Congressman Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) had some harsh words for Barack Obama Wednesday.
During an interview with Fox News's Bret Baier, Ryan said, "Everything the president says about budgets, about our numbers, we’re used to him telling things that are dramatic distortions" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
CONGRESSMAN PAUL RYAN (R-WISCONSIN): We knew that if we offered solutions that they were going to demagogue those solutions. But we feel that we have a moral and a legal obligation that if we don’t like the direction the president’s taking the country, we should do something about it.
More importantly, we have a law that says Congress has to pass a budget every year by April 15. We think we should follow the law. The Senate for three years has decided not to follow that law. The president has given us four budgets and never in one of those budgets has he proposed any solution to this fiscal crisis.
So what they decided to do is offer no solutions over their own, wait for Republicans to offer ours, then divide, distort, and distract.
BRET BAIER, HOST: The president was out talking about student loans. He says your budget cuts back on Pell Grants, and essentially says that Republicans are turning their backs on young people.
RYAN: Well, I think every week we’re going to see the president pander to various groups in this country in order to try and build an election coalition to try and win this election. Pell Grants, for example, dramatic increases in spending over the last number of years, and what we’ve seen is a corresponding dramatic increase in tuition inflation. What our budget does is it keeps Pell Grants where they are. We just don’t sign on for the dramatic additional increase that the president’s proposing. And apparently, if we’re not increasing spending as much as the president proposes, that’s considered a huge cut.
BAIER: So is he wrong when he says this stuff?
RYAN: Well, yes, he’s wrong all the time when he says these things. We’re used to that. Everything the president says about budgets, about our numbers, we’re used to him telling things that are dramatic distortions.
In reality, this has been part of the Democratic playbook for decades.
When Republicans in the '90s wanted to balance the budget by slowing the growth in spending on such things as school lunches, after alloting for an increase of seven percent, Democrats claimed it represented a cut because the program had been growing at 12 percent.
The same is true today. If the Republicans propose a budget with no increases to a program the Democrats hold near and dear, it's considered a cut because they want to increase spending on that item.
As always, the media are there to further the lie so the American people believe the GOP are trying to take food away from widows and orphans.
This will certainly be part of the election year rhetoric the public is going to be subjected to for the next six months.
