AP falsely reported Obama called Social Security "the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far"
SUMMARY: AP's Liz Sidoti falsely reported that at his fiscal responsibility summit, President Obama "called the long-term solvency of Social Security 'the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far.' " In fact, Obama made that comment in reference to "the rising cost of health care."
In a February 23 Associated Press article, Liz Sidoti falsely reported that at his fiscal responsibility summit, President Obama "called the long-term solvency of Social Security 'the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far.' " In fact, as blogger Kovie at OpenLeft.com has noted, Obama did not call the long-term solvency of Social Security "the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far"; rather, in delivering the summit's opening remarks, Obama made that comment in reference to "the rising cost of health care":
OBAMA: Now, I want to be very clear: While we are making important progress towards fiscal responsibility this year in this budget, this is just the beginning. In the coming years, we'll be forced to make more tough choices and do much more to address our long-term challenges, from the rising cost of health care that Peter [Orszag, Office of Management and Budget director] described, which is the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far, to the long-term solvency of Social Security.
As Media Matters for America has repeatedly noted, the 2008 Social Security trustees' report forecasts that, in the absence of a change in the law, Social Security will be able to pay full benefits until 2041, after which it will be able to cover 78 percent of currently scheduled benefits, going down to 75 percent through the end of the 75-year period the report's long-range projection covered.
From Sidoti's February 23 AP article:
Urging strict future restraint even as current spending soars, President Barack Obama pledged on Monday to dramatically slash the skyrocketing annual budget deficit as he started to dole out the record $787 billion economic stimulus package he signed last week.
"If we confront this crisis without also confronting the deficits that helped cause it, we risk sinking into another crisis down the road," the president warned, promising to cut the yearly deficit in half by the end of his four-year term. "We cannot simply spend as we please and defer the consequences."
He said he would reinstitute a pay-as-you-go rule that calls for spending reductions to match increases and would shun what he said were the past few years' "casual dishonesty of hiding irresponsible spending with clever accounting tricks." He called the long-term solvency of Social Security "the single most pressing fiscal challenge we face by far" and said reforming health care, including burgeoning entitlement programs, was a huge priority.
Dislexia of the ears, perhaps??????
More like leprosy of the brain.
What ever is this piece of missinformation supposed to do. Besides a further blow at AP's credibility.
C'mon everyone, Health Care, Social Security. Its all the same thing. Don't split hairs. ;)
peebs, but if you look carefully there are common letters associated with those two programs. A,E,R,C,L,T...I can see where they could get them confused. YIKES.
Please, give this reporter a break. She suffers from STD...Stupid Translation Disease. This is common amongst reporters, commentators and rightwing sideshow barkers. And they are growing. The number of reporters that is.
POW, I think I know where STD is originating. Hannity has a segment on his new Colmes-free show called Lib•er•al Trans•lat•or ( I don't know why he has it broken up into syllables like that.The word Translator must have made him think of a dictionary).
It's a brilliant bit of TV. He has video clips of Democrats and other evil doers, and every few seconds, stops the video with a comical screeching tire sound, at which point text appears on the screen explaining what the speaker is really saying.This is usually a list of Hannity's strawmen and paranoid hallucinations.
It ends with that wacky trombone sound that indicated "funny" on tv shows of the 50s to 70s.
Don't watch the guy on TV...However, I wonder why he changed from the Conservative Underground Movement to Conservatism-in-Exile...Something to do with initials I imagine.
Although we tease and bad-mouth these people about being stupid etc., I think they prove that they deserve it. These people, Da Rush etc., are just little, evil people who lie for money. And they badmouth common street-walkers. Lots of nerve to look down at anyone.
Its actually Lib•er•al Trans•la•tion.
But I agree, his libelous text is saved under the grace of the trombone to indicate "sarcasm" or "parody"
Wow...
I think MMFA is missing the bigger picture here...
OBAMA: "Now, I want to be very clear: While we are making important progress towards fiscal responsibility this year in this budget, this is just the beginning."
