We bet any minute Aaron Sorkin will come out with a Newsroom episode about the very special time in October 2010 when Zooey Deschanel’s younger twin sister, Paul Ryan, denied having asked for stimulus funds like Peter denied Christ. But — whoa! — would you guess that before flat-out denying that he’d lobbied for stimulus funds, Paul Ryan had in fact written five different letters to the Obama administration asking for stimulus funds? A Republican lying until his eyeballs fall out? That is so weird!
Come in, Boston Globe, over:
“I assume you voted against the stimulus,” the caller [to WBZ] began. “I’m just curious if you accepted any money in your district.”
“No, I’m not gonna vote [against] something then write letters to the government to send us money,” Ryan responded. “I did not request any stimulus money.”
Fairly straightforward! But is there more? Oh, ever so much!
But beginning in the fall of 2009, the Globe first reported on Tuesday, he sent the first of a series of letters to the Department of Energy on behalf of a pair of Wisconsin energy conservation groups, insisting the funds would help create jobs.
For example, Ryan predicted that a grant being sought by the Madison-based Wisconsin Energy Conservation Corporation would “create or retain approximately 7,600 new jobs over the three-year grant period and the subsequent three years.” [...]
The organization ultimately received $20 billion* in economy stimulus funds, while another entity that he advocated for, the Energy Center of Wisconsin, was awarded a separate $740,000, according to federal records.
Asked about the letters to the Department of Energy on Monday, Ryan’s spokesman declined to comment and pointed the Globe to a statement from Ryan’s Capitol Hill office from 2010 when the Wall Street Journal reported he had written a single letter to the Department of Labor seeking stimulus funds.
“If Congressman Ryan is asked to help a Wisconsin entity applying for existing federal grant funds, he does not believe flawed policy should get in the way of doing his job and providing a legitimate constituent service to his employers,” the 2010 statement said.
Sounds like someone’s fitting in real nice to the Romney campaign!
*The Globe has apparently amended their story to read $20 million, which seems much more likely. Soon they’ll be talking about real money!
{ 206 comments }
Sure and begorrah Romney is living the lie of Ryan!
He also had no idea that Ayn Rand was a crazy atheist Russian who ate poor children just to make sure they knew their place.
Ahem… a crazy atheist pro-choice Russian, if you please.
And enjoyed the benefits of Social Security during her elderly years.
Well Ryan went to college on Social Security Survivors Benefits so he is well acquainted with hypocrisy.
I know this is one day old so I'm late to the dance…but holy fucking shit that's hypocritical! How do these people sleep at night? I mean…okay, I've read Altemeyer and others who can assure you this rampant, whorish, demented hypocrisy is explainable (compartmentalization…immoral acts in defense of authority…easy absolution via confession, etc.). But up until this moment right now…I've honestly never encountered a more deeply hypocritical wingnut…I mean RMoney had his daddie's name and money so he didn't need gubmint (unless he was fleecing a company's pension plan) but this little cheese curd shitball has literally sucked on the governments teat at EVERY stage of his life and then tried to pretend he's a Randroid…unbelievable…and yet, oddly believable…god I hate fucking wingnuts.
Their place was center of the plate, to the right of the peas and the mashed potatoes, and keep your goddamm-eyes off the dinner roll.
so Ayn Rand is really the secret love spawn of Chris Christie and Orly Taitz?
Retroactively, yes.
AND who deeply admired a serial child-killer for his boldness in bucking society's so-called "norms."
I firmly believe that when the USPS put Ayn Rand on a stamp that was when it really started going down the toilet.
"the USPS put Ayn Rand on a stamp "
People kept spitting on the wrong side.
Giving it the full Greenspan? Licking the behind and getting a little spit on the face?
You know how I know he's lying? His ill-fitting Republican pants are on fire.
his lips are moving?
He's still breathing?
Though, to be fair, his bones will prevaricate from the grave no doubt.
A blatant falsehood will be carved on his tombstone.
Something about angels and heaven, right?
Something about his budgetary skills? Nah. The Washington Post and Politico have already bought up 3 tons of ink for that. Another 200 gallons have been reserved to remark about how good he looks, standing next to republican stalwarts like Newt and Trump. Carving it in stone would be gauche.
