Biden-Ryan Debate

Charles Krauthammer said, “If you heard it on radio, Biden won. If you watched it on television, he lost.”

Bernard Goldberg said that this was one of those times when style, I think, will trump substance. So even if there wasn’t a winner, there may have been a loser.
Joe Biden was OK when he was talking – but not when he was listening. That’s when he came off as condescending. Paul Ryan was trying to make a point and the split screen TV shot showed Biden laughing – not because anything was funny; it was Biden’s way of mocking Ryan, his way of saying Ryan didn’t know what he was talking about. There were also the frequent Biden interruptions. He came off as smug, maybe even as a bully, the older guy beating up on the new kid on the block.

Fox News’ Chris Wallace had harsh words for Biden, saying, “I don’t believe I have ever seen a debate in which one participant was as openly disrespectful of the other as Biden was to Paul Ryan.”

Britt Hume, too, discussed Biden’s demeanor, saying, “I thought it was unattractive, I thought it was rude […] It looked like a cranky old man, to some extent, debating a polite young man.”

Democratic strategist Joe Trippi believes that Joe Biden performed strongly, he thinks the performance was “diminished by the smirking.”

Dick Morris offered that Vice president Joe Biden showed that he is not qualified to be a heartbeat away from the presidency. There was no dignity, circumspection, courtesy, civility, or presidentiality in his performance in the debate with GOP contender Congressman Paul Ryan. Biden came over as a windbag and a demagogue. His constant interruptions, his phony and appropriate laughter and his grimace of a smile framed his bombast and looked like a schoolboy making faces at a rival. He had the manners and affect of a longshoreman at a union hall or a brawler in a bar. In his caricature of a politician, Biden made clear how much the Obama Administration survives by a combination of negative attacks and the rawest kind of demagogic appeal. He reduced his arguments for taxing the rich to thuggery and was so obviously pandering to populism as to be disgusting to all but the most committed Occupiers.
In the view of Morris, Paul Ryan was disappointing. He seemed over-awed and often overrun by Biden's antics. He should have been more forceful in denouncing the Administration's actions in Libya. He ought to have challenged the vice president's assertion that the Administration was "following the best intelligence we had," by noting that the State Department said it never believed that the attack was anything other than 9-11 anniversary terrorism. He would have been accurate to have labeled the Obama and Hillary claims that the attack was related to the video as a cover-up to try to head off terrorism becoming an issue against the president in November.  Nor did he do well in attacking Obama-Biden on Iran. He kept repeating two talking points: 1) That they had failed to change the Ayatollah's mind on developing nuclear weapons; and 2) That the sanctions were passed over Obama's objections. OK. But how about hitting them on not supporting the pro democracy demonstrators in Teheran? What about Gen. Dempsey's comments criticizing Israel for contemplating an attack on Iran? Why didn't Ryan just say that he would support Israel if it attacked Iran and Obama won't? Ryan did better on economic policy and was excellent on Medicare and Social Security.

Jonah Goldberg had this disappointment about Ryan: I think Ryan was right not to let Biden bait him into losing his cool. Ryan certainly came across as the more appealing, serious, and decent politician. But he would have done himself and his ticket a great service if he had simply turned to Biden and said something like, “Mr. Vice President these are serious issues and serious disagreements about the future of our country. I don’t find them funny and, frankly, I find your behavior here tonight beneath the dignity of your office.” It would have gelded Biden, elicited spontaneous applause in the audience, and endured as the most memorable soundbite of the whole debate. And, it would have been true.

