Fact-Checking Biden’s Stimulus Fact-Check
EmailABC News’ Jonathan Karl reports: Last night on "The Daily Show," Vice President Joe Biden addressed the reports of stimulus jobs in non-existent Congressional districts — but in the process, he made a mistake himself.
"Out of 140,000 people reporting in what they did with the money — who they hired, how many jobs — 70 didn't know how to count," Biden told Jon Stewart. "There were bad civics classes for 70 people and they put in districts — what district are you in? No such district.
But later, Biden spokesman Jay Carney told ABC News that the vice President misspoke. In fact, 700 reports were listed with fictional congressional districts.
Carney said Administration has made an unprecedented amount information public about the stimulus program.
"Never before in history has a federal government program been this transparent and accountable. Never. Not even close."
Even so, 700 represents only about one-half of 1 percent of the stimulus projects listed. The overwhelming majority of the stimulus projects, the vice president's office points out, were listed with the correct congressional district. Meanwhile, the 700 mistakes are being corrected
Biden said that, in contrast with the Bush administration, there has been no wasteful spending under President Obama.
"We've been in business seven, eight months," Biden said. "You haven't seen wasteful spending. No one has said we spent $2 million on things that didn't exist."
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“We’ve been in business seven, eight months,” Biden said. “You haven’t seen wasteful spending. No one has said we spent $2 million on things that didn’t exist.”
But was it really worth slowing the stimulus spending down so much to achieve this? Private companies understand that there is a cost to delay also.
Posted by: jhw539 | November 18, 2009, 3:22 pm 3:22 pm
The way I heard it, was that 98 billion in spending can’t be accounted for.
I guess in Biden’s view, that amount is chump change.
Posted by: Rick McDaniel | November 18, 2009, 3:32 pm 3:32 pm
This administration has a long list of incompetent people but ole Joe may top the list.
Posted by: jerry | November 18, 2009, 3:50 pm 3:50 pm
Now we know what Biden did in the Senate for 30 years-NOTHING! Where did the money go if Obama didn’t waste tax payer money, where is it and where are the jobs?
Posted by: John Demeter | November 18, 2009, 3:54 pm 3:54 pm
Stop blaming Obama, at least he tried to do something, the fault lies with the Banks and the regulators, if the Banks would lend the economy would grow and Businesses would start to hire, but with money being so tight, noone can afford to do anything. the small and medium size companies are the ones that hire and those are the one that are cut off, get off your butts and call your congress and senate and yell at them and vote them out of office if they don’t get the banks to lend
Posted by: Ken | November 18, 2009, 4:01 pm 4:01 pm
Ken–”the small and medium size companies are the ones that hire and those are the one that are cut off, get off your butts and call your congress and senate and yell at them and vote them out of office if they don’t get the banks to lend.” — You can’t get banks to lend money that will not bve paid back.. thats what got us into this mess in the first place.. Banks arn’t lending, cause small businesses arn’t growing.. they arn’t growing because this admistration has their foot firmly on the throat of the private sector. Stop government spending and reduce the tax burdens on those small businesses and watch what happens.. No one is expanding their business right now, because they see what is around the corner and it scares them..
Posted by: arkievet | November 18, 2009, 4:33 pm 4:33 pm
I agree with Ken ….
Also, can anyone of the nay-sayers tell me where the billions went that Bush first put out there in stimilius $$$ in the fall of 2008 …… no ….. I didn’t think you could.
Posted by: Linda | November 18, 2009, 4:33 pm 4:33 pm
A simple Stimulus Bill. Just sending money to special interests and tell them to spend it. Can’t even get that right. And folks want government health care? Some people are out of their minds, or blinded by the light from Obama’s halo. Remember, too. Every government job created is a raise in your taxes = Zero/negative economic growth.
Posted by: John A | November 18, 2009, 4:34 pm 4:34 pm
Unless, of course, you include Cash-for-Clunkers as wasteful spending. You hand out money for people to trade in “clunkers” for new, fuel efficient cars. Instead, decent cars that lower income people could have afforded were crushed, the new “fuel efficient cars” that were sold weren’t any such thing (look at the stats and you will see how many gas guzzling trucks were sold instead), and just 2 days ago GM comes out with their report of 1.2BILLION dollars in losses in the 3rd quarter. When you factor all this in with the fact that a good portion of the people who traded in for a new vehicle could very likely lose their job, and therefore their income in the next months, which in turn will cause repossessions and possible bankruptcies, it sure seems like wasteful spending to me.
One more point-if Obama is so concerned with the lower class of our country, why would one of his first “stimulus” deals be geared toward the people who qualify for new vehicles that on average cost about $20,000? I thought his whole gig was to change things up and bring our country back from the “bottom up” not by the “trickle down” theory.
If his administration is worried about fraud and abuse, I suggest they check in-house first.
Posted by: Shoe | November 18, 2009, 4:36 pm 4:36 pm
Biden said that, “in contrast with the Bush administration, there has been no wasteful spending under President Obama.” — Is he serious???
