The election still isn’t settled in Texas’ 23rd congressional district, where voters are being asked to go back to the polls on Dec. 12 to decide a runoff between Republican incumbent Rep. Henry Bonilla and his Democratic opponent, former Rep. Ciro Rodriguez. Bonilla’s latest ad features a former FBI agent telling viewers that Rodriguez sponsored a “a new law to free suspected terrorists,” was behind a meeting of “Islamic radicals” at the US Capitol, and “took contributions from those radicals.” The ad features a photograph of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, who was convicted in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

We find this ad deceitful on several counts. The “new law” Rodriquez sponsored wasn’t to “free terrorists.” It was a bipartisan proposal to prevent the government from using classified intelligence information in certain immigration hearings. It was backed by the ACLU and some conservative Republicans alike, not just “Islamic radicals.” The meeting in question wasn’t “sponsored” by Rodriguez, though he may have reserved the room at the request of those who did sponsor it. And as for “contributions from those radicals,” we found only a single donation of $250 that might fit that description.

Furthermore, there’s also no evidence that Rodriguez knew the Blind Sheik or did anything on his behalf. The sheik would not have been freed by the legislation that Rodriguez co-sponsored, which would have applied only to immigration hearings and not to criminal trials. The ad is a misleading appeal to fear on the terrorism issue.

Analysis

The Blind Sheikh

Why does the blind Egyptian Muslim cleric Omar Abdel-Rahman appear in this ad? Probably because he’s a terrorist figure that most viewers will recognize, convicted of seditious conspiracy after an investigation that grew out of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Bonilla’s surrogate in this ad, retired FBI agent Al Ortiz, connects Abdel-Rahman to Rodriguez in a roundabout and misleading way. He says, “In 2000 a summit was held in the US Capitol where Islamic radicals called for his [the cleric’s] release and a new law to free suspected terrorists.”

In fact, the meeting was  a “Summit on Secret Evidence” in a House office building, the main thrust of which was to support a bill, HR 2010, to bar the use of secret evidence by the government in immigration hearings. It may be true that some attendees also called for the cleric’s release. However, the group that organized the meeting was the National Committee Against Repressive Legislation, which traces its roots back to the McCarthy era, long before the rise of today’s Islamic radicals.

The only support Bonilla’s campaign gives for the claim that Rodriguez “sponsored” the meeting is  testimony in 2000 by Steven Emerson, a terrorism expert who told the House Judiciary Committee that Rodriguez had reserved the room used for the gathering. Even if true, that shows nothing more than an effort to marshal support for the bill he was cosponsoring.

Secret Evidence

The bill, the Secret Evidence Repeal Act, which Rodriguez co-sponsored as a member of the House in 1999, was of course not designed “to free suspected terrorists.” The goal of the proposed legislation was to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to allow aliens in immigration hearings to see the evidence against them, even if that evidence is classified. It had support across a wide ideological spectrum: it was backed by the liberal American Civil Liberties Union and eventually gained 128 co-sponsors including Republican Reps. Bob Barr of Georgia and John Sununu of New Hampshire, both of them quite conservative.

Proponents of the bill argued at a House Judiciary Committee hearing in 2000 that secret evidence “in the form of classified information often consists of mere rumor and innuendo, inherently unverified and unverifiable.” Opponents of the legislation argued that the changes were too broad, limiting INS official’s ability to use confidential information to deny potential security threats entrance into the United States. The FBI told the committee that secret evidence was in fact rarely used, claiming that it was involved in only 11 out of 300,000 pending immigration cases.

The topic was a hot one in 2000, so much so that even Gov. George Bush took a stand in his presidential campaign — against secret evidence. He raised it in his second debate with Vice President Al Gore that year, and in a written statement entitled “Governor George W. Bush’s Record of Inclusion” he said:

Bush: On the issue of secret evidence – another creation of the Clinton/Gore Justice Department – I am also troubled by the disturbing stories of how this policy is being implemented. More and more, new immigrants, often Arab or Muslim immigrants, face deportation or even imprisonment based on evidence they’ve never seen and never been able to dispute. That’s not the American way.

Newsweek reported that after Bush took office, the Justice Department prepared a plan to restrict the use of secret evidence. It was supposed to be presented by Bush to a group of Muslim leaders at a meeting in the White House scheduled for 2:00 p.m. on the afternoon of September 11, 2001, a meeting that never took place. After 9/11 the notion of limiting government’s ability to use classified evidence slipped right off the “to-do” list.

However, it is not the case, as the ad suggests, that criminals like Abdel-Rahman, who were convicted in federal court, would have been freed by this measure. The only “suspected terrorists” who might have been released would have been those against whom no criminal charges could be brought, only immigration proceedings in which classified evidence was crucial to having an individual deported. Abdel-Rahman is serving a life sentence in a Colorado prison.

Tainted Contributions?

Ortiz tells viewers that Rodriguez also “took contributions from these radicals while pushing the law they wanted.” We did find a single contribution of $250 from Abdurahman Alamoudi, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was convicted for his role in facilitating the financing of a Libyan-backed plot to assassinate the Saudi Crown Prince. However, he was  sentenced in 2004, and his contribution was given six years earlier in 1998. Alamoudi has also given money to former Rep. Bob Ney, the Ohio Republican caught up in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal; former Sen. Spencer Abraham, the Michigander who became Bush’s energy secretary; and Hillary Rodham Clinton and Bush himself, both of whom received their donations in 2000 and returned them later the same year.

The ad gets a couple of smaller points wrong as well: The summit meeting it refers to wasn’t held in the Capitol, but in a House office building nearby, and the World Trade Center was not “attacked by Sheik Abdel-Rahman.” The cleric was convicted as a result of an investigation of the 1993 bombing, but not for carrying it out.

Ortiz concludes by telling us, “I urge you, check the record. Judgment matters.” Well, we did, and it’s our judgment that this ad misrepresents the facts.

– by Brooks Jackson, Viveca Novak, James Ficaro and Justin Bank

Media

Watch Henry Bonilla Ad: “Ties”

Sources

Jefferson, Greg and Joseph S. Stroud, “Bonilla hits Rodriguez on terrorism matters.” San Antonio Express News, 5 December 2006.

Isikoff, Michael and Mark Hosenball, “Terror Watch: Friends in High Places.” Newsweek, 12 May 2005.

The post Campaign Distortions in Texas Runoff appeared first on FactCheck.org.

All year we’ve focused on what was true or false in the flood of 2006 campaign advertising, and we wrote about those that we found twisted, distorted, misleading or fabricated. Now, as we wait for the ballots to be counted, we look back on some of that ads that caught our attention for other reasons.

We offer these FactCheck.org awards just for fun.

Analysis

Here they are, the FactCheck.org Awards for 2006. We present them in no particular order, and with no claim of scientific accuracy. These are just our opinions. Feel free to agree or not, as you please.

Charlton Heston Award for Worst Impersonation of Moses
Winner: Colorado No on 42

This ad, set “somewhere in the mountains of Colorado,” features a Moses-like figure speaking hyperbolically to God about the supposed evils of ballot initiative 42, which would amend the state Constitution to provide for an annual increase in the minimum wage that’s pegged to inflation. “An annual minimum wage increase in stone for eternity,” moans the faux Moses.

This is exaggeration of Biblical proportions. There’s no Constitutional amendment, state or federal, that can’t be undone, though it’s harder than getting rid of a pesky statute. Remember Prohibition? (No, we don’t either, thank goodness.) That was also known as the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which went into effect in 1920. It was repealed by the 21st Amendment, which took effect almost 14 years later.

