Joe Sestak appeared on MSNBC yesterday in a strange, meandering, revisionist segment where he promoted the afternoon’s campaign visit from Bill Clinton in Scranton and spoke of taking “tough votes” to help the economy.
Sestak blamed the stagnant economy on the policies of President Bush and Pat Toomey (who served in Congress for a portion of Bush’s administration).
In one exchange, Sestak praised the job creation of the 1990s under President Clinton, and condemned the policies of President Bush:
Sestak: “We can’t go back to the Bush years. Can we go back to the Clinton years? Absolutely, and that’s where we’re headed.”
MSNBC: “But we’re in the Obama years now…”
In struggling to answer this rather fundamental point-of-fact, Sestak delivered a genuinely stunning line in what amounts to an extraordinary feat of mental gymnastics:
Sestak: ”We had to control the damage Congressman Toomey did when he said, throw out the window the requirement that President Clinton had had of pay as you go, if you want a new program, cancel another one, but balance the budget. And the president and we have put that back in place.” [emphasis added; you’ll find the audio at 2:13 in the video below]
I’m sorry, did I miss the memo? Sestak and Obama are “putting back in place” a balanced budget, pay-as-you-go spending policy?
How about that $1.2 trillion dollar federal deficit?
Here’s the video of Sestak’s MSNBC appearance: