Romney’s Chart Fraud

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On Tuesday, Massachussetts Governor Mitt Romney unveiled his “jobs plan,” which unsurprisingly mostly involves tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy. Oliver Willis catches Romney engaging in a pretty blatant example of chart fraud, highlighting job loss during 2007 and 2008, the last two years of the Bush administration, as part of the “Obama recovery.”

Here’s the thing: With employment still hovering around nine percent, it’s not like Romney needs to lie in order to go after Obama’s record on the economy. Recent polls have shown nothing but grim news for the president on this front. Why be so conspicuously dishonest about it?

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In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

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