Busiest Supporting Actor
Winner: President Bush

President Bush was far and away the most frequent supporting actor – in Democratic ads. His name or image have appeared in at least 186 Democratic ads since Oct. 1, by our count, and we probably missed some that appeared in smaller TV markets not covered by the Campaign Media Analysis Group. The strategy is clear: whether they’re referring to a Republican candidate as a “supporter” of the “Bush agenda” or as a “rubberstamp,” Democrats believe the President’s low approval ratings are a stone they can use to sink their opponents.  The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee’s ad, “Together,” which began running on Sept 19, is a classic of the genre.

Busiest Supporting Actress
Winner: Hillary Clinton

Democratic Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York got the most mentions in Republican ads holding forth the supposed horrors of a Democratic-controlled Senate. We counted 11 since Oct. 1. This one from GOP Senate Candidate Pete Ricketts in Nebraska is typical, saying Democrat Ben Nelson will “vote to put Democrats in charge,” including Sen. Clinton who “wants higher taxes.”

The runner-up for this award is “San Francisco Liberal Nancy Pelosi,” who is mentioned in at least 6 GOP ads as a reason not to vote for a Democrat who would in turn vote to make her Speaker of the House.

 Kinkiest Action Figure
Winner: Kinky Friedman

Independent Jewish Cowboy Kinky Friedman, who’s running for governor of Texas, used the “Kinky Friedman Action Figure” as a major element of his campaign strategy. The plastic Kinky had the following responses to tough questions from reporters in this ad:

On border issues:
“I’ll keep us out of war with Oklahoma.”

On getting the Democrats and Republicans to work together:
“I’m running for Governor, not God.”

It is unclear whether the doll comes with karate chop action or hair you can style yourself.

The “Who Needs Enemies?” Award
Winner: Idaho State Rep. Bill Sali

State Rep. Bill Sali, a Republican running in Idaho ’s First Congressional District, appears to have few friends even in his own party. The quotes in this ad are not only devastating, but accurate, at least as reported by the press  – except that state House Speaker Bruce Newcomb’s full quote was even better than we’re told in the ad. “That idiot is an absolute idiot,” he opined. Forcefully. Newcomb’s comments were made when Sali refused to stop talking about an alleged link between abortions and breast cancer on the floor of the state House last spring, even though a fellow legislator (the Democratic leader) who was a breast cancer survivor began crying. The House’s 11 Democrats walked out to protest Sali’s remarks.

Cult Classic Award
Winner: Vernon Robinson
(Recognized for the body of his work)

Taken together, Robinson’s ads make up an anthology he could title, “The Attack of the 40-Foot Liberal.” In one that has received wide (and free!) exposure on cable news programs, Robinson compares modern day America to the Twilight Zone, illegal immigrants to intergalactic alien invaders, and equates the 1950’s show Leave It to Beaver with “traditional American values.” An announcer says, “You can burn the American flag and kill a million babies a year, but you can’t post the Ten Commandments or say God in public.” (Note to Vern: Actually, you can say God in public. The Supreme Court unanimously overturned that ruling against reciting “under God” in public schools.)

Other Robinson ads included:

• A claim that Democratic incumbent Brad Miller “has no trouble spending your money…he would just rather spend it on sex” (we debunked that claim here ).
• A radio spot in which Robinson claimed, backed by a mariachi soundtrack, that if incumbent Democrat Brad Miller “had his way, America would be nothing but one big fiesta for illegal aliens and homosexuals.”
• A mutation of the “Beverly Hillbillies” theme song that closes with this tag line: “Hey all you illegals. Put your shoes on. Go home. Don’t come back now, y’hear?”

Best Send-up of an Ineffective Federal Mandate
Winner: Phil Maymin

Libertarian House candidate Phil Maymin, running in Connecticut’s 4th district, ran a cable-only spot spoofing the “stand by your ad” provision of the McCain-Feingold campaign law. That’s the federal requirement that candidates appear in their own ads and say “I approve this message,” or words to that effect. The idea was to reduce the volume of distasteful attacks and false accusations by forcing candidates to take personal responsibility for them.

Clearly, that hasn’t worked.

In this ad Maymin gets a rubdown from a voter who’s clueless about who he is or what a Libertarian stands for, asking  “You’re a librarian? . . . You’re Joe Lieberman?” Maymin explains, and then says “I approve this massage.”

Best Musical Score
Winner: Ned Lamont

This ad’s shrieking strings, reminiscent of the score in the Alfred Hitchcock classic “Psycho,” seemed to us a perfect parody of much of this year’s crop of attack ads, with their over-the-top appeals to fear. Imagine this score behind, for example, the RNC’s ad suggesting that voting Democratic might lead to a terrorist attack with a nuclear weapon, which we critiqued here , and you get the idea.

 The “Empty Calories” Award
Winner: Americans United

This 15-second ad from a liberal group funded by labor unions takes the cake (so to speak) for lack of substance. It shows an elderly couple cutting a single hot dog in half to share for their meal, while the announcer asks “If George Bush and his backers in Congress privatize Social Security and cut benefits in half, what will you have to cut in half?” That wildly misrepresents Bush’s proposal, which would not have touched benefits for anybody currently receiving them or about to receive them, and would have allowed benefits for future recipients to grow, though more slowly than under current law. The plan died last year for lack of Republican support in any case.

Awards Committee: Brooks Jackson, Viveca Novak, Justin Bank, James Ficaro & Emi Kolawole.

Media

Watch Pete Ricketts Ad: “In Charge”

Watch CO No on 42 Ad: “Hello”

Watch Grant Ad: “Republicans”

Watch Vernon Robinson Ad: “Twilight Zone”

Watch Kinky Friedman Ad: “Action Doll”

Watch Ned Lamont Ad: “Horror”

Watch American United Ad: “Hot Dog”

Watch Maymin Ad: “Massage”

Watch DSCC Ad: “Together”

Sources

Footnotes? We don’t need them here. These are just our opinions.

The post Our 2006 Awards appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Voters in Tennessee, Missouri and Virginia – three states where polls have shown the Senate candidates to be neck-and-neck – have been particularly swamped with ads.

A Tennessee ad falsely implies tax dodging on the part of Republican Bob Corker, while Republicans leave out context while accusing Rep. Harold Ford, Jr. of condoning President Clinton’s pardon of 16 individuals associated with a 1970’s Puerto Rican terrorist group. In Missouri, Republicans accuse Democrat Claire McCaskill of failing to act against a nursing-home rape when she had no authority to do so. And Democrats accuse Republican Sen. Jim Talent of favoring tax incentives for shipping jobs overseas, when Missouri has actually gained jobs. In Virginia, Republicans quote Democrat Jim Webb out of context regarding an old Navy sex-harassment scandal, and a Democratic ad falsely implies that Republican Sen. George Allen opposed all stem-cell research.

Analysis

On Nov. 4, The Washington Post reported that political analysts on both the right and the left “agreed that Missouri, Virginia and Tennessee are the keys to controlling the 100-member Senate.” We look at ads on both sides. Some pay about as much attention to the truth as the candidates pay to voters from the Lesser Antilles.

Tennessee

In Tennessee, the Corker campaign and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign committee sparred with misleading attacks.

Corker the Tax Dodger?

An Oct. 25 DSCC ad claims Corker, “admits there have been years when he paid no taxes at all” and that it’s “not surprising Corker won’t release his taxes.” In fact, as we stated in an earlier report when this deceptive line of attack was first used by one of Corker’s Republican primary opponents, there’s no evidence that Corker illegally evaded taxes, cut any ethical corners or paid one dime less than he owed. And while Corker hasn’t made a general public release of his income-tax returns, he has allowed reporters to review copies of the basic returns.

