Q: Is it true that persons older than 59 can’t get heart surgery in England?
A: There’s no such prohibition on heart operations in England, as a chain e-mail claims.
Person: Barack Obama
Same Inaccurate Claim on Oil Imports
In a July 6 interview with Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta, President Obama repeated his false claim that the U.S. “import[s] more oil today than ever before.” When Obama first said this in February during an address to a joint-session of Congress, we wrote that the president had gotten his facts wrong. We said then that oil imports peaked in 2005 and have “substantially” declined since.
That’s still the case. This chart from the U.S. Energy Information Administration,
More Unemployment Blues
If you’re the glass-half-full type, you might think it’s good news that the nation’s unemployment rate was largely unchanged from May to June. It crept up just 0.1 percentage points to 9.5 percent. But that also means that the original projections from President Obama’s economic advisers on what would happen with and without the stimulus plan are still off — and significantly so.
In mid-June, we wrote about the large discrepancy between the jobs that actually have been lost and what administration economists had predicted in January.
The Long-Term View
As part of his ongoing health-care-overhaul tour, President Barack Obama held a town hall event July 1 in Annandale, Va. Among the president’s messages: Medicare and Medicaid spending are getting out of control. And he’s right.
Obama said: “And for those who rightly worry about deficits, the amount our government spends on Medicare and Medicaid will eventually grow larger than what our government spends today on everything else combined,” adding that a recent Congressional Budget Office study showed that “when you look at the rising costs of entitlement,
Veteran Visit
Q: Was Obama rude to wounded veterans during a visit to the National Naval Medical Center?
A: A chain e-mail that makes such a claim gets several facts wrong and is disputed by an official who was present at the meeting.
Campaigning on Single Payer?
On “Meet the Press” on June 28, former presidential candidate and Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney falsely claimed that President Obama had called for a “single-payer” health care system on the campaign trail:
Romney: President Obama, when he was campaigning, said he wanted a single-payer system.
We debunked this falsehood when Sen. John McCain said it during the third presidential debate. McCain claimed that “as he said, his object is a single payer system.” But as a presidential candidate,
Pushing for a Public Plan
Liberal groups have hit TV and radio with ads praising the idea of a public health insurance plan, an option that President Obama and other Democrats support as part of changes to the health care system. But the ads lack context and could well mislead the public: A TV ad …
500 Percent Ammo Tax?
Q: Is Obama planning to increase the federal tax on gun ammunition by 500 percent?
A: No such proposal has been made by the Obama administration. And nobody in Congress has introduced any bill to increase the 11 percent federal excise tax on ammo.
Reviewing Polls
Earlier this week we wrote about a television ad from Americans United for Change and found it to be misleading. The ad claimed that "a new poll shows that 62 percent of Americans support" President Obama’s "plan to reform health care." Americans United for Change disagreed with our analysis and Deputy Communications Director Lauren Weiner sent us an e-mail to say:
Weiner: Our "62%" ad is based on the Diageo/Hotline poll which asked voters if they supported Congress and the President enacting major overhaul of health care.
Third term for Obama?
Q: Is there a move to make Obama eligible for more than two terms as president?
A: A bill that proposes repealing the 22nd Amendment has been introduced, but so far it has very little support.