Bush Chief Political Strategist: Paul Ryan’s Speech Was Full Of Lies

Paul Ryan’s speech before the Republican National Convention was riddled with lies, including a tall-tale blaming President Obama for the closure of a GM plant that announced its shutdown in June 2008. On ABC’s This Week on Sunday, Matthew Dowd, chief political strategist for former President Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign, criticized Ryan’s for its many falsehoods, saying, “at some point, the truth should matter”:

DOWD: Paul Ryan, what he did in his speech, I think so stretched the truth. And I like Paul Ryan, have a lot of great respect for Paul Ryan, but the elements that he said about closing the GM plant which closed before Barack Obama took President [sic], about the Simpson-Bowles bill which he opposed and then all of a sudden he faults Barack Obama for. At some point, the truth should matter…He was trying to convey that Barack Obama was responsible for the closing of that GM plant and that isn’t true.

Watch it:

The Bush administration actually praised the closure of the GM plant to which Ryan referred, calling it a sign that GM was “adapting well.” So even former Bush figures are willing to cop to what Ryan won’t.