The reason Corker “paid no taxes” in some years is that he didn’t owe any. Those were years he could claim sizeable, legal deductions resulting from his real-estate ventures. According to a Sept 29 report in the Memphis Commercial Appeal, which the ad cites, “Corker owed no taxes in 1985, writing off all of his $326,700 in income, and also in 1989, when he generated $344,600 in income.” And as we noted before, in those years Corker voluntarily paid the IRS several thousand dollars which he earmarked for reducing the national debt.

The claim that Corker “won’t release his taxes” is not exactly true. The fact is Corker has made 29 years worth of his basic IRS Form 1040s available to Tennessee reporters for review, though he hasn’t allowed the documents to be copied and distributed. He has also withheld the schedules to those tax returns, which cover such things as details of his capital gains and losses and specific business expenses for which he claimed deductions.

On another matter, the ad also claims “Corker was Don Sundquist’s Finance Commissioner, then came Sundquist’s plan to raise income taxes.” It’s true that then-Tennessee Governor Sundquist proposed to raise Tennessee income taxes, but that was three years after Corker left the finance commissioner post.

Ford & Terrorist Pardons

An ad aired by the Corker campaign on Nov. 1, accuses Ford of not opposing President Clinton’s pardon of “sixteen members of a terrorist group, responsible for 150 bombings and six US deaths.” In truth, none of the 16 pardoned members of the Puerto Rican terrorist group Armed Forces of National Liberation (FALN) had been involved in any killings, which dated back to the 1970’s and early 1980’s. As The Associated Press reported at the time of the pardons:

AP: The 16 people offered clemency were associated with mostly FALN members , but were neither involved in any killings nor convicted in the bombings. They were found guilty of seditious conspiracy or possessions of weapons and explosives and were sentenced up to 90 years.

It’s true Ford was the only member of his delegation who voted “present” when the House considered a symbolic “sense of the Congress” resolution Sept. 9, 1999, condemning the pardons. All House Republicans supported it, while a total of 71 House Democrats abstained by voting “present.” At the time The AP quoted Ford as saying, “I voted present because it would have been like rebuking the Constitution. . . This was obviously just an effort to embarrass the President.”

Missouri

In Missouri the DSCC and the Republican National Committee have been running competing ads against incumbent Republican Sen. Jim Talent and Democratic challenger Claire McCaskill.

Bought an Election?

An Oct 31 RNC ad attacking McCaskill claims McCaskill used “profit from the family’s nursing homes” to “try to buy an election.” Loose wording like that could lead some to think McCaskill was being accused of election fraud, which isn’t the case. In 2002 McCaskill married Joseph Shepard, a real-estate developer who co-owned and operated six nursing homes at the time, according to Missouri’s Columbia Daily Tribune. The ad refers to a $1.6 million campaign loan she took from their family assets towards her 2004 campaign for governor. It was perfectly legal.

The ad also implies that McCaskill, a state auditor, failed to act when “rape, poor care, even wrongful death were going on in her current husband’s nursing homes.”

It’s true that a rape occurred in one of Shepard’s six nursing homes, according to a March 2002 report in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Shepard is also among those named in a civil lawsuit alleging wrongful death in an apartment complex for the elderly (not a “nursing home”) managed by a company in which he is a general partner.

However, McCaskill had no authority as auditor to sanction individual nursing homes. Her job was to examine how well state agencies did their work, and her audits brought to light numerous errors and instances of mismanagement on the part of state nursing-home investigators. She said her husband’s nursing homes “should be sanctioned just like any others if the care is not what it should be,” according to a 2002 AP report.

Helping Ship Jobs Overseas?

An Oct. 28 DSCC ad claims that Talent “voted for tax breaks for companies that send jobs overseas,” and adds that Missouri has lost 60,000 manufacturing jobs. While it’s true Talent voted against an amendment that called for repeal of tax subsidies for companies that move their operations overseas, the ad fails to paint a full picture.

For one thing, Missouri has gained jobs. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Missouri has lost  59,800 manufacturing jobs between Dec 2000 and Sept. 2006, but gains in other job categories have more than offset that. Overall, the state has gained 35,930 jobs during the same period.

Furthermore, the amendment Talent opposed would not actually have repealed a single dollar of tax breaks. It was an amendment offered to a budget resolution (number 210) and simply set a goal for Congress to “to repeal the tax subsidy for certain domestic companies which move manufacturing operations and American jobs.” Actually accomplishing such a feat is not so simple as it may sound. As we reported in 2004, the tax incentives for locating new plants overseas has been a feature of the federal corporate income tax since its inception, and flows mainly from the fact that the US taxes corporations at much higher rates that many other nations. In any case, removing the tax benefit would do little to keep US jobs at home. Economists say lower wages and proximity to overseas markets are much more powerful incentives than taxes to locate plants in other countries.

Virginia

The NRSC’s ad “Right for 1806,” strafes Democrat Jim Webb for comments about the 1991 Tailhook scandal and for his works of fiction. Meanwhile the DSCC has been attacking the incumbent Republican, George Allen, for hewing close to Bush’s legislative goals.

Webb & Women

The NRSC ad says Webb referred to Tailhook – in which 83 women and 7 men reported being assaulted or sexually harassed at a wild party for Navy aviators, according to a Pentagon report – as a “feminist plot” and a “witch hunt.” But there’s more to it than that.

Webb did describe the official investigation of the affair as a “witch hunt” in an Oct. 6, 1992 article in The New York Times  headlined “Witch Hunt in the Navy.” But he also called the treatment of the women at the convention “inexcusable harassment.”

Webb was upset that the investigation had dragged out more than a year and had ended the careers of some officers who hadn’t even been at the event. Here’s what he wrote:

Webb: The Tailhook scandal has been “spun up,” to borrow a service phrase, into a crisis that affects the Navy leadership’s credibility on a wide range of issues. A botched internal investigation and the ongoing revelations of inexcusable harassment of women at a Las Vegas convention of naval aviators a year ago have also left in their wake a witch hunt that threatens to swamp the entire naval service.

Careers have been ruined, often on the basis of mere innuendo and without a shred of due process. And on Sept. 25 Acting Navy Secretary Sean O’Keefe made a series of sweeping decisions – and one altogether remarkable pronouncement – guaranteeing that the effects of this scandal will reverberate for years.

The ad also says that Webb called Tailhook “a feminist plot.” But in fact, there’s no record of Webb ever using the phrase “feminist plot” or anything vaguely like it to describe Tailhook. He did say that Tailhook had been “seized upon and used by feminists to attack the military culture.” Here’s the full quote from his piece “The War on the Military Culture” in The Weekly Standard on Jan. 20, 1997:

Webb: Events such as the 1991 Tailhook debacle have been seized upon and used by feminists to attack the military culture and bring about major concessions.

Saying that feminists have “used” Tailhook is a very different thing than saying the scandal itself was a “plot.”

The ad also says Webb’s novels “routinely stereotype women as promiscuous objects.” He’s written six novels, and whether or not any of them “stereotype” women is a matter on which opinions may differ. The books do include sex scenes. The ad shows excerpts but obliterates the passages with the word “Censored.”

Mr. 96 Percent?

DSCC AD:
“Siding With”

Announcer: What does it mean that George Allen sides with George Bush 96% of the time? It means Allen voted against stem cell research that could provide life saving cures. Allen opposed letting women take unpaid leave after the birth of a child. And 96% means Allen is one of the biggest supporters of Bush’s ‘Stay the Course’ strategy in Iraq. What dose Allen siding 96% with Bush mean? It means he’s not siding with you.

