This morning, among the many debatable things said by all in DC, this bit from the president is probably the least debatable.
President Obama on Friday kept up the pressure on Republicans to agree to revenue increases in a deal to raise the debt ceiling, claiming 80 percent of the public supports Democrats’ demand for tax increases.
“The American people are sold,” Obama said. “The problem is members of Congress are dug in ideologically.”
Throughout the press conference, Obama blasted Republicans for ignoring what he said is the will of the American people by rejecting tax increases that would balance out spending cuts in a debt package.
But hey, let’s leave our politics at the door! How sold does he think the American people are? Well, he specifically said that 80% of us support “a balanced approach” that includes tax hikes in the debt deal. Via RCP by way of Hot Air.
“You have 80% of the American people who support a balanced approach. 80% of the American people support an approach that includes revenues and includes cuts. So the notion that somehow the American people aren’t sold is not the problem. The problem is members of Congress are dug in ideologically.”
“Revenues” is the key word there — that’s the newspeak for tax increases of one form or another.
Where is he getting this 80% figure? How about “out of his hind end.” Gallup doesn’t back him up. Neither does Rasmussen. Gallup gets you closest, but you have do get a little creative with the numbers and even it shows that 50% would prefer a deal with no “revenues” at all (Ras shows 55% on that side).
Obama’s just scattin’ and be-boppin’ and makin’ stuff up.
Update: In comments, Jay Caruso says Obama is citing this poll. Heh, he may well be. It’s a PPP (they’re the people who polled Rick Perry behind Obama — in Texas) and this particular poll is up to their usual standards. It was commissioned by MoveOn and other leftists, and cherry picks four states. If that’s the poll he’s citing, he may be outsourcing the making up of the stuff.
90% of the guns in Mexican cartel hands come from gun stores in the U.S.. Riiiiiight. If you show that to be a lie, he will put the ATF on the job and make it come true.
This guy is a national disgrace.
Well, according to the Gallup poll you link to, only 20% of Americans want the deficit reduced only with spending cuts, so maybe Obama’s not making stats up out of nothing after all.
It’s just the way the question was asked.
That poll shows a dramatic preference for spending cuts over tax hikes. But when asked many options, many people opt for a ‘mostly spending cuts’, and are then thrown in as supporters of Obama’s tax hike plan that doesn’t even resolve the deficit at all.
sure, if you were going to balance the budget, and had a realistic way of doing so that involved deep spending cuts and some tax increases, I would be OK with that. But that isn’t even an option. Obama isn’t talking about balancing the budget and in this recession, a tax hike would probably increase the deficit as the economy tanked.
It is simply a lie to put me in as a supporter of Obama’s side of this debate. But the asinine way he’s reading this poll would put me in that category.
No, a majority of Americans do not want tax hikes. That’s just a fact, and those who claim they seriously believe otherwise are simply lying.
It’s called the “Big Lie” technique, and it’s worked before.
Will it work this time?
Joseph, look about five slots below the line you’re citing.
Only 80 percent? Numbers are wonderful. Remember – “Nine out of ten Doctors that tried Camels prefer women.”
Napoleon the Pig was a sleazeball community organizer too.
Good one, good one.
Hey Mortay! Thanks
Obama is a liar or stupid or both.
I miss Trump. Not that I support him as president but I miss some of his comments. Like the one when Trump said the job of the press is to cover for Obama.
True dat.
Joseph,
How ’bout we go with the average, and make it 4-to-1 cuts vs taxes? Is that what Obama was proposing?
42% of statistics are made up on the spot.
Anyone can make up statistics, 78% of the people know that.
Actually it is 42.7% of all statistics are made up.
Actually, it would not be unusual for a narcissist to actually believe the carp they come up with..
“Aw, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. Forty percent of all people know that.”
He could have said 100%! Because I’m sure 100% of the slackers who don’t pay ANY income taxes would like to see tax rates increased for those 10% of evil rich people who DO pay 60% of all income taxes.