His zombie eyes are open?
Because he just told you.
He's got weird eyes by the way.
AND A WIDOWS PEAK YOU CAN SET YOUR WATCH TO
Eddie Munster, all growed up.
On a meth-fueled serial murder binge.
I don't understand. Sometimes they are as cold blue as an Arctic sea. At other times they are wolverine yellow. What gives?
lycanthropy
Those are your standard-issue sociopath eyes. All filled with emotion, seeming to be half-brimmed up with warmth and caring and compassion all the time. Only the emotion is all self-pity, the warmth is all self-love, the caring is all self-concern. Very common amongst those who care deeply and strongly and only about themselves. Boehnor, too.
And what is worse is when you realize there is nothing behind those eyes. No brains, no thoughts, no understanding on a deeper level other than "what do I want next?"
Like as much as we love our dogs, and they can have pretty eyes, in the end, when you look deep in your dog's eyes, there is nothing there at all but "me me me," and you realize if you dropped dead in the house and they were trapped, they would eat you.
I know my dogs would chomp me down if I lay dead, but I think they'd do it out of love* and feel a twinge of sorow.
*love of meat
I just desperately want to take his eyes and turn them inwards just a bit so they at LEAST are level with his face. Oh course don't want to turn them TOO much or they will start to look Asian… God forbid hes ethnic!!
Paur 'Lyin
We need the actual letters to come out. Has anyone seen them yet? This is so amazing that Romney/Ryan are trying to make this so easy for Obama.
Maddow read part of one on air, and Lawrence O'Donnell has pointed out that he's got a whole track record of pushing for public money for back home. They are public documents, and it is total bullshit for Ryan to claim he didn't do exactly what he needed to in order to make sure his district got his.
Oh, and the family business that created any stability in the Ryan family – a road paving company his grandfather started. You know, those guys who wouldn't exist without Federal and state tax revenue and who, in turn build the infrastructure all these whiny "I built my business" babies rely on every second of every day.
ThinkProgress has them.
Lies (And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them). The end.
I'd heard of Franken's book, but the title was all yelly, so for years I avoided it. Finally picked it up this week and it's lovely. Franken's humor is very understated, insightful, elegant and humane – the opposite of what I expected from the title.
Highly recommended.
Its a disturbing book because, while highly political and partisan, it is chock-a-block loaded with FACTS. Scary stuff!
I sooooo miss AL Franken, the writer. I had mixed emotions when he won a seat in CONgress because I knew hed stop writing his amazing books. I still hold out some small hope, however, that hes secretly documenting all the crazy bullshit that goes on on the hill, and will some day write the most incredible tell-all blockbuster.
I can dream…
I will dream with you, and maybe, through the power of positive thinking, it will happen!
Austerity for you, windmills for me. What's the big deal?
Depends, how big are your windmills?
At this point they came in sight of thirty forty windmills that there are on plain, and as soon as Don Quixote saw them he said to his squire, "Fortune is arranging matters for us better than we could have shaped our desires ourselves, for look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants present themselves, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes; for this is righteous warfare, and it is God's good service to sweep so evil a breed from off the face of the earth."
In an ironic twist, 400 years after "The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha" was published, Republicans consider any form of wind power to be monstrous and deserving of a good tilting.
As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.-gore vidal
No, I never wrote a comment on any wonkette article.
When challenged Generation[redacted] said he would check and get back to the press pool.
You couldn't because Wonkette doesn't allow comments.
I've never been to the Internet.
I went, but I didn't inhale
I tried to leave a comment but there was nowhere to type a comment in.
I typed all the comments the law requires. Why would I type any more comments than that?
I typed at a top rate of 13%. But don't check.
Trust me.
When I commented, I did so on behalf of my constituents, here in my pants….
Generation[redacted] later stated that he did comment on Wonkette, but as he matured he realized that Wonkette was a collective made up of snarky communist types and after that he never commented there. At all. Ever. not even once.
This is exactly why I never go there anymore. But if I ever did you can be damn sure I wouldn't leave a comment !
