Mike Pence Caught Making Up Health Care Numbers On MSNBC (VIDEO)

Yesterday, on MSNBC, Republican Conference Chairman Rep. Mike Pence (Ind.) went on the air with Carlos Watson to discuss the House's health care reform bill. Pence used the occasion to do what he's done in the past: straight up make stuff up! On this occasion, Pence attempted to peddle some phony CBO figures:

PENCE: We don't need this administration and House Democrats, even with the changes that have been negotiated in their deal, are intent on doing, and that is launching a massive, new, government-run insurance plan that will [mean] literally nearly a trillion dollars in higher taxes at the outset...

Watson jumped on the remark rather quickly, saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa ... unless you're looking at different data than I'm looking at, I don't remember there being a trillion dollars in new taxes." Asked to clarify his statement, Pence averred, "Yeah, I'm rounding up," later offering a $800 billion price tag.

This is an awesome and magical job of rounding up he's doing! Via ThinkProgress:

In fact, the CBO's preliminary estimate of the House bill said that its entire cost would be just over $1 trillion over 10 years. $540 billion of that (i.e. not $800 billion or $1 trillion) would be paid for with new taxes on the rich affecting just 1.2 percent of U.S. households. The rest of the bill would be fully offset by savings in Medicare and other health systems.

So, Pence "rounds up" $540 billion to $1 trillion -- or maybe $800 billion? That's a wonderfully precise way of looking at the numbers! By that logic, the House need only find a way to drop that $540 billion line item by fifty billion or so ... Mike Pence would be forced to round the cost down to nothing!

Of course, the greater feat of magical mathematics is the way Pence takes the 1.2 percent of U.S. households that will be affected by the proposed surtax and, by implication, rounds it all the way up to "everybody."

[WATCH]

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Comments

[mimigrammy]

09:29 AM on 08/03/2009

Pence was at it again while being interviewed on the Sunday Fox show. This guy is so null of substance that can't answer his own questions much less someone elses. Even the interviewer from Fox had him stumped, and Pence is the best the Republican's can throw out there. PATHETIC!

[joceeco]

06:51 AM on 08/03/2009

Nice job Carlos! More folks in the media should offer a challenge to the lie the GOP tells.

[Poorsarah]

09:16 PM on 08/02/2009

One of the many valid reasons I decided to become a progressive Democrat. The GOP, Fox News, Limbaugh, and the likes of them, are masters of misinformation, lies, half-truths, hypocrisies.
The "party of family values/rule of law/integrity"??? Sorry, GOP, but your actions speak oppositely of your words.

[JRGris]

06:39 PM on 08/02/2009

As ex President once said "fool me once shame on errrr................................

[Clare53]

06:35 PM on 08/02/2009

What a knucklehead.

[manicore]

05:54 PM on 08/02/2009

If there is a Line of Bullshit to Sell to the Media Odds are that the Republicans will be the Culprits.
The Party of Just say NO!

[UncleJimbo]

05:11 PM on 08/02/2009

Makin' Stuff Up? WWSS.....What Would Sarah Say!?

[Budokan]

04:26 PM on 08/02/2009

Huh. A Ratpig RepubliKan lying again. THAT's news. *sarcasm drips like ice*

http://kennethmarkhoover.com

[CTtransplant]

02:22 PM on 08/02/2009

I don't know if the rest of you are as fed up as I am with the obstruction and political game playing going on with this health care reform...but I DO know this - the Republican obstructionists and the Blue Dog Dems have absolutely NO clue what the rest of us are going through with healthcare. Maybe it's time they did!

If you agree, please sign the petition below, and forward it - any way you can - to anyone and everyone you know! Time to let them know how we feel!!!!

http://www.petitiononline.com/PubOp676/petition.html

[HLL]

02:30 PM on 08/02/2009

Thank you. I signed it.

[Lisamiamoore]

04:18 PM on 08/02/2009

thank you, signed and up on twitter.

[jackthecommentor]

02:22 PM on 08/02/2009

Don't these people who run for office take an oath to their constituants to be truthful, and to look out for their best interests? What sort of people vote for liars who only serve to make themselves and their families better off? This guy should have to go before a review board that sends him home to apologize to the folks that he has lied to and left out in the cold. How long are we as a nation going to be able to survive in an invironment where our elected officials are allowed to lie, cheat, steal, and take oaths that they have no intention of living up to[with impunity]? We as voters better start demanding a better class of folks to elect into office or we are going to bring about our countries demise, and will only be able to blame ourselves.

[HLL]

02:02 PM on 08/02/2009

You mean - gasp - the GOP are lying about Health Care? What a shocker.

It would be truly amazing if they told the truth - about anything.

[lagumbo]

02:01 PM on 08/02/2009

This is what Pence and the GOP does, lies, lies, and more lies. You would think the people of their states would look at this and say, if they tell lies about something as important as health care, what else would they lie about. People this is who you voted in office. Liars, who doesn't give a damn about you, just about them, their family, and the insurance companies. People we need to wake up.

[thisisntme]

12:56 PM on 08/02/2009

Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies.

[onenation]

11:27 AM on 08/02/2009

So who does Faux News have on their Sunday morning show? Mike Pence! Slithering through the lies and near-lies with Chris Wallace playing his enabler role.
Two minutes and I had it. Barf. Wallace has done better in the past, and Charles Wrangle got a credible shot, but Pence got the Paid Political Advertisement treatment, unchalanged lies and all..

[graceland9]

05:46 PM on 08/02/2009

Major kudos for surviving two minutes. I can't take two seconds of that channel.

[ubuntu]

09:08 AM on 08/02/2009

The only thing more repug..nant and nar..cissistic than a pol..i..tician...is a tv talk..ing head.