…and I don’t play politics
He’s getting the 80% figure from a BS poll conducted in 4 states that asks a question designed to elicit a response of 80% being for it. Details here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/06/poll-swing-state-voters-tax-wealthy-deficit_n_891485.html
Since fully 80% of Democrats pay no income tax – in fact a very high percentage of the Democratic base doesn’t pay taxes, they eat them – I am sure he was confusing their opinion with all voters.
I’m in a financial services industry and review the tax returns of 100′s of clients per year. I can tell you this—many of the ones making the most money are paying the smallest percentage of taxes (relative to their TOTAL income). In some cases, the wealthiest pay next to nothing due to loopholes in the tax codes and accounting practices that shield some income from the IRS.
Easily explainable. I wrote last October that Obama, like all “progressives,” thinks that the masses are actually eager to be embrace statist control of their lives. The progressive world view is that ordinary people are basically incapable of living rightly. Therefore, they must be managed for their own good, and the more closely the better. Furthermore, they think that the masses agree. But we don’t and we won’t.
Obama thinks that his positions are so reasonable, so good and so right that almost everyone must agree with him. It’s only the eeevvviiiiill Republicans who manage to cloud people’s minds. So he really does believe that 80 percent of the people want exactly his programs and tax increases to go through.
But you can’t get 80 pct of Americans to agree that the sun rises in the east, so good luck, Barry!
I drilled all the way down on that Gallup poll. Very odd poll. These are just questions embedded in a much larger poll. The odd thing is that they found 273 wanted the debt ceiling increased…460 people who didn’t…out of 1016. So we have people saying that they don’t want to raise the ceiling but are ok with some tax increases.
The way this is headlined by Gallup, it has the feel of a push poll. We don’t know all the questions but they wait until q35 to ask people if they want the ceiling increased…and then 38 how they want it done. Question response is sensitive to order..also, this far into a poll people may have zoned out, wanting to get off the phone.
And of course, the 1016 “adults” include all the people that were dumb enough to vote for Obama in the first place.
I think Obama might have got his stats from Pauline Kael.
The questions were loaded. It’s a miracle no one was hurt. Yet.
If you don’t give the people you’re asking the information they need to answer the question, and instead give them a suggestion that one answer is the answer they want, they’re going to pick that answer for the most part.
But if you told them that if you were to tax all capital gains 100% at an upper-bracket rate of 35%, and by doing that raise less than $100b in the first year when the shortfall is over a trillion and a half, absolutely no one is going to think that’s the solution. So, you can’t tell them that.
He meant 80% want other people taxed.
20% of the American people consider themselves Liberal.
1 in 5 Americans are mentally ill.
Coincidence? I think not.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/141032/2010-conservatives-outnumber-moderates-liberals.aspx
http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/news/20101118/mental-illness-affects-in-in-5-americans
100% of Obama voters are tools. I just took that poll.
It seems to me — a Tea Party sympathizer — that Joseph is right that Obama is getting the admittedly tendentious but, strictly speaking, accurate 80% number directly from Gallup.
Obama is engaged in dubious rhetoric, sure, but to say he’s making things up exaggerates the point.
According to Gallup, 80% of those surveyed said that they prefer *some* tax increase to reduce the deficit to *no* tax increase to reduce the deficit.
Of course the trick here is that this figure includes those who want the deficit mostly-but-not-wholly reduced with spending cuts, which Obama is characterizing as a “balanced” approach. This seems like a mischaracterization, given the 50-11 margin in favor of “only/mostly” by spending cuts to only/mostly by tax increases.
But, Bryan, as much as I like your work and am on your side, I don’t think it helps your argument to characterize Obama as making statistics up out of nothing. He’s just spinning them in absolutely the best light for him possible, to the point of being misleading. It’s less rhetorically effective to accuse Obama of misleading spin than making stuff up — but, honestly, he wasn’t making it up. Strictly speaking, under his explicit definition of “a balanced approach,” what he said was true according to Gallup.
DJ:
Admirable effort, but let me ask you this:
What is the reward and value of being “fair” and “balanced” with people like Obama and the left in general?
Right. Exactly. It only makes you look like a fool and weak in their eyes.
So why did you even bother?
Some of us think intellectual honesty is its own reward. That’s partly why I loathe Obama.