Then he retroactively uncommented the comments he never made.
Somebody hacked my internet and is posting a comment on Wonkette right now!
And that link to what appears to be an unclad preadolescent is not a picture of me!
Also, they totally photoshopped my face in the mirror.
It's all backwards an junk.
Dear Fred,
Sorry!
Signed,
Generation[redacted]
What kind of fucked up place has this become, when actually trying to do good for people that vote for you is so vastly embarrassing/campaign killing, that you have to lie about it.
They made their bed, and now they must lie in it.
Heehee.
Will there be diapers involved?
No kidding – he's trying to bullshit everyone about DOING HIS JOB!
We call it America.
If his eyeballs did fall out, he'd look significantly less creepy.
Separated at birth?
Chucky is after grandma's life.
http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTIwMjA5ODc…
"Too late."
like this? https://picasaweb.google.com/11400799981044075510…
This is how Ryan balances the budget, btw. By having cake, and eating it, too. Your theories of space-time continuum are only theories, after all.
Also, your theories of double-entry bookkeeping.
Double entry bookkeeping is where two bankruptcies make a profit.
Depends whose version of right you're doing it.
Timecube libel!
but he had the secret service pick that cake up from Crumb and Get It, so it's Patriot Cake®
WhY DO YoU haTe MuricA!1!
"Oh, that stimulus money?"
OK, add "stimulus" to the growing list of four-letter words Obama is not allowed to use anymore. Words such as "chains", "dad", "Medicare", …
how ungentlemanly of you to even bring it up
Well its not like a black man is allowed to use the word "chains". Some white folks might get upset about it.
Paul Ryan looked up from sucking a government tit to deplore the government tit sucking and then back to sucking a government tit until he thought he might be nominated for vice president, at which point he denied that the tit existed.
Between sucks, that is.
"I did not have stimulus relations with that Bill."
–Paul Ryan
That was so fun to read, I re-read it thrice more. Thank you.
It was pretty fun, wasn't it?
laughed out loud coolhandnuke.
You like me. you really like me.
That was worth a follow, sir. Also, Paul Newman!
he is a liar!
I lived in his district while he let the GM plant and all it support factories close
Jerkass
That depends on what the definition of stimulus is, stimulus.
Got Mittens?
Well played!
(Polite golf clapping)
That smug smile begs to be punched.
With votes?
he needs to be slapped in the face with a white hot hammer repeatedly also too
"Aww, just the tip of the stimulus, baby…"
"I promise, I'll pull out before the check clears, baby. . ."
Atlas Fibbed.
Oh no, Atlas was a lying motherfucker, or grandmother killer.
Atlas Fudged?
If you can just Photoshop that Mitt Romney fudge photo with Paul Ryan… On second thought, please don't.
Atlas Flubbed.
Mom, that vice president candidate is staring at me!
Mom: Say no if he asks if you'd like to be dropped off at a swingset.
He did mention something about crossing state lines. Should I be scared?
I love when Republicans in office forget they're public figures.
They all think they're Fourthbranch.
Do as I say and not as I do.
Not to pick a nit, but the article says it was $20 million, not billion. Carry on snarkers! Ryan's still a dick.
The organization ultimately received $20 million in economy stimulus funds, while another entity that he advocated for, the Energy Center of Wisconsin, was awarded a separate $740,000, according to federal records.
It's still quite a bit more than the $0 he claimed to have asked for.
Then they've fixed. I copied that shit, it was $20 billion originally.
That's the LIBERAL Media spreading their lies again!
Billion Shmillion these guys work with dollars in scientific notation and it's all the same.
$20 million is 13% of what?
$160 mil, or about half of what Mitt admits to having.
HE HAS BEEN CHEATING ON SWEET CHASTE LADY LIBERTARIANISM WITH DIRTY STATIST MONEYS
Hot, rape-y, Ayn Rand-y sex!
Eeeeooowwww
That's Ayn O'Connor to the Social Security Administration.
He was for stimulus funds before he was against them. What's new…
Who hasn't sought illicit stimulation in quiet rooms?
$20M, not $20B….
