Eight GOP Politicians Parrot False $1,761 Talking Point on Costs of Climate Bill

I mentioned last week that both CBS and Politico were forced to issue corrections on pieces they published citing inflated cost-estimates of a version of climate legislation that was never considered by Congress.

Despite immediate and forceful pushback from the Treasury Department, the Congressional Budget Office and environmental groups, solid reporting by the Wonk Room and the Washington Post, and thorough debunkings by Media Matters and Politifact, several leading GOP elected officials have begun citing the highly misleading figure.

Brad Johnson has an important piece at Think Progress documenting the process conservatives used to disseminate this misleading talking point:

STEP ONE: "News" generated by right-wing think tank.

STEP TWO: Right-wing print journalists write "breaking news" story.

STEP THREE: Promoted by Drudge, story repeated endlessly on right-wing blogs, Twitter, and talk radio.

STEP FOUR: Republican politicians, right-wing think tanks, and polluter front groups release statements of shock and outrage.

STEP FIVE: On Fox News, Glenn Beck calls President Obama a liar/socialist/Marxist/communist/fascist/racist.

Reading Brad's meticulous documentation of how this meme was disseminated, I realized that they are setting this up to be one of the major talking points in the fight against clean energy legislation in the months to come. From the looks of things, marching orders have already gone out. Eight Republican elected officials, several of whom are in leadership positions, have already begun parroting this talking point:

• Senator Lamar Alexander issued a press release saying "American families can't afford a new $1,761 yearly energy tax."


• Senator James Inhofe issued a press release claiming that "the President's own economic team said his cap-and-trade proposal would cost each family $1,761 per year."


• Senator Lisa Murkowski issued a press release stating that "At the upper end of the administration's estimate, the cost per American household would be $1,761 a year, on top of what they already pay in taxes to the government."


• 2008 also-ran Mitt Romney told the crowd at the conservative Value Voters Summit on Saturday that the clean energy legislation "would cost the average American family $1,761 a year, the equivalent to a 15% income tax hike."


• Representative Roy Blunt tweeted: "CBS reports the Obama Admin privately concluded cap & trade could cost families $1,761 a year. Same as a 15% personal income tax increase."


• Representative Fred Upton fired off a letter, which cites the $1700 figure, accusing the Treasury Department of censoring information in the FOIA release.


• House Minority Leader John Boehner said on PBS' NewsHour: "It's a cap-and-trade proposal that came through the House that we now find out from the Treasury Department would cost each American family over $1,700 per year."


• House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence copied-and-pasted the wholly discredited CBS blog post where the $1,761 figure originated into an email to supporters.

These eight Republican politicians either think you are too stupid or too lazy to do even the most cursory fact-checking research on their increasingly hysterical claims. Tellingly, four of the eight -- Alexander, Inhofe, Boehner and Pence -- were also heavily involved in promoting another intentionally misinterpreted study claiming the legislation would cost each household $3,100 per year.


These staunch advocates of the status quo are grasping at increasingly ludicrous straws in their attempts to make Americans afraid of meaningful reform. When your position is based on ignoring science to prop up polluting industries, you have little choice but to cite misleading statistics to make your point. The problem for opponents of clean energy reform is that when Americans know the truth about the full range of costs and benefits associated with the legislation, they overwhelmingly approve -- even in districts that are generally considered conservative. As long as we don't let manufactured lies dominate the debate, support will remain strong and we'll pass legislation in the next few months.

Follow Josh Nelson on Twitter: www.twitter.com/enviroknow

Comments

[CelticMajic]

fact check says this "Testifying before the House Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support in March, Terry M. Dinan, a senior adviser for the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, conceded that price increases from a cap-and-trade system would increase energy costs for American households. According to Dinan’s testimony, a 15 percent cut in CO2 emissions could run the average household about $1,600 (in 2006 dollars). The range: $700 for the average household in the lowest one-fifth of all households, according to income, to nearly $2,200 for households in the highest quintile."

So I guess those evil enemies were off by a whopping $39....how dare they LIE??????

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/05/cap-and-trade-cost-inflation/

So Josh, I guess

[EndTheEcho]

The media needs to spend less time giving politicians time to talk, and more time to get to the truth. It is clear from the transcript that the Boehner comment was off topic as part of a general scare tactic. But the format the the Newshour picks is not get to the truth, but to compare and contrast what different sides think of an issue.

On the issue of the steps above, it is step 1, then step 2-5 happen all at the same time. That is how they dominate the newscycles, they don't wait, but prep to hit all forms of communication on the smae day.

[Exfl]

We gave George W. Bush enough votes to steal the election in 2000 and then reelected him in 2004. As Forest's mama always used to say: "Stupid is as stupid does."

[CessnaDriver]

Well, it seems there are problems with the 2004 Presidential election in Ohio.

[kamachanda]

I assure you, they think we are stupid. Majority rules in this country and they may be right.

[simplify]

All the GOP got is lies and more lies. And yet these people are allowed to fill our airwaves with crap everyday.

[dans5843]

Two words to the GOP

YOU LIE

[dans5843]

Two words for replblican­s.........­......

YOU LIE !!!!!!!!!!!

[temogen]

constantly

[Elbrando]

I believe Ed Gillespie was on This Week with George S. and repeated this lie (or a similar one). They seem to be spending their powder to early again on this debate. Didn't they learn anything from healthcare. You have to talk when people are concerned about the topic.

[ilse]

All the republican party has done is lie. They can't make themselves useful and contribute to make the United States a better place. It's always no, no, no, lie, lie, lie. Their only interest is war and making the rich even richer. All they contributed this year was their Jerry Springer atomosphere and lies. It's time the republican party just laid down and died.

[tapley]

Boehner said the same lie on MTP and Gregory let it pass, but why should we be suprised!

[markscoular]

We All miss Tim Russert.... wish he were here to call these liars what they are. Gregory does not have the personality to pull it off.

[Petey131]

The GOP lies? No, really?

[wldone]

obama lies? no really?

[doctorwang]

so says the parrot........sort of ironic, huh?

"Eight GOP Politicians Parrot False Talking Point....."

[jsgaetano]

Name one. Please, by all means, go into detail.

Then, for extra credit, name one positive thing the GOP accomplished during the last twelve years. Just one.

[Elbrando]

No he doesn't. Really.

[dax49]

i think the tanning spray has begun to seep into boehner brain, and the sheep are just following suit- by the way, i wonder how the pages thar boehner "protected" from mark foley are doing?

[bronceye]

Why don't they just appoint one repube per week to talk. They all say the same thing, the same way. Also, to save billions, one repube could do proxy votes for all others since they are going to vote no on everything. Think of the savings for staffs and travel expenses alone.

[jsgaetano]

> These eight Republican politicians either think you are too stupid
> or too lazy to do even the most cursory fact-checking research on
> their increasingly hysterical claims.

They know they are preaching to conservatives... people who ARE too stupid or too lazy to do even the most cursory fact-checking research on their increasingly hysterical claims.

[moveyourimage]

GOP = Predictable.

[LookingHawk]

...Liars!!