Lets see.. 4 billion to Acorn, 315 million for teenage STD research (important, but not stimulus related). 4 million to hollywood producers (gotta keep those actors employed so they can campaign for the dems).. Union payoffs, special interest payoffs… all told about 70% of the stimlus was funding that did not directly corrispond to job growth, yet our VP claims that there was no waste… TOO FUNNY>>>>
Posted by: arkievet | November 18, 2009, 4:40 pm 4:40 pm
Ken–”Stop blaming Obama, at least he tried to do something”— yeah, he tried ( and continues to try) to destroy the economy further. Read Alinky’s rules for radicals pertaining to the necessary preparation of sociaty to promote Marxist revolution. “To control the citizenry, you must first destroy the economy on which they depend”…
Posted by: arkievet | November 18, 2009, 4:44 pm 4:44 pm
Linda–”Also, can anyone of the nay-sayers tell me where the billions went that Bush first put out there in stimilius $$$ in the fall of 2008 …… no ….. I didn’t think you could. Actaully I can — the majority of outlays in that stimulus bill was in the form of rebates to the general population (to stimulate direct spending and kickstart a stagnated private sector production rate) the remainer was not actually stimuls spending but rather tax cuts which only show as expenditures until the tax revenue rebounds to cover the initial revenue loss.
Lets compare the results of the two philosophies (Bush and Obama). When Bush initiated the tax cuts in 2003 the unemployment rate was 7.8% and the US had lost 6.8 million jobs in just over one year (due to the collapse of the dot com industry at the end of the Clinton administration). Within 8 months, the unemployment rate went from 7.8% to under 6%. Withing 18 months, it had dropped to below 5% (you can verify this on the dept of labor website under “historical unemployment charts by month”. By the second year, small to medium business growth had rebounded to the point of restoring taw revenue to pre cut levels.
As for Obama, Unemployment was at 7.6% when his “stimulus” was passed After 8 months it is now at 10.2% and continuing to rise. We have spent almost 1.4 trillion between tarp and the stimulus and basically have nothing to show for it..
As for the difference in revenue generation, the national debt went up 4.5 trillion in 8 years under Bush (definately nothing to brag about). Under Obama it has went up 2.6 trillion in 9 months (9.6 to 12.3 trillion). At the current rate, the national debt will be between 17 and 20 trillion by the end of Obama’s first (and hopefully only) 4 years.
Posted by: arkievet | November 18, 2009, 4:59 pm 4:59 pm
Pleeeeese!
This administration is all about waste! Giveaways to UAW members (let the white collar staff rot), givaways to buy a car or buy a house. Throwing good money after bad to bail out Liberal supporters on Wall Street!
Posted by: ELF | November 18, 2009, 5:04 pm 5:04 pm
Arkievet
When you need to lie to make your point, you haven’t made your point at all. It is truly astounding how misinformed you are.
I went to the BLS website, where I discovered many facts that are at odds with your “facts” that you claim to have gotten from the same source.
Bush’s first tax cut went into effect in June of 2001, when unemployment was 4.5%, not 7.8%.
The US did not lose 6.8 million jobs in Bush’s first year.
Tax revenue has never returned to pre cut levels. If they had, we wouldn’t have seen the debt double during Bush’s disaster of a presidency.
The national debt on the day Obama was sworn in was already over 10 trillion, $10.6 to be exact.
Posted by: gary | November 18, 2009, 7:26 pm 7:26 pm
I blame Obama and the Congress because they are the ones who misled us and who are spending us into oblivion! Yes Bush was a wild spender, but he has now been eclipsed by Obama. The CBO warns the current level of debt ($12 trillion) to be unsustainable yet Obama wills to double it to $24 trillion by year 2019.
Posted by: Ed Taylor | November 18, 2009, 7:38 pm 7:38 pm
If you want toknow where the stimulus money went-it went to other countries and in return they were to import more goods from America and create jobs. But these countries took the money and turn their nose up to Obama. That is the money that Biden can’t account for!!!
Posted by: John Demeter | November 18, 2009, 9:23 pm 9:23 pm
It cost $18 nmillion to update the recovery.org website, but WHAT DID THE WEBSITE ORIGINALLY COST?
I think this one falls under WASTE, FRAUD AND ABUSE!
Posted by: Ed Taylor | November 18, 2009, 11:05 pm 11:05 pm
This is typical Demon Chicago Politics all rolled into one! The Great Narcissist, Vain Hussein Obama, thinks all of America are dummies because he fooled them into voting for him and his idiotic Marxist ideas! Obama and his whole Demon Administration are America’s Greatest Enemy Within!
Hussein won just like the kid in class who promised the whole class ice cream if they voted for him. Obama did the same to Americans, especially the ones who care nothing about contributing to society but leach from it. Gimme Freebies, I Vote For You! What a bunch of dumb voters!
Posted by: billwhit | November 19, 2009, 4:44 am 4:44 am
The thing we must all remember is that Obama said he would rather be a one term president if he could get all of his ideas implentmented. What does that say? He is not instered in fixing our eceonmy he is instered in how history will remember him. Any time the goverement implenments a new policy it means higher taxes. The prople who voted for him want the hand outs until they find out that with no one working the hand outs start to go away. What happens when no one working can afford to give. Our Charities go away then we all are in trouble. How many prople will be living with you in a year? IF not with you than where?
Posted by: Kathy | November 19, 2009, 12:00 pm 12:00 pm