FACT CHECK: Obama and his imbalanced ledger (SOTU Bull)

AP/Yahoo News ^ | 01/26/11 | Calvin Woodward

[MissesBush]

The ledger did not appear to be adding up Tuesday night when President Barack Obama urged more spending on one hand and a spending freeze on the other.

Obama spoke ambitiously of putting money into roads, research, education, efficient cars, high-speed rail and other initiatives in his State of the Union speech. He pointed to the transportation and construction projects of the last two years and proposed "we redouble these efforts." He coupled this with a call to "freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years."

But Obama offered far more examples of where he would spend than where he would cut, and some of the areas he identified for savings are not certain to yield much if anything.

For example, he said he wants to eliminate "billions in taxpayer dollars we currently give to oil companies." Yet he made a similar proposal last year that went nowhere. He sought $36.5 billion in tax increases on oil and gas companies over the next decade, but Congress largely ignored the request, even though Democrats were then in charge of both houses of Congress.

A look at some of Obama's statements Tuesday night and how they compare with the facts:

OBAMA: Tackling the deficit "means further reducing health care costs, including programs like Medicare and Medicaid, which are the single biggest contributor to our long-term deficit. Health insurance reform will slow these rising costs, which is part of why nonpartisan economists have said that repealing the health care law would add a quarter of a trillion dollars to our deficit."

THE FACTS: The idea that Obama's health care law saves money for the government is based on some arguable assumptions.

[MissesBush]

Color me shocked AP would run such a story. I'm guessing their reporters will now be barred from the White House.

The Obama claim of Obamacareless reducing deficits is even worse than this reporter claims. It relies on a lot of double accounting that would never pass muster in the private sector, a doctor's fix Congress has since jettisoned and just outright phony gimmicks and overly ambitious accounting of new tax revenues. Paul Ryan did a great job of laying out this phony accounting a few days okay.

[TSgt]

This from the AP?

[isthisnickcool]

Obama is absolutely unqualified and inept except for his ability to run the country right in to the ground.

[combat_boots]

1/26/2011 “A History of Surpluses and Deficits in the United States”: http://www.davemanuel.com/history-of-deficits-and-surpluses-in-the-united-states.php

“US Federal Debt as a Percent of GDP”: http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_debt_chart.html

The upcoming $1.5 T debt will put us with on the books debt that will be larger than the value of our entire economy. Even suggesting the freezing of spending freezes current monies.

[ridesthemiles]

I would not trust him to water my horses.

[Beaten Valve]

*

[giotto]

Color me shocked AP would run such a story.

Equally shocking is the fact that this was second on a list of six headlines highlighted on Yahoo News after the SOTU.