For those interested in some fact checking, consider the following.
Topic: Iran’s Nuclear Program
1) Ryan: “When Barack Obama was elected, (Iran) had enough fissile material — nuclear material to make one bomb. Now they have enough for five.”
FALSE
* Ryan’s claim is misleading. Iran isn’t believed to have produced any of the highly enriched uranium needed to produce even one nuclear weapon, let alone five.
* That point isn’t even disputed by Israel, whose Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu implored the world at the United Nations last month to create a “red line” at enrichment above 20 percent.
* Iran would have to enrich uranium at much higher levels to produce a weapon.
* There is intelligence suggesting that Iran has worked on weapons designs, but not that it has developed a delivery system for any potential nuclear warhead.
[Source: Associated Press: FACT CHECK: Slips in vice president's debate; 10/11/12]
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* A March report from the ISIS concluded that the likelihood of Iran attempting to enrich the material to the levels needed to build nuclear weapons is low, because it would be detected and ensure a military strike, and that current sanctions are working:
“Without past negotiated outcomes, international pressure, sanctions, and intelligence operations, Iran would likely have nuclear weapons by now. Iran has proven vulnerable to international pressure. It now faces several inhibitions against building nuclear weapons, not least of which is fear of a military strike by Israel and perhaps others if it breaks out by egregiously violating its commitments under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and moves to produce highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons.”
[Source: ISIS: PREVENTING IRAN FROM GETTING NUCLEAR WEAPONS: CONSTRAINING ITS FUTURE NUCLEAR OPTIONS; March 5, 2012]
2) Biden: “The ayatollah sees that there are 50 percent fewer exports of oil. He sees the currency going into the tank. He sees the economy going into freefall. And he sees the world for the first time totally united in opposition to him getting a nuclear weapon.”
TRUE
* Shipments from Iran have plunged by 1.2 million barrels a day, or 52 percent, since the sanctions banning the purchase, transport, financing and insuring of Iranian crude began July 1, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Annualized, that would cost President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s country about $48 billion in revenue, equivalent to 10 percent of its economy.
[Source: Bloomberg, Iran Loses $133 Million a Day on Embargo, Buoying Obama, Aug 2, 2012]
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RELATED LINKS:
Check out analysis of last night’s debate:
Krauthammer’s Analysis: If You Heard the Debate on the Radio, Biden Won; If You Watched It on TV, He Lost
Brit Hume: Joe Biden ‘Looked Like a Cranky Old Man Debating a Polite Young Man’
Geraldo: Biden Kept Democrats ‘In the Game,’ But Ryan Held His Own
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* They must now explain to a reeling public how they intend to stabilize an economy slammed by Western sanctions that have cut into oil exports and a deflated currency that lost nearly 40 percent of its value in a weeklong plummet – and why taking to the streets in protests is not the answer.
* Ahmadinejad’s political foes have openly scapegoated him as the cause for the rial’s drop, which hit an all-time low of 35,500 to the dollar on Wednesday and touched off merchant strikes at Tehran’s bazaar and sporadic clashes as police tried to round up sidewalk money changers. The rate was about 10,000 as recently as early last year.
[Source: Washington Post, Iran's currency chaos rattles leaders but fails to threaten grip, Oct 7, 2012]
3) Ryan: “They’ve given 20 waivers to this sanction.”
TRUE
* The U.S. said China and Singapore have “significantly reduced” their purchases of Iranian oil, earning exemptions from U.S. financial sanctions that otherwise would have been imposed.
* China was the biggest importer of Iranian crude last year, and Singapore is Asia’s oil trading and refining hub. The U.S. granted renewable, 180-day exemptions on March 20 to Japan and 10 European Union nations. India, South Korea, Turkey, South Africa, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Taiwan won exemptions in June.
“A total of 20 world economies have now qualified for such an exception,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said yesterday in an e-mailed statement. “Their cumulative actions are a clear demonstration to Iran’s government that Iran’s continued violation of its international nuclear obligations carries an enormous economic cost.”
[Source: Bloomberg, China, Singapore Exempted From U.S. Iran Oil Sanctions, June 29, 2012]
Topic: The Economy
1) Biden: They’re pushing the continuation of a tax cut that will give an additional $500 billion in tax cuts to 120,000 families.
Ryan: You know what the unemployment rate in Scranton is today?
Biden: I sure do.
Ryan: It’s 10 percent.
Biden: Yeah.
Ryan: You know what it was the day you guys came in? 8.5 percent.
HALF TRUE
*The unemployment rate in Scranton-Wilkes-Barre, PA Metropolitan Statistical Area was 9.6% in August 2012, up from 8.4% in January of 2009, according to BLS data.
[Source: BLS]
