The Sunday talk shows included exaggerated claims from both sides about the debate over automatic spending cuts scheduled to take effect March 1:
Education Secretary Arne Duncan said “as many as 40,000 teachers could lose their jobs.” But that assumes the entire $2.8 billion in looming DOE cuts would come from teacher salaries. Duncan himself testified there would be cuts elsewhere — including cutting “more than 70,000 students from grant and work study programs”
Q: Is it true that this year’s deficit is greater than the total taxable income of Americans earning more than $100,000?
A: No, it’s not true. The statistic comes from a Wall Street Journal editorial, which has been corrected.
Republicans at the Conservative Political Action Conference this past weekend strayed at times from the facts, although for the most part, they stuck to expressing their low opinions of the current administration and its policies. …
Don Benton, a Republican from Washington state who is running for U.S. Senate against Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, is airing a false and misleading ad that says: "Patty Murray voted to use taxpayer money to give Viagra to sex offenders.” The ad goes on to say, “What if I told you your taxpayer dollars are already doing that?”
It ends by urging viewers to “tell Patty Murray that you’re sick of her reckless spending.”
In a graphic on screen,
We tuned in to watch the president’s health care summit at Blair House today — all six-plus hours of it. And we weren’t surprised to hear some factual missteps in the discussion: Sen. Lamar Alexander said premiums will go up for “millions” under the Senate bill and president’s plan, while President Barack Obama said families …