The Politics of the Big Lie

Leaders of the Republican Party are bragging that more Americans are against the Health Reform legislation than are for it and while this is true they cannot resist exaggerating even when polls are in their favor.

Thus Senator Jim DeMint appearing on Face the Nation on March 28 says “Over sixty percent of Americans still want Republicans to fight to repeal this.” Bob Schiefer to his credit immediately corrects this saying, “a new poll…does not suggest that a majority of Americans are against this…It says forty-six percent support this, fifty percent oppose it.”

But before the program is over so many out-and-out lies are told that with all good intentions Schiefer cannot keep correcting the falsehoods.

It isn’t 50% who are against this bill. It is 50% who are against a bill (now a law) characterized by endless and baseless lies. If I believed the lies, as many Americans apparently do, I would be against the law as well. But most people assume that their leaders would not tell out and out lies. They assume that there must be at least some truth to what they say. Unfortunately, that is not the case. What is being circulated are baseless lies, without a shred of truth to most of them. I have spend a great deal of time and effort documenting many of these lies and rather than try to repeat myself refer the reader to earlier writings on this subject - Health Insurance Reform, Health Insurance Reform - Lies and Damned Lies, Health Reform - Reality, Health Care Reform – Facts and Fiction, Republican Talking Points on Health Care, Continuing the Health Care debate and Lying pays off!!!!! Smears succeed!!!! Obstructionism is rewarded!!!!.

But I return to this subject because I keep running into ever greater whoppers. I thought I had heard the worst of them when Sarah Palin claimed “Death Panels” without any basis whatsoever, and hoped that there were some Republicans who were responsible enough to repudiate it. But to my great disappointment not one Republican denounced it or distanced him/herself from it, and most even tried to justify it. What kind of a Party is it that would be so irresponsible?

Last Sunday I listened to the Sunday interviews and if anything the lies have gotten bigger, the claims more hysterical. The claim by Sen. DeMint mentioned above was minor compared to what followed in the form of wild claims of Rep. Michele Bachmann.

I reproduce part of the transcript from that interview with my comments in bold letters:

“Congresswoman--and we used a little clip of what you said in the beginning of this--you said last week that health care reform was dangerous, and-- and you equated it with tyranny. Do you really mean that?"

REPRESENTATIVE MICHELE BACHMANN (R-Minnesota): "I do, because now we have the federal government, Bob, taking over ownership or control of fifty-one percent of the American economy. This is stunning. Prior to September of 2008, one hundred percent of the private economy was private."

            I will return to the claim that the government has taken over 51% of the economy. At this point let me address the claim that prior to “September 2008 one hundred percent of the private economy was private.” Has she forgotten that the government ran & runs the military, the US Postal Service, Social Security, Medicare, etc. etc. But then I realize that she is right. She is playing three cards Monte. It was 100% of the “private economy was private.” But 100% of the “private” economy will always be private by definition.

So we have to look at the reference to 51% of the American economy which the government has taken control of since 9/08. But allow me to expand on this.

           "Today, the federal government has taken either direct ownership or control of banks, the largest insurance company in the United States, AIG, Freddie and Fannie."

            The only part of this that is true is that the government has taken control of Freddie and Fannie, which are relatively small companies. They loaned money to the other entities mentioned to keep them from going under and took Preferred, non-voting stock as surety, but have neither ownership nor control. This is a barefaced lie!

           "The federal government now owns, Bob, over fifty percent of all home mortgages..."

Since Freddie and Fannie own many mortgages, the government owns those mortgages, but it is nowhere near 50%. This is a barefaced lie!

"Now, the direct student loan industry..."

            The government didn’t take it over. It was always the government that was making the loans since the banks wouldn’t. Under the old system the banks acted as a middleman and took a large cut. The middleman has been eliminated with a substantial saving to the US taxpayer. This is a barefaced lie!

           "...Chrysler, GM. And with the health care industry that’s an additional eighteen percent of the private economy…"

            The government didn’t take any of these over. Chrysler and GM were both given loans and are not owned by the government and the health insurance reform did not take over the health care industry. The health insurance companies remain private but are now subject to certain regulations just as we regulate and have always regulated numerous industries. The rest of the health care industry i.e. doctors and hospitals are not even regulated. This is a barefaced lie!

