Avik Roy Says: Dave Weigel Is Right: Paul Ryan Is a Big Liar
Avik Roy:
Paul Ryan Son Obama's Fiscal Record at the Republican Convention: I asked my liberal friends on Twitter to send me an itemized list of Ryan’s alleged lies…. Dave Weigel of Slate compiled a useful list….
Charge #1: Paul Ryan accused Obama of cutting Medicare by $716 billion, but Ryan’s own budget preserved those cuts….
It’s true that Ryan’s budgets in 2011 and 2012 preserved Obamacare’s cuts to Medicare….
Charge #2: Paul Ryan criticized Obama for ignoring the recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles deficit commission. But Ryan voted against those recommendations himself….
It’s true that Paul Ryan voted against the Simpson-Bowles recommendations….
Charge #3: Paul Ryan blamed Obama for Standard & Poor’s downgrade of American government debt from AAA to AA+, but Paul Ryan is actually to blame because he resisted tax increases that would have closed the deficit….
I suppose it’s true that you can blame Ryan and the rest of the GOP for opposing trillions in tax increases….
Charge #4: Paul Ryan opposed the stimulus, but he lobbied for stimulus grants that went to his district….
We can debate the merits of the stimulus…. It is also true that Ryan did seek some stimulus money for his district after the law was passed. Ryan had initially said that he had not taken any stimulus money, but was forced to correct that record…. In addition, Ryan voted for a similarly misguided temporary stimulus package under President Bush….
Finally, Weigel and a number of other commentators complained about the Janesville General Motors plant that Ryan cited in his speech. Ryan pointed out that Obama promised that, under his administration, “this plant will be here for another hundred years.” But it closed in December 2008, before President Obama was inaugurated, and didn’t reopen under President Obama’s GM bailout, which is the focus of Ryan’s criticism. As this is a health-care and fiscal blog, I’m going to let others argue about that one.
