And Yet Toomey Still Misleads

Via thinkprogress, I found this interview with Congressman Pat Toomey.

The thingprogress piece points out how Toomey is being misleading about his plans to privatize Social Security:

Earlier this week, a host of Republican pundits tried to claim that no members of their party are proposing to privatize Social Security. “There’s no Republican, basically, standing up and saying that, and we haven’t for a very long time,” said Republican talking head Ed Rollins. Of course, plenty of Republicans have proposed just that, most notably Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), whose Roadmap for America includes the creation of personal Social Security accounts. And then there’s Pat Toomey, the Republican nominee for the Senate in Pennsylvania, who during an interview with Real Clear Politics touted his plan for Social Security, conveniently leaving out that he would privatize the system

Thinkprogress points out that:

In Toomey’s book, the first subhead under the “Transforming Social Security” chapter is “Personal Accounts Lead to Personal Prosperity.” And that’s really no surprise, considering Toomey said he was “thrilled” with President George W. Bush’s privatization scheme.

But that's not what I wanted to talk about.

What I wanted to point out about that interview is that Pat is still misleading the public about Justice Elena Kagan. Take a look:

During her testimony, she did nothing to overcome the legitimate concerns that I and others have about how she would rule on things like the First Amendment, given her support for the government's position on campaign finance regulation that would actually, by her own admission, permit the federal government to ban books.

She gave no comfort to those who think that she would support the idea of unlimited federal powers under the Commerce Clause. When asked about that, she indicated no belief in any real limits imposed by the Commerce Clause. When she was the dean of the law school at Harvard, I think she subverted the law that forbids colleges and universities from getting federal funds if they prevent the military from having equal access to recruiting opportunities on the campus.

Haven't we danced this dance before?

Yes, we have - in late July in response to this piece Toomey wrote in the P-G.

In that piece, Toomey mislead when he wrote that:

Ms. Kagan expressed the view that it was within Congress' power to pass a law that banned a pamphlet or book because of its advocacy of a political viewpoint.

This is simply not true. Neither is what Toomey told Real Clear Politics. Slate has the truth:

But what has so exercised Sen. McConnell, David Bossie, and others is Kagan's statement at argument—in response to more pressing by the conservative justices—that if a corporation produced "a pamphlet" directly calling for the election or defeat of a federal candidate ("Vote against Smith"), it would have to pay for it with its PAC funds. This is hardly the stuff of book-banning and government censorship. As Justice Stevens explained in his dissent in Citizens United, to call the PAC requirement a "ban" is "highly misleading, and needs to be corrected." [emphasis added.]

Pat has yet to correct himself.

Of course Mr. Wall Street can't help himself with the part about Hah-Vahd - incorrectly asserting (again) that Kagan "subverted federal law" when dealing with the military recruiters up there.

Kagan, as Law School Dean (and I can't believe I have to correct Pat on this AGAIN) pulled the plug on the military recruiters after the Solomon Amendment was declared unconstitutional. It was the Solomon Amendment that forced gave those recruters access.

So she was following the law, Pat, not "subverting" it.

So not only does Pat Toomey mislead the public about his support for the privatization of Social Security, he continues to mislead the public about Justice Elena Kagan's record.