Paul Ryan's Freudian slip

We all misspeak occasionally, and if all of our statements were being recorded round the clock, they would frequently be embarrassing.  So we shouldn't fixate obsessively on every mistaken, confused, careless, or unintentionally comical statement by a public figure.  But some Freudian slips are just too striking, and too revealing, to ignore.

Paul Ryan recently provided an irresistible example.  This comes from the Washington Post 's Dana Milbank, reporting on the public rollout of the latest Ryan Budget:

CNN’s Dana Bash asked whether Ryan was being “disingenuous” by including new taxes that he opposed.

“We’re not going to refight the past,” he explained.

If Ryan is “not going to fight the past,” Fox News’s Chad Pergram asked, why is he still trying to repeal Obamacare?

“This to us is something that we’re not going to give up on,” Ryan answered, “because we’re not going to give up on destroying the health-care system for the American people.”

Well, he got that right. Here it is on video:



—Jeff Weintraub