(h/t ThinkProgress)

Seriously, I don't understand this. Why don't Republicans understand the concept of videotape? This is not hard: We have records of what they've said in the past. We know when they've flip-flopped or are being hypocritical by showing them their own words.

Now granted, it's rare that you see a tradmed outlet confronting a Republican politician for his doublespeak, but that's exactly what Jonathan Karl did to Rep. Paul Ryan on his blasting President Obama for the looming sequester cuts. H/T to ThinkProgress for the video and transcripts:

As Karl pointed out, when Congress was debating the Budget Control Act in August of 2011, Ryan supported the framework and urged his fellow Republicans to vote for the sequester:

KARL: Congressman, I’ve heard you Republicans for a long time. This was the president’s idea on and on and on but let’s look at your own words. What you said right after the law putting this in place was passed in August of 2011. These are your words. You said “what conservatives like me have been fighting for for years are statutory caps on spending, literally legal caps in law that says government agencies cannot spend over a set amount of money and if they breach that amount across the board sequester comes in to cut that spending. You can’t turn it out without a supermajority. We got that into law.” Now, it sounds to me there like if you weren’t taking credit for the idea of the sequester, you were certainly suggesting it was a good idea.

RYAN: So those are the budget caps on discretionary spending. Those occurred. We want those. Everybody wants budget caps. The sequester that we’re talking about now is backing up the super committee. Remember the Super Committee in addition to those caps was supposed to come up with 1.2 trillion in savings. The Republicans on the super committee offered even higher revenues in exchange for spending cuts as part of that. It was rejected by the president and the Democrats. So no resolution occurred and therefore the sequester is occurring.

So Ryan can make his bones in Republican leadership and position himself as a Very. Serious. Budget. Pointman. by pushing for these automatic sequester cuts...until it gets to the point where Congress is too inept to come together to present President Obama a budget that is acceptable enough to pass to the majority of the members of Congress. Then it's all Obama's fault.

With Cantor and Kyl exiting the debt ceiling debates with their best drama queen flourish this week, it was inevitable that the debt ceiling would be of discussion on the Sunday shows. But in true disinformation fashion that really embodies the state of journalism these days, the conversation falls far short in really pointing out what the problems are.

For a low info voter (or someone not forced by John Amato to watch these shows week after week), it sounds as if this is just a politics-as-usual posturing by both parties...a kabuki theater where everyone understands the ending. But let's be clear: this theater, these dramatics are wholly the fault of the Republican Party, because they have stated that their number one goal--more important than taking care of their citizens, their fat money donors, hell, the country as a whole--is to make Obama a one-term president. They raised the debt ceiling nineteen times in eight years during the Bush administration without once feeling the need to create this drama. As Chrystia Freeland points out, the GOP's choice to play these games right up to the deadline is causing uncertainty in the market as well.

So why not call a spade a spade and point out exactly the consequences of the GOP's gamesmanship?

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Remember the video of the guy in the "pimp costume" who got advice from ACORN employees on how to run his prostitution ring? Turns out the whole story was just a lie, a doctored-video smear job on an important organization. The guy never wore a "pimp costume" and the real, undoctored videos showed that ACORN employees did nothing wrong. But a lie travels around the world before the corporate media bothers to check the facts. The "news" media blasted the story everywhere, and Congress was so outraged they forced ACORN to close its doors. And here we are again.

The corporate media is blasting out the story that the IRS "targeted conservative groups." Some in the media say there was "IRS harassment of conservative groups." Some of the media are going so far as claiming that conservative groups were "audited."

This story that is being repeated and treated as "true" is just not what happened at all. It is one more right-wing victimization fable, repeated endlessly until the public has no choice except to believe it.

Conservative Groups Were Not "Targeted," "Singled Out" Or Anything Else

You are hearing that conservative groups were "targeted." What you are not hearing is that progressive groups were also "targeted." So were groups that are not progressive or conservative.

All that happened here is that groups applying to the IRS for special tax status were checked to see if they were engaged in political activity. They were checked, not targeted. Only one-third of the groups checked were conservative groups.

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