Welcome to 1984.
Yes, Big Brother Obama and the Democrats borrowing and spending $787 Billion dollars and say they are making progress toward fiscal responsibility.
Gotta love that liberal logic!
You are completely correct. Spending such huge amounts of money is destroying our economy. Even if this money is being spent inside this country it still causes long-term debt. The only worse thing would be to start an unnecessary war and just blow up or lose over a trillion dollars in a country like, say, Iraq.
Oh wait......
Never mind.
http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/obamas-summit-and-myth-republican-fiscal
The last fiscally conservative republican was Ike, per this info.
ewe,
Why would you link to a chart that is out of date. It only goes up to mid 2008? Oama's huge increase in deficit spending is not included. Nice try, but you'll have to do better than that.
The spending in the stimulus will come back the spending by Bush left the country for good. The only President to pay on the princible of the national debt in my life time was Clinton and he was bashed for not giving the surplus back in tax cuts. True fiscal responsibility is lost on the GOP.
Out of date ?? Are you freaking kidding, AA? This is ridiculous even for you. A chart showing trends from 1950 up until 4 or 5 months ago (leaving out Bush's disastrous final months, and Obama's first month in office), and you're going to try to paint this as a deliberate omission in Obama's favor?
Do you have comparable figured from October until today? Do you think those are all calculated? Are you off your rocker?
Your gonna have to wait for the current policies to have an effect before you can say anything cedible about them or even to process the raw data produced. Your complaint makes for typical wingnut logic. Which is to say there is no logic in it. Its just infomation that you don't wish to accept. Any old motheaten excuse will do for you.
You should have included the phrase "I expect you will dispute the chart, but that will only prove my point" in your post. Then AA wouldn't be able to say anything even if there actually was some problem with it.
I think MMFA is missing the bigger picture here...
Pleaseeeee!
YOU couldn't find the "bigger picture" if it sat on YOUR face!
Just imagine IF Republicans HAD handled FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE LAST 8 YEARS!
WE WOULDN'T BE IN THIS MESS IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Can't AFFORD ANY MORE REPUBLICAN INSANITY!
And by the looks of it, AA has a problem getting anyone or anything to sit on his face...
just sayin'....
I like the suggestion that MMfA shouldn't have run this article because you disagree with his definition of fiscal responsibility. As if that has anything to do with Sidoti forwarding false information about what Obama said.
Incidentally, if you're broke and you want to borrow money to get a business running, then that's not fiscally irresponsible. The key is that you use the money as you're supposed to and act in good faith, because the idea is that it will get you back on your feet. The idea that spending money is automatically irresponsible is childlike thinking at best.
AA,
Could you kindly provide an explanation for source of the $5.1 TRILLION in new federal debt during the 8 years of the Bush administration? Was this demonstrative of the GOP principle "fiscal conservatism?" If so, what principle did it demonstrate?
1. That's not what Obama said.
2. Politicians, especially speechy ones like Obama, should stay away from starting multi-phrase, multi-pause, multi-comma'd statements with "Now, I want to be very clear." lol
Trolls, especially screechy ones like dexteritas0071418, should stay away from attempting to understand multi-phrase, multi-pause, multi-comma'd statements begun with words such as "Now, I want to be very clear."
They're just incapable of it.
This would have been avoided if the reporter had just PRINTED OBAMA'S FULL QUOTE. It was succinct and tight and would have fit right into the article.
Look closely at how the media's default position is to give you less information. Even when the paraphrase is as long as the quote, the paraphrase is preferred.
Liz Sidoti has to be one of the worst reporters around. The woman is little more than a stenographer at best, a shameless liar at worst. AP is trying to become the Fox News of wire services.
Not to contradict you, but if Ms. Sidoti was a good stenographer, I've worked with quite a few during patent litigation cases, this would not have been a problem.
I think this is a problem of a editorial mislabeled as reporting.
Perhaps the AP should change their name to "Associated Propaganda?"