Swing and a Miss

At the beginning of his remarks earlier this week at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Mitt Romney delivered a futile stab at humor: "I spent the weekend in Vancouver. As always, the Olympic Games were inspiring. But in case you didn’t hear the late breaking news, the gold medal in the downhill was taken away from American Lindsey Vonn. It was determined that President Obama is going downhill faster than she is." Romney's attempt at a joke may have actually even been slightly amusing to supporters of President Obama if the rest of his speech didn't contain numerous inaccuracies and a baseless defense of the Bush "legacy". The following is a list of other ridiculous excerpts from Romney's speech:

• "[President Obama] himself promised change of biblical proportion. And given his filibuster proof Senate and lopsided House, he had everything he needed to deliver it." -- Even before Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) won the special election in January, the Democrats only held fifty-eight seats in the Senate. Yes, two other seats were held by Independents, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), but we all know which side of the aisle Lieberman truly supports.
• "Remember the B+ grade [President Obama] gave himself for his first year? Tell that to the four million Americans who lost their jobs last year and to the millions more who stopped looking." -- Let's not forget that President Obama inherited an economy in the midst of a recession, an economy which suffered 2.6 million job losses in 2008.
• Romney complained about "the absence of any meaningful sanctions against Iran even as it funds terror and races to become a nuclear nation". -- Last year President Obama extended the sanctions against Iran which had been established in 1995. And then just a few days before Romney's speech, Obama announced that his administration, in conjunction with international officials, will be "developing a significant regime of sanctions".
• "President Obama’s self-proclaimed B+ will go down in history as the biggest exaggeration since Al Gore’s invention of the Internet!" -- It is utterly amazing to me that Republicans still resort to the Al Gore/Internet reference after all this time. However, as many people (including yours truly) have reported, much more knowledgeable individuals disagree with Romney's stance on Gore's role in this area. This is clearly evident by the following quotes from Internet pioneers Vinton Cerf and Robert Kahn: "Al Gore was the first political leader to recognize the importance of the Internet and to promote and support its development...The fact of the matter is that Gore was talking about and promoting the Internet long before most people were listening...As far back as the 1970s, Gore promoted the idea of high speed telecommunications as an engine for both economic growth and the improvement of our educational system...As a Senator in the 1980s, Gore urged government agencies to consolidate what at the time were several dozen different and unconnected networks into an 'Interagency Network'...The Gore sponsored High Performance Computing and Communications Act in 1991 supported the National Research and Education Network (NREN) initiative, which became one of the major vehicles for the spread of the Internet beyond the field of computer science...Gore provided much needed political support for the speedy privatization of the Internet when the time arrived for it to become a commercially driven operation...No one in public life has been more intellectually engaged in helping to create the climate for a thriving Internet than the [former] Vice President...The [former] Vice President deserves credit for his early recognition of the value of high speed computing and communication and for his long term and consistent articulation of the potential value of the Internet to American citizens and industry and, indeed, to the rest of the world."
• "As Everett Dirksen used to say, 'When they felt the heat, they saw the light'." -- Nice try, Mitt. Actually former Sen. Dirksen (R-IL) was frequently quoted as saying "When I feel the heat, I see the light".
• "My party should never be a rubber stamp for rubber check spending." -- Figures from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office show that Bush was actually the largest spender since President Lyndon Johnson and that his spending increases were far larger than the three previous Presidents.
• "We conservatives don’t have a corner on saying no; we’re just the ones who say it when that’s the right thing to do!" -- Earlier this month, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) placed a blanket hold on at least seventy nominations President Obama sent to the Senate until two lucrative programs were approved, sending more than $40 billion in taxpayer dollars to his home state.
• "I am convinced that history will judge President Bush far more kindly. He pulled us from a deepening recession following the attack of 9/11, he overcame teachers unions to test school children and evaluate schools, he took down the Taliban, waged a war against the jihadists and was not afraid to call it what it is - a war - and he kept us safe." -- Yes, the recession following 9/11 (which Mr. Bush did nothing to stop despite the intelligence he received) did end during his administration. However, the most recent recession started while he was in the White House due to his lack of action. His No Child Left Behind Act has been widely criticized for multiple reasons, including a system of incentives and penalties which motivates schools, districts and states to manipulate test results. As far as the Taliban is concerned, the Islamist movement continued its resurgence in both Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2009. In fact, the Taliban was blamed for the violence prior to August's presidential election in Afghanistan. And although Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, a top commander in the Taliban, was arrested this week, terrorism and insurgency experts believe that Baradar's capture will only have a short term effect because the Taliban has proven itself to be "a resilient organization". And "he kept us safe"? See my comment above regarding 9/11.
• "I also respect the loyalty and indefatigable defense of truth that comes from our 'I don’t give a damn' Vice President Dick Cheney!" -- Does this truth include Mr. Cheney's cowardly and irresponsible claims that Richard Clarke, the chief counterterrorism advisor for Mr. Bush, was responsible for 9/11?
• "Ronald Reagan used to say this about liberals: 'It’s not that they’re ignorant, it’s that what they know is wrong'." -- Wrong again, Mitt. What President Reagan said was this: "The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so."
• "Conservatism has had, from its inception, a vigorously positive, intellectually rigorous agenda. That agenda should have three pillars: strengthen the economy, strengthen our security and strengthen our families." -- Unless your family contains a homosexual couple.