A DSCC ad dating from Oct. 31 announces that Allen voted with George Bush 96 percent of the time. According to Congressional Quarterly, Allen did vote with Bush 96 percent of the time in 2005, the last full year for which data is available; his rate for 2006 so far is 90 percent.

Allen didn’t vote against all stem cell research, however, as one might conclude from the ad. In July he voted against expanded federal support for  embryonic stem cell research, a crucial distinction in this debate. President Bush eventually vetoed the measure.

Allen did, on the other hand, vote against the Family and Medical Leave Act, as the ad says, when he was in the House – twice in September 2002, in fact. He voted against it once when the House passed it 241-161, and again when the House failed to get a two-thirds majority to override the veto of then-President George H.W. Bush, 258-169. Has he supported Bush’s “stay-the-course strategy” in Iraq? Yes, until recently, when he began saying that “progress has been too slow” and “We can’t keep doing things the same way.”

Media

Watch DSCC Ad: “Tax Free”

Watch Corker Campaign Ad: “Terrorism”

Watch RNC Ad: “Her Mansion”

Watch DSCC Ad: “Actually Done”

Watch NRSC Ad: “Right for 1806”

Watch DSCC Ad: “Siding With”

Sources

Locker, Richard.  “Sundquist Hints At 4% State Income Tax Plan: Rules Out Lotter In Special Session,” The Commercial Appeal (Memphis). 26 Oct 1999.

“Sales Tax Urged on Now-Exempt Services,” The Associated Press. 6 Nov 1997.

Young, Virginia.  “A campaign of contrasts for Missouri Challenger is known for her zest and her freewheeling style,” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch. 1 Oct 2006.

Ganey, Terry. “Attack ads intensify Senate race: Negative tactics suggest tenor of desperation in Talent campaign,” The Columbia Daily Tribune. 31 Oct 2006.

“Frist, GOP Attack Ford being only Tennessean not to denounce Clinton,” Associated Press.  17 Sep 1999.

Babington, Charles and Jonathan Weisman. “Anxious GOP Focuses on Not Losing Senate: Tight Races in VA., Mo. and Tenn. Seen as Crucial; House Outlook remains Grim,” The Washington Post. 4 Nov 2006.

Perrusquia, Marc. “Corker’s tax details a mystery; Releases basic forms, but won’t disclose accompanying records,” The Commercial Appeal. 29 Sept 2006.

“Frist, GOP attack Ford being only Tennessean not to denounce Clinton,” The Associated Press.  17 Sept 1999.

Young, Virginia. “Governor criticizes rival and her husband,” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch. 31 July 2004.

Young, Virginia. “Magazine Rates 28 Nursing Homes In Area As Substandard; Consumer Reports Used State Inspection Records For Its ‘Watch List,'” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch. 24 Mar 2002.

O’Connor, Phillip. “Residents Sue Over Deaths At Apartments in Berkeley,” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch.  28 Jul 2001.

“McCaskill: Husband will stop seeking state aid for businesses,” The Associated Press. 27 Oct 2006.

“Freed activist vows to fight for Puerto Rico in ‘humane’ way,” The Associated Press. 20 Sept 1999.

“State auditor says marrying mursing home businessman won’t slow her reform-seeking,” The Associated Press.  11 Feb 2002.

West, Paul. “An Ugly, Unexpected Senate Race in VA,” The Baltimore Sun. 3 Nov. 2006.

“Hollow Assurances on Progress in Iraq,” The Virginian-Pilot. 6 June 2006.

James Webb, “Witch Hunt in the Navy,” The New York Times. 6 Oct 1992.

The post Accusations Fly in Senate Squeakers appeared first on FactCheck.org.

The mid-term elections of 2006 brought an unprecedented barrage of advertising containing much that is false or misleading. We found examples of disregard for facts and honesty – on both sides – that would get a reporter fired in a heartbeat from any decent news organization.

Candidates, parties and independent groups have faked quotes, twisted words, misrepresented votes and positions, and engaged in rank fear-mongering and outright fabrication. Here we review some of the worst deceptions we found.

Analysis

We haven’t addressed every false or misleading statement in 2006 House and Senate campaigns – there were too many of them and our resources are too limited for that. For the full record of our work please refer to the earlier articles on the home page and in our archive.

Disregard for Facts

Much of what we found went well beyond the bounds of honest advocacy, and would warrant dismissal for any reporter who tried to pass it off as an accurate news story. We believe reasonable citizens will also find these distortions to be unacceptable even in political advertising, where a certain amount of puffery is expected and tolerated. It’s one thing to present your own case in the best light and to point out the flaws in your opponent. But a lot of what we encountered was far from the truth. Some examples:

• In Ohio, a Democratic ad said Republican House candidate Joy Padgett was investigated “for abusing her position to help her own business.” The truth is the investigation was triggered by an anonymous accusation and the investigators concluded there was “no substance to the allegation.”  See “When Democrats Attack ” from Nov. 2.
• In New York, a Republican ad accused Democratic House candidate Michael Arcuri, a prosecutor, of letting an accused rapist go free because he “failed to indict him in time.” The truth is that Arcuri was left with no choice when the victim and another key witness didn’t show up. The man was free eight days before Arcuri eventually indicted him and secured a guilty plea to a reduced charge. See “Republican Mudslinging On An Industrial Scale” from Oct. 27.
• Republican Sen. Jim Talent of Missouri ran ads attributing unflattering words about his opponent to the Kansas City Star. The truth is the words were those of partisans and critics, whom the Star was quoting along with others as part of their balanced coverage. See “Talent For Deception” from Oct. 21.
• Nebraska Republican Senate candidate Pete Ricketts used newspaper headlines in one of his TV ads, but the truth is the headlines were faked. A spokesman explained this was due to “creative reasons.” See “Fake News, Nebraska Style” from Aug. 2.
• In Florida, a Democratic ad accused GOP Rep. Clay Shaw of profiting from a “drug deal” by buying and selling a pharmaceutical company’s stock while voting for the Medicare prescription drug benefit. The truth is the company in question was not among those that could have benefited from the new Medicare program. See “A ‘Drug Deal’ Gone Bad” from Oct. 16.

In addition to a general disregard for factual accuracy, we also found systematic attempts to mislead voters about some of the most important issues of the day. Republicans repeatedly mischaracterized Democratic positions on dealing with terrorism. Democrats continued to claim that the Medicare drug benefit is somehow bad for seniors when in fact it saves them hundreds of dollars per year on average.

Terrorism & Iraq

• A national Republican ad suggested in not-very-subtle terms that voting Democratic carries a risk of death in a nuclear attack. It quoted a bin Laden lieutenant boasting that “we purchased some suitcase bombs,” followed by images of al Qaeda fighters and a graphic image of a rapidly expanding orange-yellow globe resembling a nuclear fireball. The ad offered no evidence that Democrats would be any less zealous in keeping nuclear weapons from the hands of terrorists, however. And experts say it is improbable that al Qaeda or any terrorist organization actually has or could get a workable nuclear device. See “‘Daisy’ Redux” from Oct. 20.
• A Democratic-leaning group ran false ads accusing a few Republican senators of voting to deny modern body armor for troops in Iraq. In fact, the amendment cited by the ad didn’t mention body armor, and passing it wouldn’t have allowed the Pentagon to acquire a single additional armored vest: It already was buying as many as the economy could produce. See “False Claims About Body Armor” from Sept. 20. A Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee ad repeated this false claim even after we de-bunked it. See “Accusations Without Evidence and Moldy Bunk in Virginia .”
• Republicans raised similar false body-armor claims against Democrats. For one example see “‘XXX’ Marks the Spot Where Campaign Ads Head South” from Sept. 27.
• Republicans repeatedly mischaracterized the Democratic position on President Bush’s National Security Agency eavesdropping program, which is being conducted without court warrants or review. An ad by the pro-Bush group Progress for America falsely gave those wiretaps credit for the thwarting of a hijack plot that was actually uncovered by Scotland Yard following up an informant’s tip. See “A Misleading Appeal To Fear” from Sept. 8.
• Republican ads also have said that Democrats are against eavesdropping on terrorists, which isn’t true. It’s the lack of judicial oversight they object to. See “Hillary Clinton’s Voting Record Distorted” from Aug. 16.
• Another Republican distortion is a claim that Democrats are “against terrorist interrogation,” when their objection (shared by a number of Republicans) actually is to torture. See “New RNC Web Ad Blurs History” from Aug. 22.

