Responding to a frustrated man who works for the Environmental Protection Agency and has lost many hours of work and pay because of sequestration — Paul Ryan concocted this fantastical story.
This was is something the president has done through the Budget Control Act. We didn’t like it so we passed two bills to replace it. Twice. I passed a bill twice. I passed a bill in December that said instead of doing the sequester, here’s how the government should cut to pay for it. They rejected it. Then this last March we passed a bill funding the government and giving the executive branch the authority and flexibility on top to implement the sequester.
What Paul Ryan conveniently leaves out is that he and many of his colleagues voted for the Budget Control Act, and that at the time of its passage he declared that it was major victory.
But you don’t need to take my word for it. You can read the statement he issued following the original passage of the bill in 2011 right here.
“The Budget Control Act represents a victory for those committed to controlling government spending and growing our economy. I applaud Speaker Boehner’s leadership in stopping tax increases on job creators, rejecting President Obama’s demands for a blank check to keep borrowing, and advancing real spending cuts and controls.”
Ryan also leaves out the part where the replacement bills he proposed and voted for would be worse than sequestration and would have, among other things, shifted cuts to the Pentagon back onto social programs.
And not only that. His latest budget proposal was even more radical than the budget he and Mitt Romney ran on in 2012. (see: here, here, here, and here)
Paul Ryan isn’t just a liar. He’s a coward. He won’t take responsibility for his policy proposals or his votes. It’s always someone else’s fault.
(H/T ThinkProgress)