But it’s also true that when you make an exaggerated argument, you set yourself up to be easily refuted. Putting aside the point that the 80% should be 73% — which is admittedly a bad mistake for a presidential address — it’s still hyperbole to say Obama made the stat up out of nothing. It’s spun like crazy, and he gets to 80 (rather than 73) by a mistake. That’s bad enough.
Bryan has a better argument available than the one he actually made, IMO. It’s not like pointing that out here, of all places, is somehow going to help the leftist cause.
DJ…If the polling were to suggest 80% of Americans loves Tea Party’s Bachman, this site would be all over it as validation of fact. Rather funny watching how folks accept and reject polling data. No matter the political party, the politicians and their activists never let facts get in the way of their intended rhetoric.
TrollTroll: We can expect that 100% of the time, you will say something so silly that everybody will see that you are a troll. Talk about setting up a hypothetical straw man so you can attack something! How about putting in that ‘populist’ appellation you love so much, so you can feel good about being silly in public?
Life-long Republican concerned about the future of the party, right?
Why be a schmuck, Rob? I’ve read — and enjoyed — your comments here and elsewhere for years. I’m not a concern troll. The point is simple: if you just look at how Obama defines “balance” and subtract the 20% who told Gallup that they wanted only spending cuts, then you get 80%.
That’s a small mistake (because it should be 73%) and a huge spin (because people who want primarily spending cuts but are willing to accept some minor tax increases are much closer to the Republican position than to Obama’s), but it just isn’t “making stuff up.”
Why don’t you go attack someone who isn’t on your/our side, like #48?
Bryan, if you’re going to update your post, you might want to note that Michael Warren at The Weekly Standard has exactly my take on this:
The president didn’t cite a particular poll, but he was most likely referring to this Gallup poll, which found that only 20 percent of Americans believe in reducing the deficit “only with spending cuts.” The other 80 percent, the president seems to have concluded, are for a combination of spending cuts and tax increases. (Obama did not, conveniently, mention that polls have shown more Americans are against raising the debt ceiling than are for it.)
Warren calls this analysis “misleading” — for exactly the reasons I point out — and he doesn’t note the point that the figure should really be 73% (which I didn’t notice the first time either).
TWS isn’t exactly a RINO mag. The original post is overstated; Obama is better criticized for wildly misleading spin than for making up statistics. Or for using a minor poll of only a few states, as your update suggests.
The link is here: http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-misleads-support-balanced-deficit-agreement_576887.html
Obama got the 80% number by polling only 7 of the 57 states.
No, Obama said that 80% wanted a “balanced” (whatever that means) approach to deficit reduction.
Telling gullible leftist white people what they wanted to hear got Him into the White House, why should He stop now?
From Gary Muledeer;
“Out of all home appliances 9 out of 10 people prefer watching television.”
Statistics don’t lie, but liers use statistics.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
How about a straight up question:
“Are YOU willing to pay more taxes to help Washington balance its budget?
My guess is that that one will poll under 10%”.
“Are you willing to give up some of the money you and your loved ones and employers receive from the government to help balance the budget?” I am sure those answering positively will be in the high 80′s percentage wise.
Obama and the Mrs. would be the first ones to give up their perks.
The catchwords are NIMBY and ALAMOING: “Not In my Back Yard” and “As long as My Ox is not gourded.”
On second thought — and some addition — it does look like Obama was factually wrong. (So was I.) I got to 80% by subtracting the 20% who favor only cuts, according to Gallup, from 100%.
But if you add up the other responses they don’t sum to 100%, no doubt because there were some non-responders. What would have been accurate, given the misleading but explicit definition of “a balanced approach” as including at least some tax increases, would be 73% not 80%.
That’s still a very high number, due to misleading spin. And there’s an error involved, albeit one that I made myself in a comment to a blog post not a presidential address (in my own defense).
DJ – It’s a republic. And he’s the president. Who cares if it’s 1% or 99%. He suppossed to do something becasue it’s in the best interest of the country.
And you come here with your “80… no wait – mea culpa – 73%” nonsense. And then wonder why people “attack” you instead of some other person who’s “not on our side”?
Please. People like you ARE the problem, with your mealy-mouth rationalizations. Go read a book – any book – on leadership, then get back to us.