But hey, what's $19 billion among friends!
Corporations are friends too, my people.
Depends on what your definition of "stimulus" is.
20… billion? That doesn't sound possible for a state energy conservation group.
EDIT: And it now shows as million on the Globe page.
Energy in Wisconsin is hella expensive!
Considering how cold it gets up there the heating bills must be super-high.
Oops, everyone jumped on Remecca's misquoting.
OMG! Our Editrix is the second coming of Mecca?!
It's official: The R&R campaign is being run by liberal plants who are making the 2012 campaign the political equivalent of the Home Run Derby.
And Obama's allowed to take steriods, HGH, an eight-ball of Peruvian Marching Powder, and anything else that might help him knock it outta the park.
There's simply no other explanation.
Energy Conservation!!!!!!!!!!!
My, I am shocked, shocked I tell you to discover that a prominent Republican is a big liar.
When Irish eyes are lying…
Paul Ryan publicly speaking out against the stimulus and privately lobbying for stimulus money.
You Can't Explain That!
Objectimavism.
"…he does not believe flawed policy should get in the way of doing his job…"
"I was just following orders"
More Ohio Art record keeping, apparently
Sadly, when you have the kind of moola the R/R ticket has, there is no lie that cannot be sold as the truth to the vast majority of the the electorate.
Uh, that's $20 million in stimulus funds, Ms. Becky Nicehead. With an M, not a B.
Also,
“If Congressman Ryan is asked to help a Wisconsin entity applying for existing federal grant funds, he does not believe flawed policy should get in the way of doing his job and providing a legitimate constituent service to his employers,” the 2010 statement said.
Translation: Dude, that was primo reefer goin' round! No way I'm not gonna intercept it!
Popcorn's all popped but I'm not even getting a chance to leave my seat and fill my bowl!
The mean Energy Conservation Corporation (which sounds like Republican-eze for "find all the world's oil and burn it just for shit's and giggles") FORCED him to accept all that sweet sweet Obama black magic I tellz ya! Shoved it down his throat also, too.
All the cool kids were doing it.
Obama called out the Rs for just this sort of thing some time ago. Blasting the stimulus as worthless while attending ribbon-cutting ceremonies–and claiming job creation–within the same hour, I'll bet.
Kind of like Rick Perry threatening to secede 'cause he didn't want no bad gummit money, and then whining when Obama didn't plop down a big wad of money on his desk for the forest fires, which were not helped by Perry's slashing rural firefighter funds.
The bigger the lie, the more believable…
to the believers.
If you say it often enough (on Faux News) it becomes the truth.
Rmoney and Ryayn! Soulless mates! BFFs 4evar!
I bet they would have been a great gang tackling and hair cutting team in high school.
Ah, but he was against the stimulus before he was for it. And now he's against it again. So he's not lying now, and he wasn't lying in the first place. There's only a brief window of time where he was lying, and that window is now closed, so it is absolutely forbidden to speak of it, ever again. Move along, folks. Nothing to see here. Hey, can somebody notify security that there's a bunch of nasty liberals questioning things that Are Not To Be Questioned?
Why won't your sign the pledge to not say bad things about Mitt and Paul?
So which was it , the Department of Energy or the Department of Labor? Or was it the Ministry of Truth?
It was the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.
Duh!
ministry of magic.
Vetting? What exactly is vetting?
O/T but really important. Spoiler alert. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/16/donald-t…
Ah-ahahahahaaaa… Pareene wins (1) internet.
He is a Time Lord!
yeah but that one extra evil time lord who always shows up to make things bad for our hero.
THE MASTER!
In a related incident the Silversun Pickups told R'money to stop using their song, as they dislike the candidate.
Is it possible to be eye-raped? That picture. It makes me feel icky, like I need a post-rape shower. Those eyes have defiled me.
Curled up on the floor of a lab next to an eye wash station muttering "can't get clean."
Another lying Koch sucker from Wisconsin.
…he does not believe flawed policy should get in the way of doing his job…
I took the position with Mrs. Wadisay that flawed morality should not stand in the way of my relationships with other women. Ask me how that one worked out.
