Despite the fact that Mitt Romney's campaign did some "selective editing" with a speech President Obama made last week to make it sound like he said something he didn't, and despite the fact that it has been debunked, fact-checked and discussed widely, there are still some members of the traditional media who insist on calling the President's remarks a "gaffe." Just this morning, I saw someone Tweet it again as a "gaffe."
No, it wasn't a "gaffe." It was the Romney campaign editing out parts of what the President actually said in order to twist the facts.
Because those members of media are being lazy with the facts surrounding the "didn't build that" narrative parroted by Romney and subsequently the Republican party, here are the facts again.
Below is what President Obama ACTUALLY said:
President Obama was NOT demeaning business owners nor their success. Mitt Romney edited the audio, then distorted it. Romney also went on to say nearly the same thing President Obama said in his actual speech before Romney twisted his words. You can see that here:
Greg Sargent over at The Plum Line does a great job explaining why the Romney campaign was so quick to distort and exploit President Obama's views. As he puts it:
As it happens, mainstream economic consensus is closer to Obama than to Romney on the broader questions here. Many economists believe the stimulus worked (albeit not as well as we’d like); that tax cuts for the wealthy won’t magically create enough growth to pay for themselves; that more spending now would indeed create jobs; and that more austerity now could make things worse. The public’s views on these matters are not nearly as clear cut. But on the question of the relationship between government spending and job creation, Romney’s positions are at odds with mainstream economic opinion. “The debate in Washington has become completely unmoored from this consensus,” Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers write today. “Republicans have pushed their representatives to adopt positions that are at odds with the best of modern economic thinking. “
Romney does not have a plan to fix the short term crisis, in the sense that he’d be proposing exactly the same things if the economy were doing great. But the politics of the presidential race are such that Romney needs to promise that electing him would fix the crisis. To make this case, he has to sell the American people on the idea that government — and Obama’s hostility towards individual initiative and American free enterprise — are to blame for holding back the recovery, and that shoving both of those things “out of the way” will reignite the economy. That’s why Romney continues to falsely claim that stimulus spending only succeeded in growing government and didn’t help the private sector at all. That’s why he continues to falsely claim that Obama “demeans success.” That’s why he continues to falsely claim that Obama thinks only government, and not individual initiative, creates jobs — and that this is why you’re suffering.
These ideas are essential to Romney’s entire argument. Without them, he doesn’t have one.
Sargent has written more on this and it's well worth taking the time to read all of it. If you know people who aren't aware of exactly what Romney and the Republicans are doing, or who don't have the time to stay up on the real facts, pass this along. Because Romney and Republicans are counting on voters to take what they say at face value regardless of the facts, and they continue to distort President Obama's words even after being called out for it.
As usual, some in the media are joining in and helping the Romney campaign out instead of giving voters the real facts. But make no mistake, this is no "gaffe" on President Obama's part. It's more than just words taken out of context. It's essentially editing and twisting the President's words in order to fit him into the fantasy world of a President the Republicans want the public to believe that doesn't actually exist.
