Fact Checking the mendacity of 'Mittens'

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Time once again for Steve Benen's weekly fact check of the shameless shapeshifter and pathological liar, Willard "Mittens" Romney. A blockbuster this week with 36 entries. Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity, Vol. XXXIV:

In an interview aired this morning with George Stephanopoulos, the host told Mitt Romney that, despite his claims to the contrary, the Obama administration never showed sympathy for attackers in Egypt and Libya. How did the candidate explain the discrepancy? He didn't -- Romney dodged the question and let the lie stand.

Towards the end of the interview, however, Romney looked ahead to the upcoming debates and said he'll have a challenge to deal with: "[T]he president tends to, how shall I say it, to say things that aren't true."

There's no sense of shame and no sense of irony.

A Washington Post/ABC News poll out today shows a plurality of Americans believes the Obama campaign is saying things "it believes to be true" rather than "intentionally misleading people." On the other hand, a plurality of Americans believes the opposite about the Romney campaign.

If anyone's wondering why the public has this impression, consider the 34th installment of my weekly series, chronicling Mitt's mendacity.

1. At a campaign event in Virginia yesterday, Romney said he "couldn't believe" the president said "if you have a business you didn't build it, someone else did that."

Of course he couldn't believe it -- that's not even close to being true.

2. On Wednesday morning, Romney accused Obama administration officials of issuing an "apology for American values."

That never happened.

3. Romney also said, in response to violence in Libya and Egypt, that "the Obama administration's first response" to the violence was to "sympathize with those who waged the attacks."

Not in this reality.

4. As part of the same statement, Romney also said that the Cairo Embassy "put out a statement after their grounds had been breached. Protesters were inside the grounds. They reiterated that statement after the breach."

Nope, that's not true, either.

5. Pressed by reporters, Romney added, "I'm not going to take hypotheticals about what would have been known what and so forth. I, we responded last night to the events that happened in Egypt."

That's an understandable attempt to cover up the truth, but Romney's statement referred to "attacks on our diplomatic missions," not just Egypt.

Continue reading Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity, Vol. XXXIV.

Previous editions of Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity: Vol. I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII,XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, XVIII, XIX, XX, XXI, XXII, XXIII, XXIV, XXV, XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII, XXIX, XXX, XXXI, XXXII, XXXIII