From the Obama campaign:
As we walk away from the first Presidential debate, one thing should stand out in your mind: Facts matter and Mitt Romney is unwilling to give them to the American people.
While Mitt Romney’s rhetoric may have sounded polished tonight, it just wasn’t true. On issue after issue, Romney avoided giving specifics and, in several instances, told flat-out falsehoods.
· WATCH: President Obama to Romney: Is Your Plan Too Good to Share?http://youtu.be/R1HIwGK8qKQ
“And at some point, I think the American people have to ask themselves, is the reason that Governor Romney is keeping all these plans to replace secret because they're too good? Is it — is it because that somehow middle-class families are going to benefit too much from them?”
· WATCH: Romney Won't Support Own Tax Plan: http://youtu.be/yXgG5z53VNw
“I will not reduce the share paid by high income individuals. I know that you and your running mate keep saying that and I know it’s a popular thing to say with a lot of people but it’s not the case.”
· WATCH: President Obama on Romney's Medicare Plan http://youtu.be/SBPshz7nFug
Some key quotes:
· President Obama: “Under Governor Romney's definition, there are a whole bunch of millionaires and billionaires who are small businesses. Donald Trump is a small business. Now, I know Donald Trump doesn't like to think of himself as small anything, but — but that's how you define small businesses if you're getting business income.”
· Governor Romney lies about pre-existing conditions: “And with regards to health care, you had remarkable details with regards to my pre-existing condition plan. You obviously studied up on – on my plan. In fact, I do have a plan that deals with people with pre-existing conditions. That's part of my health care plan.”
· (PS – No it isn’t: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/10/top-romney-adviser-states-will-have-to-cover-people-with-pre-existing-conditions-under-president-rom.php )
· President Obama on Oil Subsidies: “The oil industry gets $4 billion a year in corporate welfare.Basically, they get deductions that those small businesses that Governor Romney refers to, they don't get. Now, does anybody think that ExxonMobil needs some extra money, when they're making money every time you go to the pump? Why wouldn't we want to eliminate that? Why wouldn't we eliminate tax breaks for corporate jets? My attitude is, if you got a corporate jet, you can probably afford to pay full freight, not get a special break for it.”
· President Obama on Wall Street Reform: “Does anybody out there think that the big problem we had is that there was too much oversight and regulation of Wall Street? Because if you do, then Governor Romney is your candidate. But that's not what I believe.”
From the Pundits:
· Gergen on CNN: President Obama Surprised Romney Was Lying:http://youtu.be/xcwgDULlQB0
· Andrea Mitchell: Romney Won't Say How He Would Pay For Tax Plan:http://youtu.be/2D-CmcfL3_Q
· CNBC Fact Check: Romney Won't Say How He Would Pay For Tax Cuts:http://youtu.be/ZRE7xSBfnbU
· Rana Foroohar: We Still Don't Know What Tax Loopholes Romney Would Close:http://youtu.be/3eP9vQGepfU
· Annie Lowrey: Romney Hasn’t Given Us Specifics That Would Allow Us to Do the Math:http://youtu.be/Z9e6ko5CF_4
Romney's lying reached new heights as he tried to appeal to moderates and undecided voters. He also unveiled his great cost-saving plan: to eliminate PBS and Big Bird.
· WATCH: Romney: I'll Get Rid of PBS Subsidy http://youtu.be/Iuk2wVejqgU
“I'm sorry, Jim, I'm going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I'm going to stop other things. I like PBS, I love Big Bird. Actually like you, too. But I'm not going to — I'm not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for. That's number one.”
The Internet Responds to Mitt Romney’s Plan to Cut Big Bird:
· http://boldprogressives.org/romney-corporate-tax-cuts-public-broadcasting/
· https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151249290881942&set=p.10151249290881942&type=1&theater
· http://savebigbird.tumblr.com/
· https://twitter.com/BigBirdRomney
We fact check Mitt Romney:
FACT CHECK: Romney Has No Health Care Plan, Would Leave Tens of Millions Without Coverage And Expose Them To Insurance Company Abuse Mitt Romneytonight promised to repeal Obamacare, but he hasn’t laid out a single specific idea to protect millions of Americans who now have coverage under the law. That’s because the truth about what he’d do would be devastating for middle class families. If he has his way, insurance companies would once again be allowed to discriminate against Americans with pre-existing conditions, charge women higher premiums than they charge men for the same coverage, and kick kids off their parents' plans when they graduate from college or high school.