Social Security & Medicare

Both sides made false or twisted claims about the government’s largest benefit programs, Social Security and Medicare.

• Several Republican ads claimed Democratic House candidates would “cut benefits for seniors” and “raise Social Security taxes ” on workers, when all they had said was that they endorsed the AARP’s approach to addressing Social Security’s enormous deficit by making “modest adjustments in future benefits” and getting “additional contributions from higher-income workers.” None were proposing cuts in current benefit levels. For more on this, see “Scaring Seniors on Social Security” from Oct. 17.
• Democrats repeatedly accused Republicans of voting to “raid the Social Security trust fund ,” based on their support for federal budgets that were in deficit. That’s nonsense. Deficits don’t affect Social Security benefits by one penny, and have no effect on the IOU’s that build up in the trust fund, either. See “Tired Old Trust Fund Bunk” from Oct. 25.
• Numerous Republican ads claimed Democrats wanted to “give Social Security benefits to illegal immigrants.” But nobody’s proposing paying a dollar of benefits to anyone while they are illegal. The ads  mischaracterize Democratic support for current law, which allows immigrants to get credit for the Social Security taxes they paid while working illegally, but only if and when they become legal or gain citizenship and then become eligible to receive benefits. See “Republican Campaign Theme Debunked: Social Security for Illegal Immigrants” from Oct. 10.
• Democratic ads continue to misinform voters about the Medicare prescription drug benefit. One Florida ad said it is “bad for seniors.” See “A ‘Drug Deal’ Gone Bad” from Oct. 16. Several ads from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee also attacked Republicans for supporting the plan because it prevents federal officials from negotiating with drug companies for volume discounts. But the ads fail to note that seniors enrolled in the plan are expected to save an average of several hundred dollars a year on their prescription drugs, and that most seniors report that their initial experience with the plan has been positive. See “When Democrats Attack” from Nov. 2.

This year, as in the 2004 campaign, a number of persons have asked us how candidates and other groups can get away with such deceitful advertising. The truth is that the law of libel is not a practical deterrent. There also is no federal “truth in political advertising” law on the books, nor is there likely to be such a law so long as the First Amendment stands. For a full discussion see “False Ads: There Oughtta Be A Law! Or – Maybe Not,” our Special Report from June 3, 2004. Our system of government leaves it to voters to sort out the truth from what they see and hear, with whatever help they can get from a free press.

Sources

(For footnotes see original articles)

The post The Whoppers Of 2006 appeared first on FactCheck.org.

GOP Rep. John Sweeney’s ad goes after his opponent, first-time House candidate Kirsten Gillibrand, with a half-dozen accusations layered over a soundtrack that’s somehow both scary and sad. The ad tars Gillibrand with everything from taking illegal contributions to hiring a consultant tied to the Abramoff lobbying scandal to making children cry at a Sweeney rally, and more.

Gillibrand’s campaign staff calls this “the spaghetti ad,” as in, “throw everything at her and see what sticks.” That’s a fair assessment. All of the charges, in our judgment, are either exceedingly misleading or downright baseless. Some of them list no backup citations, which is unusual for ads in this campaign cycle and makes them difficult for the average viewer to research. The Sweeney campaign did not respond to numerous phone messages we left inquiring about this ad.

Analysis

The Sweeney-Gillibrand race has drawn national attention for being so negative. We take the ad’s allegations in turn.

“Overseas Transactions”

The ad begins with the announcer saying, “Kirsten Gillibrand hides tax records to cover up questions she refuses to answer.”

On screen are the words “conflicts of interest” and “Overseas Dubai Transactions” with “Intercar LLC, Glen Falls Post-Star 10/26/2006” below.

It’s true that Gillibrand has not released her tax returns, as some candidates choose to do voluntarily. But it’s misleading to say she’s “hiding” them, since there’s no legal requirement for her to make them public.

Her campaign says she “has released all appropriate and adequate financial paperwork.” She’s right in that by submitting a financial disclosure form to the Clerk of the House Gillibrand has released all the financial information that’s required of her, including her own and her husband’s incomes, stock holdings and other assets and obligations.

As for “conflicts of interest,” the Sweeney ad doesn’t even make clear what those might be, and the Sweeney campaign won’t say. Any potential conflicts should be discernible on her form, which is publicly available, although not on the Internet.

The use of quotation marks around “Overseas Dubai Transactions” makes it seem as though those words appeared in the Post-Star.  But that phrase was not in the paper in any story about Gillibrand on that day, or any other day, according to a Post-Star staffer who conducted a computerized search of the newspaper’s back issues at our request. On the date given in the ad, just one article and one letter to the editor referring to the Sweeney-Gillibrand race appeared, and neither of them mentioned “Intercar” or “Dubai.” According to the Gillibrand campaign, Intercar is a company that hosts an annual classic car show in Florida, and the candidate’s husband is a managing director. It has no connections to Dubai, a campaign spokeswoman said.

Adding insult to injury, this part of the ad even misspells Gillibrand’s first name.

A War Profiteer?

Next is a charge the Sweeney campaign has used before: Gillibrand “profits off the sacrifice of fallen soldiers.” Earlier ads from Sweeney have called Gillibrand a “war profiteer.” This characterization is unfounded.  The claim is based on the fact that Gillibrand’s husband Jonathan, an engineer, worked at British Aerospace (BAE) until 1998 and as a result has a retirement account that includes the company’s stock. BAE’s stock, like that of many defense contractors, has increased in value since military operations began in Afghanistan and then Iraq. But we judge it to be a real stretch to call ownership of a defense contractor’s stock, purchased years before any war broke out, “war profiteering.”

For one thing, Gillibrand’s profit is only on paper. The campaign says he hasn’t sold any shares. So it’s not as though the stock was purchased in anticipation of military operations and then cashed in after a run-up in value. That might be called “profiteering” but isn’t what happened here.

By the way, Sweeney’s own campaign has accepted $2,000 from BAE’s political action committee this election cycle and $2,000 during the 2004 cycle.

Harassing a Fallen Soldier’s Mom?

Next, the ad says that supporters of Gillibrand “take shots at a mom whose son has never returned,” as the words “anonymous calls” and “nasty letters” appear on the screen. The mother the ad is referencing is Kathy Brown, a registered Democrat and Gold Star mother who, despite her opposition to the war in Iraq, is supporting Sweeney. She appeared in a separate campaign ad endorsing him.

The Gillibrand campaign said any “nasty letters” and “anonymous calls” that Ms. Brown supposedly was subjected to did not come from the candidate or her staff. Gillibrand released a statement earlier this fall saying she “extends her sympathies and condolences to Ms. Brown and joins all New Yorkers in honoring her son’s sacrifice.” The ad says Gillibrand’s “supporters” were to blame, a claim we found difficult to check. A political reporter at the Glens Falls newspaper that is cited on the screen said he was unaware that Ms. Brown had been harassed.

