GOP Fiction or the Real Barack Obama

by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright Sept 6, 2012
All Rights Reserved.                                         

             Since President Obama was sworn in Jan. 20, 2009, the Republican Party has demonized the nation’s first African American president.  Before he was elected, voters heard a daily diet on right wing radio talk shows about how Barack was an Islamic terrorist, the most left wing Democrat to ever run for president and raised questions about his birth certificate and citizenship.  Forget about the fact that his mother Ann Dunham was an American citizen, born Nov. 29, 1942 in Wichita, Kansas, making Barack a U.S. citizen no matter where his mother gave birth.  Before the 48-year-old president-elect put his left-hand on the bible, the GOP spin machine had already blamed him for the collapse of the U.S. economy.  Before the Democratic National Convention begins in Charlotte, N.C. Sept. 4, the president told USA Today Sept. 3 that the GOP had created “a fictional Barack Obama.”

            Battling hurricane Isaac before the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fl. last week, the Republican story painted the president as an utter failure.  His GOP rival, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, flippantly refers to Barack as well-intentioned but just over his head.  Citing Labor Department reports about the nation’s 8.3% unemployment rate, Romney often promises to add 12 million jobs but won’t say how he’ll pull it off.  He and his 42-yar-old running mate, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, are diehard subscribers to GOP Party boss Grover Norquist’s “No Tax Pledge,” preventing them from raising taxes on even millionaires and billionaires.  Both are Supply Side Economics zealots who believe cutting taxes solve the economy’s economic woes.  Neither Romney nor Ryan gives any specifics how they plan to create 12 million jobs or balance the budget.

            Romney and Ryan rip Barack for creating over 4 million jobs since the economy bottomed out in March 2010.  They complain about July’s 163,000 private sector jobs, insisting they could do better.  They never complain about former President George W. Bush losing over 200,000 jobs a month at the end of his term.  Republicans “have spent a lot of time creating a fictional Barack Obama who is supposedly taking work out of welfare reform, or doesn’t think small businesses built their own businesses,” Barack told USA Today, only scratching the surface of GOP fairytales.  Romney and Ryan find their campaign content on conservative blog-sites and right wing radio talk shows.  They won’t give the president credit for anything, including the successful May 1, 2011 Operation Neptune Spear to get Sept. 11 terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden.  Barack gets no credit from today’s GOP.

            When the DNC convention opens tomorrow, Democrats plan to roll out a different story, including one that talks about the rebirth of the U.S. auto industry.  General Motors, Ford and Chrysler have all thrived since the 2007-08 historic economic collapse that left the nation’s banks broke and their industry near bankruptcy.  Both Romney and Ryan opposed a bailout of Detroit, now humming after Barack rescued them with the Feb. 17, 2009 bailout bill.  Working closely with Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, Obama’s bailout helped keep teachers, police and firefighters employed, while states faced unprecedented deficits.  Since taking office, Wall Street responded positively to Obama’s economic policies, rising from 8,000 when he took office to over 13,000, a nearly 70% increase.  Romney continues to bash Obama’s economic policies without offering any options.

             Obama’s health care overhaul bill, approved by the U.S. Supreme Court June 28, has been so demonized, the opponents could care less about the facts.  It’s become Obama the socialist, against Romney the capitalist, even though Obamacare was fashioned after Romney’s own health care program while governor of Massachusetts.  Romney has been relentless characterizing Barack as a foe of small and big business.  Yet Obama’s health care legislation should save small and large businesses millions of dollars in health care costs.  Obamacare promises to fuel the biggest expansion ever seen in the health care business, creating thousands, if not millions, of new jobs.  “I guess their premise is that the American people will be convinced, if we just get rid of Obama, then somehow that will be enough,” Barack USA Today.  This week’s DNC convention promises to set the record straight.

            Voters need to weigh through pernicious propaganda to know what to do in the voting booth.  When voters listen to biased talk shows, they get a mega-dose of spin, rarely looking at real facts.  Obama promises Charlotte will be “less an introduction to the American people than a conversation with them,” said the president.  He’s got a daunting task of presenting the facts and answering right wing spin that doesn’t match the record.  GOP officials stretch reality to the breaking point when they argue autoworkers are worse off than they were four years ago.  They give independent fact-checkers a field-day when they try to convince voters the nation’s banks and brokerage houses are worse off.  “The American people know me,” said Barack  “They know my strengths.  I’m sure they know my weaknesses—and if they aren’t familiar with them, the other side will be happy to point them out.”

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.  He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com.and author of Dodging the Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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