FACT CHECK: Romney Would End Medicare As We Know It And Turn It Into A Voucher Program. Mitt Romney just repeated the false claim that the President made $716 billion in cuts to Medicare and has no plan to protect the program. The AARP endorsed Obamacare because it extended the life of the program by nearly a decade by reducing unnecessary insurance company subsidies and rooting out waste and fraud. Mitt Romney’s plan would bankrupt Medicare by 2016, turn the program into a voucher system, and could increase costs for seniors by morethan $6,000 a year – based on an analysis of his current plan. In fact, the savings Romney just decried were included in his running mate’s budget, which Romney called “marvelous” and promised to sign into law.http://OFA.BO/FtDiK5
FACT CHECK: Romney Would Slash Investments in K-12, Make Deep Cuts To Pell Grants: Mitt Romney just said he doesn’t want to cut education, but his plan would slash investments in K-12 education and make deep cuts to Pell Grants. If applied across the board, the Romney-Ryan budget could eliminate 65,000 educator jobs and cut Pell Grants by $1,000 for 10 million students.
FACT CHECK: Romney Was Not Bipartisan In MA: While MittRomney said that he worked effectively across the aisle as the governor of Massachusetts, the facts tell a different story. As Governor, Romney was more interested in running for President and picking fights than building governing coalitions. His doors were closed to lawmakers and Massachusetts legislators have panned his tenure as Governor. http://OFA.BO/7enzkh
FACT CHECK: Romney Has Long Record of Supporting Outsourcing, President Obama Supports Insourcing: Mitt Romney has a long record of outsourcing and would promote it as president. As independent news reports have highlighted, Mitt Romney invested in companies that were pioneers of outsourcing and as governor, he helped ship Massachusetts jobs to India. But Mitt Romney would promote outsourcing by eliminating corporations’ taxes on overseas profits, which could create 800,000 jobs overseas in countries like China, India, and Mexico. President Obama has a jobs plan that would close corporate loopholes and eliminate tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas, and instead reward companies that create more jobs here at home.http://OFA.BO/XyxjYo
FACT CHECK: President Obama Has A Plan To Reduce The Deficit In a Balanced Way, Romney Would Raise Middle Class Taxes Or Explode The Deficit: Mitt Romney has no credibility when it comes to reducing the deficit.The truth is that President Obama has already signed $1 trillion of deficit reduction into law as part of a plan to reduce the deficit by more than $4 trillion while asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share and investing in an economy built to last. Romney refuses to ask for a penny more from the wealthy – even pledging to reject a deal including 10 dollars in spending cuts for every 1dollar of new revenue – and would have to raise middle class taxes or explode the deficit in order to pay for his $250,000 tax cuts for multi-millionaires and increased defense spending. http://OFA.BO/YTZkMq
FACT CHECK: Romney’s 5 Point Plan Would Not Create Jobs: In tonight’s debate, Mitt Romney cited his 5 point economic plan and said that it would help create jobs. But independent economists have said that Romney’s budget plan could slow the economic recovery and eliminate jobs, while his 5 pointplan doesn’t add up.http://OFA.BO/zJ4RKZ
FACT CHECK: Romney’s Energy Plan Is Written By Big Oil for Big Oil, And Can’t Get Us To Energy Independence He Promises: Despite Mitt Romney’s claims that his plan would make North America energy independent, the truth is that Romney’s energy plan was written by Big Oil, focuses principally on oil drilling, and would maintain $4 billion in subsidies for Romney’s Big Oil friends, while not getting us to the energy independence he promises. He cannot achieve energy independence by 2020 while opposing President Obama’s fuel efficiency standards and other clean energy investments. Mitt Romney would walk away from the critical investments in renewable and incentives – like the wind production tax credit – that have helped make us, under President Obama’s leadership, the least dependent on foreign oil that we’ve been in 20 years, and will help get us to cut our net oil imports in half by 2020. http://OFA.BO/z7HL34
FACT CHECK: Romney Would Let Wall Street Write Its Own Rules Again. Mitt Romney repeated tonight that he would repeal Wall Street reform, allowing Wall Street to return to the risky financial deals that eroded middle-class security, destroyed trillions of dollars of wealth, and cost millions of workers their jobs. And he has no plan to replace it. The Wall Street reform that President Obama championed ensures that we end taxpayer-funded bailouts of the financial sector and protects the middle class from the risky financial deals that crashed our economy in the first place. And it does so while supporting community banks – putting them on a more level playing field with Wall Street. http://OFA.BO/u8fPGS
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