Dirty Campaign Money

The Sweeney ad’s allegation that Gillibrand was “caught taking illegal contributions but refuses to return the money” refers to two letters from an analyst at the Federal Election Commission to the Gillibrand campaign in recent months. The letters are requests for additional information (RFAIs) about entries on her campaign finance reports to the agency.

Among the matters the agency asks about are contributions from 12 individuals or political action committees that appear to be larger than the $2,100 and $5,000 allowed, respectively, by law. The agency often permits candidates to remedy excessive contributions by re-attributing them to family members of the donors, by reallocating them to other elections (for instance, a primary rather than a general) or by refunding them. Gillibrand filed amendments to her FEC reports that appeared to take care of the problems noted by the agency.

Taking illegal contributions is a serious offense, and a serious allegation. In Gillibrand’s case it is false. RFAI letters are several steps away from findings of illegality, and they are not orders to refund the contributions. They are also not uncommon, as Sweeney should know. His campaign has received 2 RFAIs in the last two election cycles. Another way of looking at it: So far in the 2005-2006 cycle, about 14,000 RFAIs have been sent out, according to FEC spokesman Bob Biersack.

Adviser Tied to Scandal

The ad claims that Gillibrand is “keeping an adviser tied to a Washington scandal.” That refers to Howard Wolfson, a principal of the Washington-based Glover Park Group who has been working for the Gillibrand campaign. But saying Wolfson is “tied” to the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal is a little like saying the ankle bone’s connected to . . .  the toothbrush. In the past, the Glover Park Group, a lobbying and consulting firm, had occasionally been a subcontractor to a similar, more Republican firm called Alexander Strategy Group on lobbying projects. Glover Park was paid by Alexander Strategy for those projects, though the funds actually came from its clients. That all ended when Alexander Strategy went out of business earlier this year, engulfed in the Abramoff mushroom cloud; the firm’s biggest rainmakers had close ties to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and lobbyist Abramoff, connections that were highly valued in Washington once upon a time.

According to Glover Park partner Joel Johnson, Wolfson never worked on the joint projects, nor does he lobby. Wolfson is an old hand on political campaigns, most prominently those of Sen. Hillary Clinton. Moreover, for Sweeney to accuse Gillibrand of being tied to the Abramoff scandal is odd, since it invites attention to his own, much closer connection. Recent news reports have focused on a trip  he took in 2001 to the Northern Mariana Islands, an Abramoff client, with Tony Rudy,  a former top staffer for DeLay who worked with Abramoff before becoming a partner at Alexander Strategy. Rudy pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges earlier this year in connection with Abramoff’s actions.

Bullying Children

The ad ends by saying that the Gillibrand campaign invaded a “Sweeney rally where women are bullied and children are left in tears.” The Sweeney campaign has provided us with no evidence to back up this claim, and the Gillibrand campaign calls the allegation “completely false.” According to a Gillibrand spokeswoman, nobody from the Gillibrand campaign even attended the Sweeney rally. Joe Seeman, an activist who was at the rally, told Factcheck.org  that five protesters (including himself), none of whom were connected to Gillibrand’s campaign, were outside of the event and acted “non-violently, respectfully, and legally.” The Sweeney campaign did not return our numerous telephone calls to ask about this charge and the others in the ad.

-by James Ficaro & Viveca Novak

Media

Watch Sweeney Ad: “Conflicts of Interest”

Sources

Benjamin, Elizabeth. “Sweeney Touts Anti-War Mom’s Support,” The Times Union, 17 Sep 2006.

“Sampling of Editorials from Upstate New York,” The Associated Press State & Local Wire. 11 October 2006.

O’Brien, Tim. “Gillibrand challenges Sweeney to meet,” The Times-Union. 14 Sept. 2006.

Benjamin, Elizabeth. “Sweeney asks for clarity on rules,” The Times-Union, 19 Oct. 2006.

The post Sweeney No Sweet-Talker In Kitchen-Sink Attack appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Gauging by the attack ads flowing from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party’s House contenders are running against Exxon, Pfizer and Bush. The ads tie Republican House candidates to unpopular industries and an unpopular President. Some of these ads are exaggerations.

At times DCCC ads run completely off the rails of factual accuracy. One falsely implies that an Illinois candidate tried to ban Dr. Seuss books from schools. Another correctly states that an Ohio candidate was investigated “for abusing her position,” but fails to mention that the investigation found “no substance” to the allegation. Others claim Republicans voted to “raid the Social Security trust fund,” a bit of misleading nonsense we’ve noted previously.

What follows is our analysis of 143 ads from the DCCC that have appeared since Labor Day, nearly all of them attack ads. For our take on ads from the DCCC’s counterpart, the National Republican Congressional Committee, see the article we posted Oct. 27.

Analysis

This analysis, like our earlier report on NRCC ads, covers TV spots run since Labor Day in the top 101 television markets, covering 87 per cent of US television households. The ads were supplied to us by the Campaign Media Analysis Group. As previously reported, ads from both party organizations are nearly all attack ads. The Republican ads were more likely than the Democratic ads to denigrate the personal character of the opposing candidate, while the Democratic ads, covered here, are more likely to attack based on public-policy positions or performance in office.

Accused of Supporting the President

A common theme in the DCCC’s ads is simply to point out an incumbent GOP House member’s record of support for President Bush.

A typical ad is one in Pennsylvania which begins, “Melissa Hart votes with George Bush and Rick Santorum 98 per cent of the time.” On screen, a counter rapidly runs up to 98 and then stops. Hart is pictured with Bush and Republican Sen. Santorum, both of whom are scoring poorly in recent polls.

In this case the DCCC is exaggerating a bit. Congressional Quarterly actually puts Rep. Hart’s record of voting for bills endorsed by the President at 89 per cent in 2006 and also in 2005. Throughout her nearly 6-year House career she’s supported Bush’s legislative agenda 92 per cent of the time, according to CQ.

In all, we count 42 DCCC ads that accuse GOP candidates of being too supportive of the President, referring to them variously as “rubberstamps” or “Bush’s candidate” or saying they support “Bush’s agenda.” The DCCC is attacking three Republican candidates for being “another vote for George Bush’s agenda,” even though all three are challengers and have never served a day in the House. They are Mike Erickson in Oregon, Mike Whalen in Iowa, and Rick O’Donnell in Colorado.

We can’t predict how anyone will vote in the future, but despite the DCCC’s occasional exaggeration, it’s generally true that Democratic House members are far less likely than Republicans to support Bush-backed legislation. In 2005 House GOP members supported the President 81 per cent of the time on average, with Democrats supporting Bush only 24 per cent of the time.

Oil and Drugs

We count 34 DCCC ads accusing Republican candidates of being too close to oil companies, pharmaceutical makers, or both.

 An ad against Indiana Republican Chris Chocola calls his relationship with oil companies “A Washington Love Affair.” Another says “We’ve learned that Chris Chocola’s in the pocket of big oil. Turns out, Chocola’s in the pocket of big drug companies too.”

Oil: These ads typically attack an incumbent for supporting “billions in tax breaks” for oil companies or opposing “a crackdown on price gouging” at the gasoline pump.

It’s true that the Republican-controlled Congress passed an energy bill last year containing $14.3 billion in tax breaks, of which $2.8 billion was for oil and natural gas producers. The bulk went to electric utilities, including nuclear, and also to subsidies for energy-efficient cars, homes and buildings and alternative fuels research. It’s also true that Republicans were nearly unanimous in opposing several Democratic proposals to establish staggeringly large penalties for “price gouging” in the future – up to $100 million in fines and prison terms of up to 10 years in one measure. But as we’ve reported previously, all these would have defined “gouging” in hazy and subjective terms that could prove difficult to enforce or uphold in court.

