WaPo Fact Checker Gives Obama 4 Pinocchios For Janitor Claim (pay cuts) [View all]

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WaPo Fact Checker Gives Obama 4 Pinocchios For Janitor Claim

In his remarks highlighting draconian budget cuts known as sequestration at the White House on Friday, President Barack Obama claimed that even janitors working on Capitol Hill would receive a pay cut.

“Starting tomorrow everybody here, all the folks who are cleaning the floors at the Capitol," Obama said at a press conference. "Now that Congress has left, somebody’s going to be vacuuming and cleaning those floors and throwing out the garbage. They’re going to have less pay. The janitors, the security guards, they just got a pay cut, and they’ve got to figure out how to manage that. That’s real.”

Glenn Kessler, who fact checks for the Washington Post, obtained a memo from the Architect of the Capitol, who manages janitorial staff, debunking the claim.

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Secretary of Education Arne Duncan also got into hot water for embellishing harmful effects of sequestration this week, when he claimed the cuts already cost teachers jobs.

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/wapo-fact-checker-gives-obama-4-pinocchios-for

Evidently, the fact checking orgs have decided it's a lie to claim sequester will hurt public employees. From the WaPo fact check:

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A White House official noted at first that the memo does refer to “further reducing overtime.” Technically, that could mean some janitors might see less pay, but it’s unclear how many actually earn overtime. Under the reasonable person test, a possible reduction in overtime appears a bit different from “just got a pay cut.”

The White House thought our position was unreasonable. “Folks who are getting paid hourly aren’t breaking up their paycheck to say, well, technically this portion of my paycheck came from my overtime pay, so I’m not going to actually count that towards my income,” an official said. “They rely on that overtime and they pay their bills with that income. So, we disagree with this ‘reasonable person test.’”

Then, another White House official asserted that the janitors--both part-time and full-time--are contracted out by the Architect of the Capitol. “Since the AOC said that the contracts would be reduced or eliminated, it’s hard to convincingly make the case those contract workers won’t be affected,” he claimed.

In other words, White House officials assumed there was an impact but they were not exactly sure themselves. We will also note that the president said the pay cut was happening “tomorrow.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/sequester-spin-obamas-incorrect-claim-of-capitol-janitors-receiving-a-pay-cut/2013/03/01/3407535c-82a9-11e2-b99e-6baf4ebe42df_blog.html

Kessler: Losing overtime pay isn't "technically" a pay cut, contract workers don't count and if furloughs are deemed necessary in the coming weeks, so what? Republicans are running around claiming all sorts of dire consequences in their strategy to blame the President.

Does the WaPo fact checker have an agenda? Here's a WaPo fact check from February 26:

Can you trust what any politician says about the impact of the sequester? Let’s just say all facts and figures should be viewed with skepticism.

The sequester is a remarkably blunt instrument, slashing many programs with equal vigor. Another issue is that the federal fiscal year, which ends Oct. 1, has just seven months left, so these reductions must be squeezed into a shorter time frame. That heightens the pain to federal agencies, especially because some of the biggest parts of the budget (such as Social Security) have been walled off from any cuts.

There is also a ramp-up effect. On March 1, when the sequester goes into effect, the cuts are not immediate; they will build up over time, so the effects may be difficult to discern at first.

These cuts also would come after the federal budget has grown dramatically in recent years. In some ways, the reductions would undo budget increases that President Obama engineered as part of the stimulus law. But even so, this round of reductions would still leave many programs at spending levels near or above what they were when Obama took office. Whether that is a good or bad thing is in the eye of the beholder.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/spin-and-counterspin-in-the-sequester-debate/2013/02/25/e709db58-7fa4-11e2-b99e-6baf4ebe42df_blog.html

What utter bullshit. In that piece, Kessler admits the sequester time frame "heightens the pain to federal agencies," but only because Social Security isn't in the mix. Social Security has nothing to do with deficit reduction. It's clear that Kessler decided to use his fact check to shill for Republicans. I mean, where the hell did he get that bizarre claim about the stimulus? He needs to get his facts straight.

For the record, last year, over President Obama's first four years, the deficit shrunk by about $300 billion. This year, the deficit is projected to be about $600 billion smaller than when the president took office. We are, in reality, currently seeing the fastest deficit reduction in several generations.

http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/22/17056939-a-well-kept-fiscal-secret