Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Hofstra U: Home of the Whopper


Tony Perkins
Family Research Council Action

President Obama may have landed the Most Improved award in last night's debate, but he fell far short of the Most Trustworthy. Of the 7,350 words the President uttered at Hofstra University, pundits still can't agree on how many were actually true. From his Clintonesque answers on Libya to his outright deception on health care, the President's campaign is at least keeping fact-checkers employed. When the discussion turned to Planned Parenthood--a subject Obama referenced more times than Libya, marriage, and religious liberty combined--the President told so many whoppers he could have been an official Burger King spokesman. "When Governor Romney says that we should eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood," he said, "there are millions of women all across the country, who rely on Planned Parenthood for, not just contraceptive care, they rely on it for mammograms, for cervical cancer screenings."

If that's the case, then someone might want to let Planned Parenthood know, because their clinics are still telling women they can't provide mammograms. Even the Susan G. Komen Foundation debunked the myth when they cut off the abortion giant's funding. "We were giving them money, they were sending women out for mammograms. What we would like to have are clinics where we can directly fund mammograms." Lila Rose also exposed the sham in a 27-state undercover investigation. See for yourself here. "We don't provide those services whatsoever," a Planned Parenthood staffer admitted. Even the left-leaning Politifact acknowledges as much.

Meanwhile, Michelle Malkin, piggybacking on a story we covered yesterday, blasted three Hollywood starlets for spreading the President's lies. "If you don't vote for Obama, the doe-eyed celebrities imply, people will DIE, DIE, DIE!" Turns out, Malkin writes, Americans are at a much greater risk of that under this administration. "In the real world, it's the Obama administration that has actively presided over and promoted a drop in cancer screenings for both men and women over the past four years." Yet the President--unlike millions of women across America--escapes the Planned Parenthood debate without a scratch.

Although CNN's Candy Crowley largely ignored social issues, Governor Romney still managed to weave in the importance of family during an exchange on assault weapons. Touching on the need to cut down violence, he brought the conversation back home. "We need moms and dads helping raise kids. Wherever possible, the benefit of having two parents in the home--and that's not always possible. A lot of great single moms, single dads. But gosh, to tell our kids that before they have babies, they ought to think about getting married to someone--that's a great idea because if there's a two-parent family, the prospect of living in poverty goes down dramatically. The opportunities that the child will be able to achieve increase dramatically."

Later, the President tried to deflect from his record on another touchy subject: energy. At one point, he blamed high gas prices on the growing economy. Say what? "[W]hen I took office, the price of gasoline was $1.80, $1.86. Why is that?" the President asked. "Because the economy was on the verge of collapse." The man who refused to open the Keystone Pipeline later insisted that America is drilling more on public lands now than it did under President Bush. That will come as news to my fellow Louisianans, who lost work when the government stopped issuing permits for offshore drilling in the Gulf. "Let's look at the President's policies, all right, as opposed to the rhetoric," Romney fired back. "And the President's right in terms of the additional oil production, but none of it came on federal land. As a matter of fact, oil production is down 14% this year on federal land, and gas production is down 9%. Why? Because the President cut in half the number of licenses and permits for drilling on federal lands and in federal waters."