Pharmaceuticals: Concerning drug companies, the ads generally attack Republicans for supporting President Bush’s Medicare prescription drug benefit, and particularly for the absence of federal price controls on the drugs it covers. A typical ad says Rep. Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania “voted to ban Medicare from negotiating lower-cost drugs for our seniors.” Others equate the new drug benefit to giving companies a windfall. New Mexico Rep. Heather Wilson is blamed in one for “voting for Bush’s plan that gives drug companies billions in profits.”

It’s true that the Bush plan prohibits federal officials from negotiating discounts from drug makers, relying instead on competition among insurance companies to hold down prices. It is also true that the new program will allow millions of seniors to buy drugs they previously could not afford, boosting sales and quite possibly profits as well. However, the precise effects on profits can’t be known until drug makers report annual sales figures to shareholders for the first year or two of the program, which went into effect Jan. 1.

As we have said before, most seniors seem to be better off financially under the new program than they were before, and the program is overwhelmingly popular with those who are enrolled. The nonpartisan Kaiser Family foundation has estimated the average senior who enrolls will spend 37 per cent less on prescription drugs in 2006, an average saving of $465. Kaiser also released a national poll  showing that more than eight in 10 seniors who enrolled in a Medicare drug plan say they are satisfied with it. Kaiser concluded: “For most seniors, initial experiences under the drug benefit have been positive.”

Campaign Donations: We found 23 ads in which Democrats mentioned contributions to Republican incumbents from the oil, gas and pharmaceutical industries. A typical ad says Connecticut Republican Rep. Rob Simmons “took nearly two hundred thousand dollars from the pharmaceutical industry and voted for George Bush’s prescription drug plan.” It’s certainly true that Republicans have received far more than Democrats in recent years from drug companies, which for years opposed any Medicare drug benefit at all on the belief that federal price controls would follow. The Center for Responsive Politics calculates that in the 2004 elections Republicans got 66 per cent of the pharmaceutical industry’s campaign donations, while Democrats got 34 per cent.

Another DCCC ad says North Carolina Rep. Charles Taylor “fills up his campaigns with over a hundred and ten thousand dollars from Big Oil and Gas while filling our tanks is nearly three bucks a gallon.” The Republican bias among oil-industry donors is even more pronounced than among drug-company givers. The CRP tabulations show 80 per cent of donations from the oil and natural gas industry went to Republicans in the 2004 election cycle, and only 20 per cent to Democrats. But the cause of high gasoline prices wasn’t campaign donations. Economists generally attribute the wild fluctuations to market forces exacerbated by fears of a major disruption in supply from the Middle East.

And in fact, by the time that anti-Taylor ad made its debut on Sept. 5, the average price of regular gasoline already had plunged to $2.74 per gallon from a peak of $3.04 a month earlier.  It was $2.12 the week of Oct. 30.

Other Distortions

We’ve reported on a number of DCCC ads containing factual stumbles in some earlier articles. One ad accused GOP Rep. Clay Shaw of profiting personally by trading in a drug-company stock while supporting the Medicare drug benefit, but we found the company to which the ad referred didn’t make any drugs covered by the new benefit – they all were anti-cancer drugs already covered by regular Medicare, and the company told shareholders it was a bit worried the new Medicare bill had rules that might actually reduce profits. We now count 8 DCCC ads making a false claim that Republicans who vote for annual budget bills calling for deficits are somehow voting to “raid the Social Security Trust Fund.” That’s nonsense. The trust fund receives exactly as many legally binding federal IOUs whether the overall budget is balanced or not. In addition, we count 7 ads that  claim that Republican candidates support the President’s plan to “privatize” Social Security. But the Bush proposal – to allow some Social Security taxes to be put in individual accounts and invested in a few broadly diversified mutual funds – died last year without ever being put into formal legislative language, due to a lack of support.

Some other DCCC ads we found problematic:

• Ban Dr. Seuss: A DCCC ad attacking Illinois Republican Pete Roskam claims Roskam “supported banning classic books. Even a book with writings by Martin Luther King, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Dr. Seuss.” That’s misleading. Roskam never supported banning any books by Dr. Seuss or King, or Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie, which is among those pictured in the ad. (He once said his own children read that one.) The book “with writings” from Dr. Seuss and the others was an anthology called Impressions that sparked national debate in 1990 and 1991 when some parents and religious groups claimed that a handful of the 822 selections in the 15-volume series promoted Satanism and witchcraft. But the DCCC has produced no evidence that Roskam ever voiced support for “banning” that anthology. An editorial in the Chicago Tribune on Oct. 20, 1992 endorsed Roskam’s opponent and gave Roskam’s “tacit support” for banning Impressions as a reason. But “tacit” support isn’t active support, and could mean no more than not speaking out against the book-banning advocates. According to  news accounts at the time, Roskam did support legislation in 1992 that would have required parents to be more involved in the state’s formal screening process for school textbooks, but the bill itself wouldn’t have banned anything.
• Abuse of Power?: Another DCCC ad claims Joy Padgett, an Ohio Republican running for Bob Ney’s House seat, was investigated “for abusing her position to help her own business.” The ad is misleading. It’s true that  Ohio’s Inspector General received a complaint – from somebody requesting anonymity – claiming that Padgett had abused her position as director of the Governor’s Office of Appalachia by coercing would-be grant recipients to buy goods from her office supply business. The IG did investigate, but what the ad fails to mention is that the investigation found “no substance to the allegation.”

That Inspector General’s report also noted in passing that appearances can be deceiving. It said public officials “should be aware that while such appearances may often have no basis in fact, they may be incorrectly assumed as fact by the casual observer.” The message to officials is to be careful of how things look. But citizens should be equally careful not to be a “casual observer” of political spots. Examined carefully they often turn out to have “no basis in fact,” either.

– by Brooks Jackson, Viveca Novak, Justin Bank, James Ficaro & Emi Kolawole

Media

Watch DCCC Ad: “98 Percent”

Watch DCCC Ad: “Big Drug Companies”

Watch DCCC Ad: “Book Ban”

Sources

Poole, Isaiah J.  “Presidential Support Background,” CQ Weekly. 9 January 2006.

“Preliminary House Presidential Support Scores for 2006 — Arranged by State,” CQ Weekly, 23 Oct 2006.

Jim Mays, Monica Brenner, Tricia Neuman, Juliette Cubanski and Gary Claxton, “Estimates of Medicare Beneficiaries’ out-of-pocket drug spending in 2006: Modeling the Impact of the MMA,” Kaiser Family Foundation, Nov. 2004.

Kaiser Family Foundation, “Most seniors enrolled in Medicare drug plans say they are satisfied with their plans,” press release, 27 July 2006.

Pyke, Marni. “Candidates tussle over Iraq, North Korea,” Chicago Daily Herald. 20 Oct 2006.

Presecky, William. “‘Impressions’ may leave its mark on the race in House District 40,” The Chicago Tribune. 17 Feb 1992.

Anderson, David E. “Censorship efforts at public schools mounting,” United Press International. 28 Aug 1991.

Hazard, Anne. “Illinois Ninth Among States For Incidences Of Censorship,” States News Service, 1 Sep 1992.