We’re taking in $200 billion a month in “revenues” (that’s confiscated property, btw) and “spending” $300b. That’s the problem.
First step in leadership: Define the problem.
You’re welcome.
We expect more rigor from the White House. Why we should have that expectation, though, is as much of a mystery as why economic expectations have been consistently been biased way above reality of late.
Two days ago, BHO explained that a poll showed 67% of Americans do not want the debt ceiling raised because they’re not following what’s going on like the elected officials are and wouldn’t necessarily know what a treasury ‘option’ is.
At the point in his remarks today when he wagged his finger claining the backing of 80% of the American people (who now know what is going on), he also said that his opponents in this debate did not have the support of the American people and had boxed themselves into an untenable ideological position. Later on in his remarks today, he accused his opponents of political posturing, which I suppose is what they’re doing to appeal to the remaining 20%.
Bottom line: he is out of his league, has no idea what he is talking about and the sycophantic press corps lets him slide.
I can only imagine Obama’s staff soiling themselves in hilarious joy when Obama makes claims of this nature, realizing he has again pulled the hoodwink over the eyes of the bamboozled – yet progressive – 52%… or whatever is left of them, if much of anything.
Dilbert: Surveys show that statistics you make up out of thin air are more persuasive than real facts.
Catbert: How many surveys, DIlbert?
Dilbert: Eighty-seven.
I favor increased revenues to the Federal Government the Repubican way — that is, lower tax rates, fewer and simpler taxes, real tax reform, rejection of taxation as a way to promote policy, less tax cheating and fraud and theft against government, less waste and boondoggling, more tax payers and more private and public profit and therefore more money and more revenue with less effort and more automation and more production. China uses capitalism (factory expansion) and gets more revenue. Obama uses socialism (government grab-fests) and destroys value and gets less revenue. So does my thinking put me in the 80% who want more revenue the smart way or the 20% with Obama who want higher taxes and less revenue the stupid way? We are dealing with collasal racist liars who want to destroy all wealth to make the minorities poorer just so they can be richer with a smaller pie. Don’t even listen to these people. Their brains are so corrupt with inner rot they don’t even know what they are talking about, and Obama is only the weakest and most irrelevant of their ignorant spokespeople.
Just doing what the IPCC has been doing for years.
I think he must be using the Gallop number that says only 20% are for spending cuts only. That’s some spin on the connotation of the poll but a fair way to support his statement.
The thing is, he needs a token concession on taxes so he can point to it as the reason for improvements on the deficit front. Otherwise it messes their whole meme about taxes and revenues.
This guy must get a rhinoplasty every night. Pinochio ain’t got nothin’ on this dude. This administration is all about “do as I say, not as I do”. The theoreticians that run this administration think they no how to handle it all while we empericists know that the theoreticians have no clue. I’ve said this before ‘The Government couldn’t manage a good bowel movement in the morning much less our economy’. These guys should SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, QUIT SPENDING, GET OUT OF THE WAY (not necessarily in that order).
And now to paraphrase the immortal Petey Greene, “I’ll tell it to the young, I’ll tell it to the old. ‘Dis prez is perfect for some comedy gold”.
Barney Stinson always uses 83% as the statistic for whatever he wants to prove. I guess he has the same source as this guy.
Where is he getting this 80% figure? How about “out of his hind end.”
This is an example of how Obama leads from his behind.
Umm… sorry Pajamasmedia… but Obama, for once, is being accurate…. did you not READ the Gallup poll???? It clearly states “Twenty percent favor an approach that relies only on spending cuts”… that means 80% are for a combination of cuts and revenues, just like he said. Trust me, it pains me to say he’s right, but he is. And for the record, I’m part of the 20% that only wants spending cuts, trust me. But please, it makes you look bad when you get mislead people with these type of articles. Get your story straight next time and READ THE POLL.
Read the comments. The figure is from an engineered poll.
So by the same token, it might not be inaccurate to say, “Only 20% of Americans are unwilling to see any Democrat politician tarred, feathered, and ridden out on a rail”?
