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Earlier this month, Glenn Kessler, whose Washington Post column is whimsically called “the Fact Checker,” grudgingly acknowledged hat Hillary Clinton never had any classified emails on her server — although he did crankily accuse her of hair-splitting that she hadn’t done. We figured it wouldn’t take very long for Kessler to atone for that, and by golly, here he is with a new column (free gift linky) giving Sen. Patty Murray (D-Washington) ALL THE PINOCCHIOS for a tweet in which she promised to protect Social Security and Medicare from privatization. Shame on her!
To be sure, Murray’s offense was truly grave. On Sunday, she tweeted thusly:
Republicans plan to end Social Security and Medicare if they take back the Senate.
Washington seniors who have spent their lives paying into these programs deserve better—and I’ll keep fighting to make sure they get it.
Kessler was quick to swat down Murray’s untruth, pointing out that, at the moment, Republicans don’t actually have a formal plan to end either program, so Murray is four-alarum lying! Heck, he could have gone farther and said that Republicans haven’t had any actual plans to do virtually any governing for years, because trolling is so much more satisfying than policy.
Kessler explains that Murray is engaging in one of those scurrilous campaign tactics that jaded experts like him call
“Mediscare” attacks — an effort to warn seniors that Republicans will take away their hard-earned benefits.
Then he reassures seniors not to worry, since “There is no such plan.”
That’s an arguable claim all its own. It depends on how you define “plan.” There is definitely not a policy document signed by all Republicans stating “we will end Social Security and Medicare.” But there’s a long history of Republican calls to privatize or limit Medicare and Social Security, including multiple examples from candidates on the ballot this year.
Read More:
WaPo Fact Checker Gives Hillary Clinton Emails Tweet Four Opposite-Pinocchio Un-Lies!
Republicans Just Can’t Stop Sticking Dicks In ‘Privatize Social Security’ Light Socket
Kessler isn’t content to stop there. He’s absolutely determined to prove that Murray is viciously giving the truth an atomic wedgie, a swirly, and a purple nurple at the same time, so he offers this weirdly selective history of the programs to suggest that Democrats have simply made up the very notion that Republicans are hostile to Social Security and Medicare:
When Social Security was established in 1935, most Republican lawmakers supported it — but more Republicans than Democrats opposed it. When Medicare was created in 1965, slightly more Republicans opposed the new program than supported it, in contrast to the broad support among Democrats.
Decades later, Democrats have never let Republicans forget this history. In campaign attacks, Democrats often conjure up nonexistent plans by Republicans to terminate or somehow undermine the programs.
It wasn’t just the initial votes on the programs, dude. There’s a long history of GOP rhetoric decrying both programs as the first steps toward socialist tyranny. You might recall Ronald Reagan’s infamous 1961 gramophone recording opposing the proposal for Medicare, in which he said it would inevitably lead to communist dictatorship and the end of American freedom.
Kessler also dismisses the very real history of actual GOP proposals to phase out or privatize both programs — like George W. Bush’s failed plan to shift much of the funding base for Social Security from taxpayers to the stock market. But look at how sneakily Kessler does it, by suggesting that even that wasn’t really a “plan” because it never had much support.
In 2014, for instance, House Democrats falsely accused then-congressional candidate Martha McSally of wanting to “privatize” Social Security, even though a more modest version of the idea by President George W. Bush years before could not even get a committee vote when Republicans controlled both houses of Congress.
If you follow the link to Kessler’s McSally column, you learn that she did indeed talk about changing the program so that new retirees would have a higher retirement age, and suggested putting Social Security funding into market investments — but it was never formalized as a “plan.” And while Bush very definitely proposed legislation, it never got a hearing either, so magically it wasn’t a “plan” either, ta-daa.
As for Murray’s statement, it’s fairly clear she’s referring to two things: 1) the proposal by Sen. Rick Scott (R Florida), who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, to “sunset” all federal laws every five years, leaving the continued existence of Social Security and Medicare up to a regular vote; and B) Sen. Ron Johnson’s call to go one worse and put funding for all federal programs up to a vote every single year. No big! If you have Social Security this year, you only need to worry the funding vote might fail next year, enjoy your retirement.
Gosh, those sure do sound like Republican plans to put both programs on the chopping block on the regular. But Kessler explains that since Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell categorically nixed both proposals, they are not “Republican plans,” and besides, both senators deny they want to end Social Security and Medicare, so Murray is lying, full stop. Here’s his verdict declaring Murray a Four-Pinocchio untruther:
Murray tweeted that if Senate Republicans win control of the Senate, they plan to end Social Security and Medicare.
But as evidence, her staff can only point to statements by a pair of Senate Republicans that have earned little support among their colleagues. The presumptive Senate Republican leader explicitly rejected the idea. Moreover, in both cases, the senators insisted that they were not trying to eliminate the programs but instead bolster their financial underpinnings. Whether such actions would reduce benefits is open to debate, but it’s not the same as ending the programs.
He notes that Murray “would have been on more solid ground” if she’d named Scott and/or Johnson and discussed their plans, which are not Republican plans, silly. None of that wimpy Politifact-style “partly true” pabulum for Glenn Kessler, because Patty Murray set Pinocchio’s pants on fire with malice aforethought.
This is yet another example in which Democrats strain to conjure up a nonexistent GOP plan regarding Social Security and Medicare. Murray earns Four Pinocchios.
You know, we’re thinking that maybe the column’s name should be changed from the “Fact Checker” to the “Explainer-Awayer”
[WaPo (gift link) / Intercept]
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