GOP Spin Machine In Action: If You Suffer from Vertigo or Dizziness, Do Not Read
Sorry, NYT, But the GOP Did NOT Pass an Extension to the Payroll Tax Holiday
The New York Times headline and front page blurb look like something out of Bizarro World:
“Defying a veto threat from President Obama, the House passed a bill extending a cut in Social Security payroll taxes, but the Democratic majority in the Senate vowed to reject it.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/14/us/politics/house-passes-extension-of-payroll-tax-cut.html?hp
Read the article, and you discover that House Republicans have voted along party lines to cut unemployment benefits by 40 weeks, fund the Keystone Pipeline, allow states to require drug testing for those receiving benefits, roll back environmental safety rules and cut federal spending for the new Health Care law. Oh, and if they get all this, then they will let middle America keep its payroll tax holiday and they will allow Medicare providers to keep their shirts.
Since most of this crap is unpalatable to Senate Democrats, House Republicans have now set up a fight in which they can claim (on the front page of the New York Times, no less) that they want to extend the payroll tax holiday but Obama wants to veto it.
I can almost hear next weeks campaign slogans: “Democrats want to raise your taxes by $1500 a year.”
WaPo has the same. Front page blurb:
"House passes Republican payroll tax package
snip
White House threatens to veto payroll tax extension"
Someone please show me where Obama has suggested that he is against a payroll tax extension. If you cite the front pages of the NYT and the WaPo, you go to the back of the class.
The article associated with the headline is here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/2chambers/post/house-passes-gop-payroll-tax-package-amid-white-house-veto-threat/2011/12/13/gIQA8ywbsO_blog.html
Note this near the bottom of the article:
"Michael Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), responded Tuesday afternoon that “the White House threatened to veto its top legislative priority for reasons that The Washington Post has reported are entirely fictitious."
Here is the article that calls Obama a liar:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/white-house-budget-spin-on-the-house-gop-payroll-tax-bill/2011/12/12/gIQAuwhrqO_blog.html?hpid=z3
Can their logic get any more convoluted than this? The WaPo accuses Obama of lying about why he plans to veto the payroll tax bill, then Republicans are quoted in the WaPo claiming that Obama is lying about why he plans to veto the payroll tax bill citing the WaPo.
I put that last part in bold, because Obama is not planning to veto the payroll tax bill. He has been demanding for weeks that Congress continue the payroll tax holiday. He is threatening to veto all the crap that the GOP has tacked onto the bill. But, if you are one of those who gets your news by skimming the headlines, you will walk away convinced that the GOP wants to give you $1500 a year and Obama wants to tax you to death...presumably so he can give the money to a bunch of rich (Black) folks who are planning to vacation in Hawaii this year at your expense.
Fox News? Don’t even ask. Huge headline:
House Votes to Extend Payroll Tax Cut
I only bother mentioning this, because misleading headlines like these are the reason so many Americans are now convinced that Obama wants to chainsaw massacre Medicare even though it was House Republicans who voted along party lines last spring to end the program.
Dizzy yet?
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