"Remember, when President Obama told Congress you have to pass my trillion-dollar bailout or we could get unemployment as high as eight percent..."

            Again not true! What most economists and the Obama Administration said was that we faced a potential repeat of 1929 when unemployment went above 37% and that with the measures taken they hoped to keep unemployment under 8%. They were a little too optimistic, because they only succeeded in keeping it from going substantially above 10%, though it has now dropped below 10%.

"President Obama’s own numbers, his own economic advisor, Christina Romer, said that Obamacare..."

(it isn’t Obamacare - Congress drafted the legislation much to the chagrin of many Democrats who felt the President should have drafted it for them.) 

 "...could cost the economy five and a half million jobs lost. "

Christina Romer did not say anything of the sort & health care reform could create millions of jobs over the next ten years, another barefaced lie without the slightest basis for it!

BOB SCHIEFFER: "… Sarah Palin famously said last week that it is not time for Republicans to retreat. It is time to reload. Now, she has since modified that and said she wasn’t talking about guns. She was talking about getting out there and using the vote. Do you think Sarah Palin has overstated it here?"

            The fact is that Palin not only talked about reloading she published a map with gun sights “one for each of the Democrats targeted this year by her political action committee SarahPAC. Three of the gun sights, those where incumbent Democrats have already announced their retirement, are colored red.” 

While I am sure Bachman wouldn’t agree, I urge the Attorney General to impanel a grand jury and seek an indictment against Palin for incitement to commit murder.            

   Bachman continued:

“And again, the New England Journal of Medicine released a survey the week that President Obama signed Obamacare stating that the-- ov--over thirty percent of American physicians--would leave the profession if the government took over health care. That’s very serious going forward."

            It would indeed be serious, if true, but it is a lie! And this one is worse than all the others if that were possible, for this one is the result of a plan to give the appearance of truth to this lie. The story originated with CNS News, which Source Watch describes as “a subsidiary of the conservative news monitoring group the Media Research Center (MRC). Originally calling itself the "Conservative News Service," CNS changed its name to Cybercast in 2000. CNS posted an article on their website under the headline: “Nearly One-Third of Doctors Could Leave Medicine if Health-Care Reform Bill Passes, According to Survey Reported in New England Journal of Medicine” and then gave details of a purported article in the New England Journal of Medicine. This was given further credence by Fox & Friends where co-host Brian Kilmeade said: "The New England Journal of Medicine has published a report and did a survey, and they said the impact of reform on primary care physicians, 46 percent, they say, feel reform will force them out or make them want to leave medicine." But the New England Journal in a statement said that it neither conducted nor published the "survey." On their website they posted the following:

“Recruiting Physicians Today is a free advertiser newsletter published by the Worldwide Advertising Sales and Marketing Department in the publishing division of the Massachusetts Medical Society. Each issue of the newsletter features research and content produced by physician recruiting firms and other independent groups involved in physician employment."

“On December 17, 2009 The Medicus Firm, a national physician search firm based in Dallas and Atlanta, published the results of a survey they conducted with 1,000 physicians regarding their attitudes toward health reform. To read their survey results at The Medicus Firm website, click here."

“The opinions expressed in the article linked to above represent those of The Medicus Firm only. That article does not represent the opinions of the New England Journal of Medicine or the Massachusetts Medical Society.”

(Emphasis added)

Any legislation has a downside to it. Any legislation can be opposed or criticized on legitimate and valid grounds. Why don’t Republicans make such arguments? One can only surmise that they are not interested in legitimate debate. They want to incite, and reasoned debate does not provoke the kind of emotional demonstrations, which they rely on to advance their agenda.

We all have an obligation to set the record straight. These lies are not to be tolerated. They are to be denounced. Where are the great newscasters of yore, like Ed Morrow, to take on the liars and the provocateurs?

But what is even worse is that the media encourages such outrageous and inflammatory behavior, for why is Bachman getting all this publicity? Why is she on "Face the Nation"? She has no leadership position in the Congress. She is just one of 435 members of Congress, representing one small district in Minnesota. She get all this exposure because she makes outrageous statements. The media rewards this. Thus the media becomes an accomplice and a promoter of the lies and the outrageous. It is the way to get the media to make them into celebrities.