Can You Handle The Truth?

By Dale Bowling

The last job report before the general election is in and the numbers show more evidence that
economic growth is gathering steam. The economy added 171,000 jobs last month - the private sector creating 184,000 jobs with cuts in government spending leading to 13,000 lost public sector jobs.
Unemployment remains under 8%.

Along with last month's job report that showed increased hiring as well as signs in the housing sector that things are picking up, this signals good news for the economy.

Unless you listen to Republicans.

According Republicans this is terrible and if we just put them back in charge, the economy would be
back to what it was under George W. Bush in no time.

Just so you know this is not a good thing, but Republicans think it is.

Most of us, most of the time look at the results of something to decide whether or not it's a good thing.

Not Republicans. They look to whether the results help or hurt their case and decide on their truth that way.

This explains why Congressional Republicans successfully silenced a report by the non-partisan,
Congressional Research Service that showed that tax cuts for top earners fuel income inequality, but
not economic growth. Despite the fact, that these are professional number crunchers in a non-partisan
office, the results didn't match Republican Articles of Faith about tax cuts for the wealthy and it was
suppressed by Republicans.

Respect for the truth wherever it takes you is not the Republican way of doing things. The laundry list
of deceptions that they represent as true, even in the presence of ample evidence to the contrary, is
overwhelming.

I am reminded of the Romney staffer who said they were not going to be dominated by fact-checkers.
This is one position that Romney hasn't switched sides on.

The Romney campaign continues to insist that Obama weakened welfare to work requirements. That
was a lie. Some states had requested flexibility on some of the welfare requirements and this was
granted by the White House. Usually Republicans like it when federal regulations are flexible. Not this time.

They say that part of the Obama auto bailout shipped some Jeep jobs to China. Not true says the Auto
Industry. There were already Jeep plants in China and those have increased production to meet
demand in China. The Jeep plants near Toledo didn't lose any jobs as a result of that. This has been
proven over and over again and the Romney campaign just keeps repeating this lie as if no fact
checkers have spoken.

Truth about climate change? Do you even have to ask?

What about the truth about which loopholes and deductions are going to make the Romney budget and tax plan work? No matter how many times we ask for the math, we go home empty-handed.

Above all, what Americans deserve from public officials is to hear the entire story about what's
happening in their country and detailed plans to fix any problems so they can make informed choices.
Republicans say you can't handle the truth.

Truth is, America is clawing its way out of the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression with very little help from Republican lawmakers. They're big on creating financial crises, but not so good at cleaning them up.

We need responsible Grown-ups in charge of Government. The ones who say that this is going to be
tough, sometimes expensive and never universally popular, but we can do it because when the
American people work together nothing is beyond its ability.

VOTE DEMOCRAT on NOV. 6!