March 07, 2014 03:35 PM UTC

Today In BS: Paul Ryan And The "Free Government Lunch"

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• by: Colorado Pols

A story from outside Colorado, but illustrative for when the same thing happens here. Which it does. A lot. Raw Story:

[Rep. Paul] Ryan’s remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Thursday regarding a “young boy from a very poor family” relying on “a government program” for his lunches was strikingly similar to the premise of the book An Invisible Thread, which recounted author Laura Schroff’s 1986 meeting with an 11-year-old “homeless panhandler” named Maurice, who was receiving lunches through a school program…

On Thursday, Ryan recounted nearly the exact same story, attributing it to Wisconsin Department of Children and Families Director Eloise Anderson, who was appointed by Gov. Scott Walker (R). But Ryan said it was Anderson who met a young student who told her he did not want a lunch from a government program, but one served in a brown paper bag.

“He wanted one, he said, because he knew a kid with a brown paper bag had someone who cared for him,” Ryan said. “This is what the left does not understand.” [Pols emphasis]

The Los Angeles Times has a little more of Ryan's speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference yesterday:

"She once met a young boy from a very poor family, and every day at school, he would get a free lunch from a government program. He told Eloise he didn’t want a free lunch. He wanted his own lunch, one in a brown-paper bag just like the other kids. He wanted one, he said, because he knew a kid with a brown-paper bag had someone who cared for him."

In Ryan's hands, this became a lesson for "the left….What they’re offering people is a full stomach and an empty soul."

But as it turns out, Ryan's story was lifted and misattributed from an almost thirty-year-old (that is, Reagan administration) story about a panhandling kid in New York City, not Wisconsin–who didn't want the author's money, but was happy to take food in a brown paper bag because it implied a caring home life. The true story had nothing whatsoever to do with a "government program" of any kind. Times:

So we start with a story about a harried sales executive learning about life from an abandoned child. That gets transformed, via the Republican wringer, into a lesson about the supposedly soul-sapping effect of a government nutritional program, and thence into a reproach to "the left," which doesn't care about the souls of our children, only about making sure they're, you know, fed. This is how the old game of "Telephone" is played in Washington today.

Once outed, Ryan issued an apology of sorts via his Facebook page: "I have just learned that Secretary Anderson misspoke, and that the story she told was improperly sourced. I regret failing to verify the original source of the story, but I appreciate her taking the time to share her insights."

Rep. Paul Ryan has a long and very well-documented history of petty dishonesty during stump speeches, including the one from 2012 about having climbed "40" Colorado fourteener peaks. You would think that so many repeat examples of Ryan demonstrably lying would convince him to, you know, stop lying.

But apparently, that would make for less exciting speeches.