Did graduate from MSU? Making Stuff Up
Itsounds like Obama is either delusional and/or has an IQ of less than 10. Poor guy, er Mr. Prez is incapable of being honest and thus he will be worse than little Jimmny Carter and his brother Billy combined. Its sad that about every 30-40 years we get an a person who has no clue as Prez as to how to take care of the people except to try to make his point be running the numbers. And anyone can run them and make their point relevant when really it is not relevant.
jensad
“Obama’s just scattin’ and be-boppin’ and makin’ stuff up.”
Where I’m from, we call that shuckin’ and a-jivin’.
I saw Mr. Obama reaching behind and rummaging around inside his belt in the back of his trousers and suddenly a new fact appeared.
In a poll 80% can support raising taxes as long as it’s someone elses taxes, but when asked if they support having their own taxes raised the answer would be near 0% with a small margin of error to account for the clinically insane and liberals.
He’s just saying it because he knows all of his sycophants in the media will parrot it completely unchallenged. Then, when the sh!t hits the fan, he can cite his own quote in the NYT as “evidence” that it was true.
The dems are just trying to get out ahead on the history of this debacle. They know, as ever, they can say absolutely anything and have it be reported as “fact” by 99% of the media.
To be fair,80% of the people Obama knows support tax increases-since they don’t intend to pay them anyway
Q: How did the debt grow from $5.8 trillion in 2001 to its current $14.3 trillion?
A: The biggest contributors to the nearly $9 trillion increase over a decade were:
—2001 and 2003 tax cuts under President George W. Bush: $1.6 trillion.
—Additional interest costs: $1.4 trillion.
—Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: $1.3 trillion.
—Economic stimulus package under Obama: $800 billion.
—2010 tax cuts, a compromise by Obama and Republicans that extended jobless benefits and cut payroll taxes: $400 billion.
—2003 creation of Medicare’s prescription drug benefit: $300 billion.
—2008 financial industry bailout: $200 billion.
—Hundreds of billions less in revenue than expected since the Great Recession began in December 2007.
— Other spending increases in domestic, farm and defense programs, adding lesser amounts.
Sure are a lot more trillion figures behind GW’s contribution. How soon we forget about ‘Mission Accomplished’. Wake up, America!
Beginning in 2006, the Dems controlled Congress in part or full. While it’s true GWB was a socialist mole who fooled many, both parties are culpable. Nice try on the blame Bush meme.
Howie…
On the Bush watch you defend by blaming only congress….citing a democrat congress. The 107th congress was split (the Senate switched majorities from Democratic to Republican and back to Democratic). The 108th congress was GOP majority. The 109th congress was Democrat majority.
On the Obama watch you tend to throw darts at only Obama when he’s had a democrat majority congress for two years and currently a divided congress since 2011.
What is your motive?
I don’t care where he gets his stats. The man is despicable and taking this wonderful country right into the crapper.
Maybe he meant “80% of Americans named Obama”. He, Michelle, and the girls are all in agreement. His aunt in Boston could not be reached for comment.
It’s a republic. And he’s the president. Who cares if it’s 1% or 99%. He suppossed to do something becaausee it’s in the best interest of the country.
And then people like DJ come here with their “80… no wait – mea culpa – 73%” nonsense. And then wonder why people “attack” them instead of some other person who’s “not on our side”?
Please. People like DJ ARE the problem, with their mealy-mouth rationalizations. Go read a book – any book – on leadership, and see if it’s got a big, fat chapter on poll-taking methodologies.
We’re taking in $200 billion a month in “revenues” (that’s confiscated property, btw) and “spending” $300b. That’s the problem.
First step in leadership: Define the problem.
You’re welcome.
You keep using the word “republic”, but I do not think that word means what you think it means.
Perhaps you’re thinking of “banana republic” where being elected means you get to ignore the other branches of government.
I’ve found that many liberals don’t understand the distinction unless a republican is in office.
I would just say as the wise prophet said: “Don’t call my bluff!!” and leave the room immediately after telling you guys at pajamasmedia: “read you tomorrow!!”
He be boppin’ and scattin and makin things up. Look! There goes a shiney bunny!
What we have here is the fruit of Affirmative Action.
“The American people are sold,” Obama said.
But I got these nifty magic beans for them…