed from Mars last night, and you happened to be channel surfing American TV and you came across that press conference, I'm sure you'd be mesmerized.
There are three people in the last 20 years who have been able to influence, inspire, and motivate millions of Americans. Barack Obama is one of them. He has a flair of speaking confidently, which is key, flair for speaking confidently, sounds professorial, sounds educated, even when he doesn't say anything. He makes everybody think he's on their side. He makes everybody think that he agrees with their point of view on things. But this man is like every other liberal to come down the path. He lies. So that's why I'm pointing these things out. Why the big deal on torture? Because Barack Obama's using it to criticize his own country. Barack Obama is weakening this nation's ability to defend itself. Barack Obama is going out of his way to point out every opportunity he has, what an immoral, unjust country this was, until he was elected. So that's why we spend time contradicting him on these things. Plus, he's listening to the writings of a left-wing blogger on this Churchill business, and it just isn't true.
END TRANSCRIPT