*However, Ryan was wrong when he said a rise in the jobless rate in Biden’s hometown was “how it’s going all around America.”
*The seasonally adjusted national unemployment rate fell to 7.8% in September, exactly the same place it was when Obama took office in January 2009, and down from a high of 10% in October of 2009.
[Source: BLS Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey]
Topic: The Auto Industry Bailout
1) Biden: “He just — he said, let it [Detroit] go bankrupt, period. Let it drop out.”
FALSE
* Biden is quoting the headline for a 2008 op-ed written by Romney in the New York Times.
* However, the headline was not written by Romney – it was written by the New York Times.
* Romney actually called for a managed bankruptcy — here is the relevant part of the op-ed:
“The American auto industry is vital to our national interest as an employer and as a hub for manufacturing. A managed bankruptcy may be the only path to the fundamental restructuring the industry needs. It would permit the companies to shed excess labor, pension and real estate costs. The federal government should provide guarantees for post-bankruptcy financing and assure car buyers that their warranties are not at risk.”
[Source: NY Times]
2) BIDEN: “All this talk — we saved a million jobs.”
TRUE
The Ann Arbor-based nonpartisan Center for Automotive Research released a study in November 2010 estimating that the auto bailout — by avoiding the worst-case scenario with drawn-out bankruptcy proceedings — saved an estimated 1.14 million U.S. jobs, slightly fewer than the earlier estimate of 1.3 million jobs.
[Sources: Politifact: Obama auto rescue saved 28,000 "middle-class" jobs in Wisconsin, 1 million in U.S., ex-Michigan governor says; Center for Automotive Research: The Impact on the U.S. Economy of the Successful Automaker Bankruptcies, November 17, 2010;]
3) Biden: “Two hundred thousand people are working today.”
TRUE, but only if you start counting when auto companies began the bankruptcy process in spring 2009.
In reality, the industry still has about 400,000 fewer jobs than it had at the start of the recession.
[Source: WH: A Look Back at GM, Chrysler and the American Auto Industry; APRIL 21, 2010]
Topic: The Housing Market
Biden: “If they get out of the way and let us allow 14 million people who are struggling to stay in their homes because their mortgages are upside down, but they never missed a mortgage payment, just get out of the way.
FALSE
* September 2012: CoreLogic, a leading provider of information, analytics and business services, released an analysis showing that 10.8 million, or 22.3%, of all residential properties with a mortgage were in negative equity at the end of the second quarter of 2012.
* This is down from 11.4 million properties, or 23.7%, at the end of the first quarter of 2012.
[Source: CoreLogic: CORELOGIC® REPORTS NUMBER OF RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES IN NEGATIVE EQUITY DECREASES AGAIN IN SECOND QUARTER OF 2012]
Topic: Department of Energy
1) Ryan: “Look at just the $90 billion in stimulus. The vice president was in charge of overseeing this. $90 billion in green pork to campaign contributors and special interest groups.”
TRUE
* The approximately $90 billion allocated in the stimulus for “green energy” breaks down to $60.7 billion in spending (relatively immediate) and tax breaks worth $29.5 billion over a 10-year period.
* Of the approximately $90 billion, about $51.9 billion (57.66%) is for projects that are outside what most people would consider the “green energy world” compared to oil & gas companies:
$19.9 billion for energy efficiency programs
$10.5 billion to modernize the electricity grid
$18.1 billion for high-speed rail and transit programs
$3.4 billion for “clean coal”
[Source: White House, Council of Economic Advisors, THE ECONOMIC IMPACT OF THE AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACT OF 2009: SUPPLEMENT TO THE THIRD QUARTERLY REPORT: THE ARRA AND THE CLEAN ENERGY TRANSFORMATION]
2) Ryan: “There are just at the Department of Energy over 100 criminal investigations that have been launched into just how stimulus…”
TRUE
* The claim is based on statements from the agency’s inspector general, Gregory Friedman, who told Congress last November that he had initiated 100 such investigations into what he called “various schemes, including the submission of false information, claims for unallowable or unauthorized expenses and other improper uses of Recovery Act funds.”
* Friedman said the investigations had led to five criminal prosecutions and recovery of more than $2.3 million.
* According to an Associated Press account of his testimony, Friedman said the fraud was due in part to the fact that very few “shovel ready” projects were available for government investment at the time the package was enacted. The Department of Energy received more than $35 billion in one-time funds and had no infrastructure and few people to oversee such a massive inflow, the inspector general said.
[Source: Recovery.gov; AP]
However:
* Executive Director Michael Wood, of the Recovery Board, said out of the $276 billion – the amount of taxpayer money allocated for contracts, grants and loans – it’s estimated that only $11.1 million had been lost to fraud.
[Source: Michael Wood, Executive Director, Recovery Board; Press Release: Watching Over $276 Billion; 9/19/12]
Topic: Entitlement Reform
