As is usually the case with Republican’ts these days, most of what Eric Can’tor says here is “on message” lying blather Republican talking points about how the “stimulus” has failed to create jobs. Whether that’s true or not, it’s hard to say, but for its part, the Obama administration says the stimulus saved or created 3.6 million jobs. My guess is the correct answer is somewhere in between Can’tor’s “zero” and the White House’s “3.6 million.”
Anyway, whether or not the stimulus worked or not wasn’t Ryan Nobles’ question. Instead, his question was what role the stimulus played in Virginia’s budget situation. The answer: “last year I think the state received somewhere around $3 billion of stimulus monies.” That’s right, $3 billion with a “b.” What was Virginia’s budget “surplus” – not counting robbing state pension funds and “restoring nearly $1 billion in state aid to localities cut from the budget, forcing cities and counties statewide to either raise local taxes, to curtail some services or begin charging fees for them” – again? That’s right, just $404 million (“million” with an “m” not a “b”). So, quick math: $404 million minus $1 billion equals a budget deficit of $596 million without the stimulus money, and an even worse deficit without shafting the VRS, state employees and Virginia localities. This is more than “smoke and mirrors” on steroids, it’s complete dishonesty, falsehood, duplicity, and any other synonym you can think of for “lying.” I guess they didn’t teach Bob McDonnell morality and ethics at good ol’ Pat Robertson’s university.
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