The Real Lying Crooks Are at it Again

By now we all know that John F’in Kerry, the "presumptive" Democratic nominee for President has refused to apologize for calling the Bush Administration “the most crooked, lying group I’ve ever seen”. Even his non-apology was a lie:

"I have no intention whatsoever to apologize for my remarks," Kerry said Thursday in front of a group of Democratic senators he just met with. "I think the Republicans need to start talking about the real issues before the country."

This is a quote, but not an exact quote. What he started to say, as all of us who heard it know, is "I think The Ad …" instead of Republicans. A little Freudian slip there that indicates pretty clearly that, despite the denials, Kerry was slinging mud at the Bush Administration. Why? Because the Bush campaign accurately represented Kerry’s record – and his intentions – in a political ad. The ad claimed that John Kerry would raise taxes by nearly a trillion dollars and is based on the premise that $900 billion is what Kerry agreed it would cost for his plan to provide health care to the masses:

Kerry Accepts Thorpe’s $900 Billion Estimate When Asked. SEN. JOHN KERRY: "[I]f you look at $75 billion a year, the president has just passed a tax cut, 54 percent of which went to 1 percent of Americans, which was about $352 billion. … That’s the choice of this race." PBS’ MARGARET WARNER: "But your plan totaled, as scored by an independent authority, $900 billion over ten years." KERRY: "Yes."(PBS’ “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer,” 7/2/03)

A simple application of logic tells you that, if he refuses to increase the deficit, yet proposes $900 billion in new spending, he'll have to raise taxes. And he says he will -- on people with incomes of over $200,000 a year.

One problem -- the facts are that it can’t be done solely by raising taxes on only people making over $200,000 a year:

Despite His Rhetoric, Kerry Cannot Pay For His Health Care Proposal By Only Raising Taxes On People Making More Than $200,000. If Kerry repealed the Bush tax cuts solely for those making $200,000 or more, it would only result in $250 billion over 10 years. ("Kerry: 'Worst Jobs Record' Since Hoover," The Washington Post, 7/11/03; David Wessel, Op-Ed, "View From The Right: Tax Increases Ahead," The Wall Street Journal, 2/19/04)

So there is a factual basis for the Bush campaign’s claim that Kerry would raise taxes. No lying and no crookedness there.

This is just one of three main FACTS cited in this ad that are researched and backed up on GeorgeWBush.com – no lying, mudslinging or crookedness involved.

Not so for the Kerry campaign and it’s supporters:

You’ll hearing Kerry out there on the stump saying things like this (taken directly from his web site):

George W. Bush has chosen tax cuts for the wealthy and special favors for special interests over our economic future. John Kerry has a plan to rebuild our future, starting with 3 million jobs in his first 500 days – and a plan to ensure that workers can achieve the American Dream in our changing economy.

Anyone one of you middle class folks (myself included) who reaped the benefit of tax bracket changes and received rebate checks for $400 last summer (and smaller ones in previous summers) for each child you have know that the idea that George Bush only cut taxes for the wealthy is a bald-faced lie. Yet you’ll hear this theme throughout the presidential campaign. WHO ARE THE LYING CROOKS???????

Another thing you’ll hear over and over again from the Kerry campaign and the Democrats is that this economic recovery (from the Clinton recession – the fastest growing economy since Reagan was president) is a "jobless recovery" and that George Bush has lost jobs. Aside from the fact that the president is not responsible for creating jobs, but is responsible for setting economic policy that makes job growth possible, this is a lie. The facts, taken from the NewsMax.com web site, are this:

# The 5.6 percent unemployment rate is the lowest in two years and below the average of the 1980s (7.3 percent) and '90s (5.8 percent), and still continues to drop. (A rate, incidentally, that has been considered nearly statistical full employment in some Democratic administrations.)

# The nation's economic output revealed the strongest quarterly growth in 20 years. The data for the fourth quarter of 2003 show that the civilian labor force rose by 333,000, while the number of unemployed in the labor force dropped by 575,000, and the number of so-called discouraged workers is less than .3 percent of the workforce, according to Paul Kersey of the Heritage Foundation.

# Consumer spending grew between 4 percent and 5 percent last year, and real hourly earnings rose 1.5 percent. Real earnings have risen over the last three years.

# Exports doubled to 19 percent in the fourth quarter, compared to less than 9 percent in the third.

# The number of American workers is at an all-time high of 138.5 million, a level never before attained in U.S. history.

# Jobless claims are 10 percent below the average of the last 25 years and still falling.

# Hiring indices are up, even in manufacturing.

# Productivity growth is extremely high.

Obviously, Bush Administration policies are setting up economic conditions that create job growth.

AGAIN, I ASK YOU WHO ARE THE LYING CROOKS???????

And it’s not just the Kerry campaign that is engaging in lying and crookedness. Other Democrats and liberal groups that support Democratic causes engage in worse lying and crookedness than the Kerry campaign. As an example, we’ll use MoveOn.org, a group that is running an ad claiming that George Bush wants to take away overtime pay from people. Problem is it’s a lie.

The new rules would actually raise the salary at which you could consider a lower-paid employee exempt from overtime by $14,000 a year. This means that millions of Americans who now don’t get overtime pay WOULD get overtime pay or a large increase in salary. The rules could result in a reduction of overtime pay for employees in some jobs making more than $65,000 a year, but even this is uncertain and the vast majority of hourly employees make far below $65,000 a year and would therefore be unaffected by any change of this sort. But, if you’ve seen the MoveOn.org ad, it’s clearly designed to scare the crap out of the average worker and lead them to believe that George Bush wants to rob them of their overtime pay. But flat-out bald-faced lies are nothing new to MoveOn.org. The whole premise that their organization is founded on is a lie.

They claim they are just an innocent little organization dedicated to as they say “bring ordinary people back into politics.” They claim that “Because MoveOn.org has only a tiny staff, our basic operating costs are very low.”

MoveOn.org’s operating costs are apparently large enough to fund a nationwide television campaign of lies to smear George W. Bush and a political action committee. And apparently George Soros, a liberal billionaire financier who has stated that he would spend all of his billions to defeat George Bush in the next election, is one of those ordinary people the "tiny staff" at MoveOn.org wants to bring back into politics, according to this, from CNN.com:

In November, billionaire philanthropist George Soros and his business partner, Peter Lewis, pledged a $5 million matching grant -- a dollar for every two raised by MoveOn members -- to create a $15 million advertising campaign to defeat President Bush. National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman George Allen responded with an online petition denouncing Soros.

You may recall that MoveOn.org is the group that ran a proposed television ad on their site that compared Bush to Hitler and then denied they sponsored it.

AGAIN I ASK YOU, WHO ARE THE LYING CROOKS?????

If John Kerry wants to talk about lying crooks, he need look no further than himself and his supporters. Democrats lied and engaged in all sorts of crookedness in 2000 in an attempt to get Al Gore elected and they're starting in on it again this campaign season – only far sooner than they did with Gore. That’s why we’ve got to do a better job of getting out there and telling the truth and not letting them get by with their lies. Or this time they may lie themselves right into the White House. But it doesn’t end with the campaign. They’ll be working overtime (something they claim George Bush wants to steal from American workers) to steal the election as they tried and failed to do in 2000. More on that later.