The Obama administration spent last week predicting a rash of unthinkable consequences if automatic sequestration cuts go into effect. Consequences from teacher furloughs to longer airport lines to criminals running free were predicted. The numerous false claims from the White House prompted even the mainstream media to eventually push back on the false and misleading claims.
Nate Beeler / Columbus Dispatch (click to view more cartoons by Beeler)
At a press conference before the White House press corps, President Obama followed the lead of several of his cabinet members by making false claims about what the impact of the sequester is going to be. The President claimed that starting March 2nd janitors and police officers at the Capitol building would be receiving a pay cut.
The facts tell a different story. No pay is being cut for workers at the Architect of the Capitol (the department that employs both janitors and police officers on the Capitol grounds). This misinformation from the President himself led the Washington post to give him “Four Pinnochios” because the facts just simply weren’t there.
On CBS’ Sunday morning show Face the Nation, Education Secretary Arne Duncan made a false claim that led both the Washington Post and Politifact to cry foul. Secretary Duncan claimed that as many as 40,000 teachers could lose their jobs and teachers were “literally” now getting pink slips/notices that they can’t come back in the fall.
Not only was this simply not true, but Secretary Duncan made this claim THREE separate times. As the Washington Post put it, “Next time, before going on television, check your facts.”
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano didn’t just make claims that weren’t true; her department released illegal immigrants being held in jail ahead of the scheduled budget cuts. After the outcry from the public about this decision, Napolitano attempted to distance herself from this decision, blaming them on employees of her department who serve in the field.
As recently as March 4th, Secretary Napolitano was blaming airport delays on the budget cuts. The airports she mentioned however – Los Angeles International Airport and Chicago’s O’Hare Airport – both routinely struggle with delays.
Last week, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said the Administration’s warnings on the sequester are not ‘scare tactics’. But the reality is the facts say otherwise. The Obama Administration is terrified that the cuts will come and the American people will be okay with them. Worse, they fear the American people will want even more government spending cut from the federal budget. More members of the President’s cabinet, both current members and outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta have routinely made claims about sequestration that just aren’t true.
If the claims are baseless enough to cause the liberal mainstream media to take notice and take them to task, it gives us an idea of how far they have gone. These cuts are not perfect; in fact they were designed by the President himself to affect the most people so that there could be public opposition to both these and future cuts.
What the President didn’t count on is this: the public is tired of the Big Government spending in Washington. Middle class Americans have been struggling for years in the Obama economy and have cut from their family budgets more than once over the course of the last four years. Americans all across this country agree: it’s time for Washington, D.C. to tighten its belt and stop spending money we can’t afford to spend. It’s time to cut. The lies from the White House can’t stop Americans and – the liberal press – from seeing the truth.
