May 11, 2022

White House press secretary Jen Psaki continues her farewell slam dunk contest tour. On Tuesday, she spoke with reporters about the Biden administration’s plans to lower inflation and help the working families and seniors in our country that are most affected by the widening economic inequality in our society.

The Biden administration didn’t have much work to do since Sen. Rick Scott, chair the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has offered up a truly horrendous (and wildly unpopular) Republican Party platform. It is filled with promises to destroy popular programs like Social Security while raising money by taxing about 100 million working Americans and seniors—and no, not the rich ones.

Psaki faced some bizarre questions backed with zero facts, and seemingly only a mealy-mouthed quote from Sen. Scott about how Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told him to mumble more. Actually, what ill-informed reporter Alexandria Hoff of Fox News was attempting to do was punch a hole in Biden’s assertion earlier in the day that the Republican Party had signed on to Scott’s terrible platform. She asked Psaki: “Are there any Republicans that you can think of, or the President might be referencing, that [are] currently behind this?” Psaki had a big bag of receipts at the ready.

Psaki began by offering up one example in the form of a question. “Do you count the chairman of the Republican National Committee an important Republican?” This was met by a piss-poor attempt at rhetorical semantics that Jen Psaki obliterated with her big brain.

“He is the chairman of a committee but if no other—“ the reporter began to say. But HE ain’t nothing, as Jen Psaki interrupted to remind the reporter “--She, it’s actually a she. The chairman of the Republican Party,” Psaki responded. Some right wingers have argued that Hoff thought Psaki was asking about Sen. Rick Scott when she replied “he,” and while that might be true and that might not be true, the fact remains, her question is based on a fallacy. That makes it a fallacious statement.

This is why Jen Psaki went on from there and opened up her binder to rattle off some receipts: “The chairman of the Republican Party, Ronna McDaniel, praised Senator Scott’s proposal as, quote, ‘a clear plan for Republicans’ that offers, quote, ‘real solutions.’ She’s the chairwoman of the Party. Rick Scott is not a random senator. He is literally in charge of winning back the Senate for Republicans and what the plan is. So he is the person who put forward this plan.”

Here’s a visual aid for you all.

ScreenshotTwitterRonnaMcDaniel.jpg

Psaki was not done with this GOP talking point masquerading as a reporter, so sheoffered up some more Republican officials who have been quoted and recorded and written stuff down in support of raising working families’ taxes while further siphoning money into the pockets of the wealthiest donors. “Senator Ron Johnson [of Wisconsin] has called the congressional GOP plan quote ‘a positive thing,’ Senator Mike Braun [of Indiana] said quote ‘I’m glad Rick did it,’ Senator Tommy Tuberville [of Alabama] said he was quote  ‘on board with the Congressional GOP plan,’ Congressman Matt Gaetz [of Florida] said he was quote ‘Proud of Senator Rick Scott for providing this bold agenda.’ So, not only that, which seems to be quite a range of Republicans, but there isn’t an alternative plan they’ve put forward. So, it’s either this—put together by the person who is leading the effort to win back the Senate—or nothing.”

A quick comparison of the two plans:

Republished with permission from Daily Kos.

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