1) Ryan: “Look what — look what Obamacare does. Obamacare takes $716 billion from Medicare to spend on Obamacare. Even their own chief actuary at Medicare backs this up. He says you can’t spend the same dollar twice. You can’t claim that this money goes to Medicare and Obamacare.”
TRUE
* A July 2012 estimate from the Congressional Budget Office, repealing the Affordable Care Act would increase Medicare spending by $716 billion between 2013 and 2022.
[Source: Douglas W. Elmendorf Director, CBO: 7/24/12]
2) Ryan: “If we don’t shore up Social Security, when we run out of the IOUs, when the program goes bankrupt, a 25 percent across-the-board benefit cut kicks in on current seniors in the middle of their retirement.”
TRUE
CBO projects that under current law, the Social Security trust fund will be exhausted in 2038:
* Under current law, the DI trust fund will be exhausted in 2016, and the OASI trust fund will be exhausted in 2038.
* It is a common analytical convention to consider the DI and OASI trust funds in combination.
* CBO projects that, if legislation to shift resources from the OASI trust fund to the DI trust fund was enacted as has been done in the past, the combined trust funds would be exhausted in 2034.
* However, considerable uncertainty surrounds the various factors that affect the program’s revenues and outlays, and thus the date at which the trust funds would be exhausted.
[Source: CBO: The 2012 Long-Term Projections for Social Security: Additional Information]
3) Biden: “Any senior out there, ask yourself: Do you have more benefits today? You do. If you’re near the donut hole, you have $800 — $600 more to help your prescription drug costs. You get wellness visits without co-pays.”
FALSE
* According to the Congressional Budget Office, for every $500 the law spends on preventive services and prescription drugs, it cuts the rest of Medicare by $7,385.
* That’s a cut-to-spending ratio of nearly 15 to 1.
[Source: Avik Roy, Forbes Magazine: The Ratio of Obamacare's Medicare Cuts to New 'Benefits' is Fifteen-to-One]
4) Ryan: “Their own actuary from the administration came to Congress and said one out of six hospitals and nursing homes are going to go out of business as a result of this.”
Biden: “That’s not what they said.”
Ryan is right, and Biden is wrong
* The Obama administration’s own Medicare actuary, Richard Foster, has explained that the Obamacare Medicare cuts could make unprofitable 15 percent of hospitals serving Medicare patients:
* It is doubtful that many [hospitals and other health care providers] will be able to improve their own productivity to the degree” necessary to accommodate the cuts, Foster has written:
“Thus, providers for whom Medicare constitutes a substantial portion of their business could find it difficult to remain profitable, and, absent legislative intervention, might end their participation in the program (possibly jeopardizing care for beneficiaries. [Our] simulations…suggest that roughly 15 percent of [hospitalization] providers would become unprofitable within the 10-year projection as a result of the [spending cuts].”
[Source: The Estimated Effect of the Affordable Care Act on Medicare and Medicaid Outlays and Total National Health Care Expenditures; Testimony before the House Committee on the Budget; January 26, 2011 by Richard S. Foster, F.S.A. Chief Actuary Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services]
5) Ryan: “7.4 million seniors are projected to lose their current Medicare Advantage coverage they have. That’s a $3,200 benefit cut.”
TRUE
* The Medicare actuary wrote:
“We estimate that in 2017, when the [Medicare Advantage] provisions will be fully phased in, enrollment in MA plans will be lower by about 50 percent (from its projected level of 14.8 million under the prior law to 7.4 million under the new law).”
[Source: Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services: Richard S. Foster Chief Actuary: Estimated Financial Effects of the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," as Amended; 4/22/10]
* An analysis of the Medicare Advantage cuts by Robert Book of the Heritage Foundation shows that, on average, MA enrollees will lose $3,714 worth of extra services by 2017 due to the MA reductions in Obamacare.
[Source: Reductions in Medicare Advantage Payments: The Impact on Seniors by Region; Robert A. Book, Ph.D., and James C. Capretta; September 14, 2010]
Topic: Mitt Romney Quote from “60 Minutes” Interview
Biden: “Governor Romney on “60 Minutes” — I guess it was about 10 days ago — was asked, ‘Governor, you pay 14 percent on $20 million. Someone making $50,000 pays more than that. Do you think that’s fair?’ He said, ‘Oh, yes, that’s fair. That’s fair.’”
TRUE
Here is the exchange between Romney and Scott Pelley on 60 Minutes:
Scott Pelley: Now, you made on your investments, personally, about twenty million dollars last year. And you paid fourteen percent in federal taxes. That’s the capital gains rate. Is that fair to the guy who makes fifty thousand dollars and paid a higher rate than you did?
Romney: It is a low rate. And one of the reasons why the capital gains tax rate is lower is because capital has already been taxed once at the corporate level, as high as thirty-five percent.
Pelley: So you think it is fair?
Romney: Yeah, I– I think it’s– it’s the right way to encourage economic growth, to get people to invest, to start businesses, to put people to work.
[Source: CBS News: Mitt Romney Interview on 60 Minutes - 9/23/12]