The president is a socialist.

This myth began with a 2008 campaign stop in Ohio, when then-Sen. Barack Obama was caught on tape telling Joe Wurzelbacher ("Joe the Plumber") that we needed to "spread the wealth around." His Republican opponent John McCain said that "sounded a lot like socialism" and cited the quote often during the campaign.

Conservatives have echoed the charge throughout Obama's presidency. Writing in Commentary magazine in 2010, Jonah Goldberg accused him of aiming to "nationalize" two auto companies, stage a "partial government takeover" of health care and seize "managerial control" of Wall Street. None of this is true. By temporarily putting major banks under government control, the Troubled Asset Relief Program bailout contained socialist elements — but that didn't make Obama any more of a socialist than then-President George W. Bush and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, who launched the rescue. Obama rejected nationalizing banks and made it clear that he had no interest in running the auto companies receiving TARP money.