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* Remember this Bobby Schilling TV ad I posted yesterday?…
Munos: [Congresswoman Cheri Bustos] voted to cut veteran benefits by six billion dollars.
Ron Tady (East Moline): Six billion dollars!
Moffett: That’s billion with a B.
Munos: After promising she never would.
Moffett: How could you cut our benefits, Cheri? […]
Tady: How could you? Shame on you.
* Well, FactCheck.org takes a look at the vote in question and pronounces it “shamefully misleading”…
The ad refers to the bill introduced last Dec. 10 by Republican Rep. Paul Ryan and Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, chairs of their respective budget committees in the House and Senate. Ryan, who was also the GOP vice presidential nominee in 2012, said at the time: “I’m proud of this agreement. It reduces the deficit — without raising taxes. … I ask all my colleagues in the House to support it.”
And the deal was approved overwhelmingly, by a vote of 332 to 94 in the House on Dec. 12, 2013, with 169 Republicans and 163 Democrats voting in favor. The Senate followed suit a few days later, passing the package on Dec. 18 by a vote of 64 to 36. This time, all 55 members of the Democratic caucus voted in favor, but only nine Republicans did so.
The deal avoided any tax increase or revisions to Social Security, Medicare or other major entitlement programs, and restored some earlier “sequester” cuts to the military budget. But one of the offsetting cuts was a reduction in future cost-of-living adjustments to the pensions of military retirees that would cut spending by an estimated $6.2 billion over 10 years, beginning in fiscal year 2016.
That would have affected about 750,000 military retirees, only a small fraction of the roughly 22 million that the Department of Veterans Affairs estimates have served in the U.S. armed forces. So the large majority of veterans would not have been affected.
Nevertheless, the pension cut quickly drew fire from military and veterans groups, prompting a rapid retreat by Congress. The House voted Feb. 11 to restore the old cost-of-living formula for all who had signed up for military service prior to 2014. The vote was 326 to 90, and Bustos was among the 120 Democrats who voted in favor. The next day, the Senate voted 95 to 3 for final passage, and the president signed the repeal into law on Feb. 15.
Given all that, we find the ad to be shamefully misleading. The man in the ad who says, “Shame on you, Congresswoman Bustos,” might accurately have said instead, “Thank you, Congresswoman Bustos, for restoring our full military pensions.”
* She’s being hammered for doing the right thing. She and the rest of Congress retreated, which was chicken-hearted, but the right political move. They retreated partly because they could all foresee ads like Schilling’s in their next elections.
There are no innocents here, but it is most definitely a misleading ad. I even wonder whether any of Schilling’s vets would’ve been among the tiny fraction who would’ve received a slightly lower COLA.
posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 10:30 am
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Fortunately, Bobby Schilling is emotionally and psychologically immune to shame.
– MrJM
Comment by MrJM Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 10:40 am
One of the few major bipartisan bills Congress could actually pass and you get whacked for it.
Comment by wordslinger Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 10:56 am
Schilling fails to mention that if he were still in Congress, he’d have voted for that bill.
Comment by Aldyth Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 11:02 am
I’m not pleased by his actions regarding this issue. I know the race is tight, but this wasn’t how to get an edge, in my opinion.
Comment by VanillaMan Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 11:03 am
So you can vote for cuts, as long as they never take place?
Is that the standard here? What am I missing?
Was it misleading for Bustos to claim that Bobby voted to end Medicare? Even after he voted to make Ryan’s provisions optional?
Comment by I miss Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 1:28 pm
Schilling’s operation is a joke. Always has been and always will be. Bustos is a pro and she’ll win by at least 8 points.
Hopefully he’ll go away after that. He surely can’t win in 2016.
Comment by Up and Adam Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 1:32 pm
His country club road ad in the last campaign was also shamefully misleading. Seems to be a habit with Schilling.
Comment by Streator Curmudgeon Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 1:40 pm
Schilling is trying the same thing he tried in 2012. Just wait till Bustos and her huge war chest start pounding him. This ad gives her the ammo to come up with a great reply ad that will make voters love her
Comment by Told You So Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 4:11 pm
It’s sad that the only way Bobby Schilling knows how to play the game is to mislead voters. What a disgrace.
Comment by ethicslover Thursday, Sep 18, 14 @ 10:30 pm
The question is a yes or no answer. Did Ms. Bustos vote to cut $6 Billion from disabled veterans and their families. The answer is YES. So the FACT is yes, Cheri voted to cut Veteran benefits. It doesn’t matter how any other member of Congress voted for the cuts , because Shilling is not running against them.
Comment by HareCutter Friday, Sep 19, 14 @ 7:14 am
Harecutter — Yes there was a cut in veterans benefits which is why factcheck.org labeled the advertisement as ‘misleading’ instead of a flat out lie.
I’m not surprised to see this coming out of the Schilling campaign. When your opponent has 3 times the amount of cash on hand then there’s really not too much to lose for him.
Comment by ANON Friday, Sep 19, 14 @ 1:48 pm