Is this akin to the sleeping with lesbians with one eye open theory?…..
Has anybody else noticed how much Ryan looks like Santorum?
I can't judge his trustworthiness until Bush looks him in the zombie-eye and is able to sense his lack of soul.
Y'know, between the android and the undead guy, you'd think the GOP ticket would be kinda cool.
Twilight has proven that even vampires and werewolves can be boring as hell, too.
It would explain a lot if Stephanie Meyer is the brains behind this campaign.
Nah- it's Beth Myers- a Rove protegee…
This deserves 10 times the upfists it has.
Ryan Stiles' less respectable cousin.
Leave Pauly alone. He is still basking in the glow of having been tapped by Mittens. Or was it plugged? Or was it fucked stupid? One of those. 69 everyone.
Wait. So that's his O face?
Actually, I wouldn't see anything hypocritical about a congressman trying to steer some of the sweet, sweet, stimulus dollars to his own state, even if he'd voted against those stimulus funds being available in the 1st place, because it's his duty to his constituents and, besides, somebody's going to get that money, but since they were all such huge dicks about it in the 1spt place, fuck them.
It's not even the hypocrisy-it's the LYING about it.
Wisconsin folks, does WE Energies still style themselves as "weenergies" in their ads and on their bills? I always loved that, and it seems strangely appropriate here.
Edit: Awww, they added a space. Still weeners.
Ryan retroactively UN-wrote those letters. Problem solved!
Now where were we?
he looks like a muppet. like remember that one time angel got turned into a muppet in the fifth season right before spike and angel and gunn and wesley and everybody died and there was a dragon?
that's what he looks like.
http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Angel
Puppet Angel is a) one of my favorite episodes of any show, ever, and b) about 20 million times cooler than Ryan will ever be.
That image is very disturbing. I wish you’d have chosen something else. I realize that it’s a shameful part of American history that we should never forget, but it’s too much.
It's like a bald-faced lie, only different.
Looks more like Alfred E. Nueman to me. See: http://www.leconcombre.com/alfred/img2/alfred_e_n…
But it must be true, I saw it on Romney's Etch-A-Sketch, er, whiteboard
Yep, Etchasketchiness in the Ryan method….
Well, Ryan won't say he has been taken for granted.
something's wrong with him
"Weird parts". Do you mean his gears and servos?
Five misguided Rep. Governors are refusing additional medicaid money from ACA. I guess Ryan just doesn't have the guts that they do.
This is just so weird, y'all. Like real reporters are asking like real questions of the candidates and shit. Has there been a paradigm shift?
That's a face right out of a comic book. The Lyin' King.
They are all Ryanesians now.
Seriously, can we put a black censorship bar or something over Ryan's eyes? He is really starting to creep me right the fuck out.
Now, see, if Sarah had done that, and somebody had asked her about it, she would have spewed five or six minutes of word salad without a detectable subject or predicate, walked around the stage in a stars and stripes bikini firing six-shooters at the ceiling, and then gone on Fox the next day to whine about how everybody is out to get her.
Ryan's just a prick, AND he has no entertainment value.
In the DC media, where a suit and tie are required to buy a cup of coffee, where nobody has colored hair or piercings, the words don't matter. What matters are the cuff links and business cards. That and the money.
Yanno, you'd think those that live their lives in the media would be smarter than that, and would avoid telling obvious whoppers that they know damned well are going to be debunked with ten seconds' research.
And you'd be wrong. Seriously, though, is there some widespread lack of short-term memory in Washington or what? Do these jamokes just not remember things and stuff?
Ryan also claims President Obama also did a terrible job to prevent the Boer War, the sinking of the SS Andrea Doria, Enron, and Russell Crowe's music career…..
"Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver" for sure- stolen from Stephanie Miller who stole it from Charlie Pierce or somebody else. That pix screams it.
Sorrow: knowledge that the meat will soon be gone.
Trust me, we have cats. I'm sure the'd feast for days if we dropped dead.
I love my dog and would not deny her the nourishment of eating me, should I drop dead.
Cats might not be so patient. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0ffwDYo00Q&fe…
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