The post When Democrats Attack appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Two of the most recent ads being aired in New Jersey by Republican Tom Kean Jr. and the NRSC stick to the recipe the Republicans have been using all season against Sen. Robert Menendez: Show the Democratic incumbent as sleazy, corrupt and possibly a criminal. These are among the hardest-hitting campaign ads we’ve seen this election cycle.

But they’re a mixed bag when it comes to accuracy. The evidence available simply doesn’t support the conclusion that Menendez “is under federal criminal investigation,” as one ad claims. Yes, a federal grand jury has subpoenaed records of a lease agreement between him and a nonprofit agency that is his tenant. But it’s not publicly known who the target of the investigation is.

Some of Kean’s other claims, such as that Menendez invited a convicted cocaine trafficker to his swearing-in, are correct.

Analysis

The drumbeat of these ads and others like them has helped Kean pull almost even with Menendez in the Senate race, despite the historic blue-ness of New Jersey ’s voting pattern.

Break the Law?

The first  claim in Kean’s “Law” ad, setting a theme, is that Menendez “believes sometimes you just have to break the law.” The root of the accusation hearkens back 19 years, to when Menendez was mayor of Union City, NJ,  and attended a fundraising dinner to pay lawyers for Cuban-American activist Eduardo Arocena. The founder of a violent anti-Castro group known as Omega 7, which was then headquartered in the Union City area, Arocena was convicted in 1984 on murder, attempted murder, weapons, explosives and other charges. Menendez’ donation didn’t cause much of a flap; his Republican opponent that year said he’d contribute, too, if he were asked.

Media

Watch NRSC Ad: “Tape”

Watch Kean Ad: “Law”

Sources

Volpe, Gregory J. “Menendez eased transfer for racketeer,” Asbury Park Press. 15 Oct. 2006.

Jackson, Herb. “Ex-ethics official sees no conflict in lease deal; says Menendez didn’t break House rules,” The Record. 20 Sept. 2006.

Mondics, Chris. “Tape adds to Menendez ethics debate; an ally’s recorded request was more a threat, an informant said,” The Philadelphia Inquirer. 28 Sept. 2006.

Delli Santi, Angela. “Corzine, Lautenberg rally behind Menendez in Senate race,” Associated Press Newswires. 1 October 2006.

Howlett, Deborah. “Menendez buddy’s past under a magnifying glass,” The Star-Ledger. 27 July 2006.

Gohlke, Josh. “Menendez associate: Loyal ally or liability?” The Record. 26 July 2006.

Whelan, Jeff and Josh Margolin. “Feds probe Menendez rental deal,” The Star-Ledger. 8 Sept. 2006.

Rivera, Ray. “A Show of Hostility for Menendez and Kean,” The New York Times. 8 October 2006.

Horowitz, Jason. “”Prosecutor Makes a Meal of NJ Senate Race,” New York Observer. 16 October 2006.

The post Sopranos Lite? Casting Menendez in a Culture of Corruption appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Both political parties are functioning in the 2006 House races as factories for attack ads, but the National Republican Campaign Committee’s work stands out this year for the sheer volume of assaults on the personal character of Democratic House challengers.

The ads being aired by both the NRCC and its rival, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, are overwhelmingly negative. However, the DCCC ads generally attack Republican candidates on policy issues or their performance in office – accusing them of casting votes favorable to drug or oil companies, or of supporting President Bush’s unpopular policies in Iraq or on Social Security. We’ve recently criticized factual inaccuracies we’ve seen in some of those, and we’ll have more to say in a later article. Here we focus on the NRCC’s ads, which are much more likely to demean an opponent’s character. That’s the very definition of political mudslinging.

The Republican ads variously accuse Democratic candidates of such things as charging an “adult fantasy” phone call to taxpayers, of being a “hypocrite,” of being a “greedy trial lawyer,” of being a “millionaire know-it-all,” or of failing to pay local business taxes on time. One ad describes a Democrat’s “ethical judgments” as “bad to bizarre” and claims he favored use of 50,000-volt Taser weapons on seven-year-olds.

A derogatory ad can be accurate, and when supported by facts can give voters information about a candidate that they may well find relevant. For example, one NRCC ad correctly states that a Democratic candidate wrote a letter asking a judge to go easy when sentencing a felon convicted of bank fraud in a scandal that bilked hundreds of homeowners. However, several of the NRCC’s ads are smears that twist facts or ignore them. A sheriff running for the House is accused of having “fixed” a speeding ticket for his daughter, for example, when in fact the ticket was paid and the daughter got no special treatment. We found repeated examples of this sort of thing, and we detail them here.

Analysis

Attack-ad Factories

First the numbers. Spending by the two party committees tells part of the story. According to the Federal Election Commission, so far in this election cycle the NRCC has spent $41.9 million attacking Democratic opponents and $5 million supporting its own candidates, roughly an 8:1 negative-to-positive ratio. The DCCC has spent $18 million and $3.1 million, respectively, for a 5:1 ratio. Most of that money on both sides is spent on television advertising.

We zoomed in for a closer look, reviewing all ads by the DCCC and NRCC that appeared since Labor Day in any of the top 101 television markets, which reach 87 per cent of American TV viewers. Copies of the ads were supplied to us by the Campaign Media Analysis Group. Of the 115 NRCC ads, we judged 91 per cent to be purely negative. The DCCC’s 104 ads included 81 per cent we found to be purely negative. We found very few on either side that were all positive, but the DCCC’s contained more mixed or “comparative” ads – a mix of positive statements about the supported candidate and negative statements about the opponent.

What stood out in the NRCC’s ads was a pronounced tendency to be petty and personal, and sometimes careless with the facts. We found 29 of the NRCC’s ads to be assaults of a personal nature on a candidate’s character or private professional dealings, rather than critiques of his or her views or votes while in federal, state or local office. Applying the same screen to the DCCC, we came up with 15 such ads, and several of those were comparative, rather than purely negative. We’d note, and leave for our readers to judge its relevance, that since there are more GOP incumbents than Democratic ones, the Republicans’ opponents may be individuals who don’t have voting records to attack.

We first noticed the NRCC’s proclivity for hitting below the belt even before the fall campaign season kicked off, in the special election for convicted Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham’s open seat in California last spring. Multiple NRCC attacks on Democrat Francine Busby included a mailer that likened her to “dangerous” and “irresponsible” teenage drunk drivers. She lost by 5 points in the June 6 special election and is currently the Democratic candidate in the Nov. 7 general election.

By late September, it was increasingly clear that this kind of attack was becoming a staple for the NRCC, and it was no accident. A New York Times story on Sept. 27 said that the Republicans’ attacks were “the product of more than a year of research into the personal and professional backgrounds of Democratic challengers.” Said Rep. Tom Reynolds, chair of the NRCC:

Reynolds: We haven’t even begun to unload this freight train.

Well, the train is at the station, and the freight being unloaded isn’t pretty, or necessarily  true.

“Fantasy Hotline”

New York Democrat Michael Acuri has learned that in spades. One of the NRCC’s spots attacking him accuses him of billing taxpayers for a call to a “fantasy hotline.” In fact, the evidence shows someone using the phone in Arcuri’s hotel room misdialed and hung up in seconds, and the total charge to taxpayers was $1.25.

The ad is laden with sexual innuendo. A woman’s voice says “Hi sexy, you’ve reached the live one on one fantasy line.” Arcuri is pictured appearing to leer as the silhouette of a woman undulates suggestively in the background.

“The phone number to an adult fantasy hotline appeared on Michael Arcuri’s New York City hotel room bill while he was there on official business,” the announcer says. “Who calls a fantasy hotline and then bills taxpayers? Michael Arcuri.”

The facts of this case paint a much different picture. The phone records indeed show a call to the number of an adult fantasy talk service at 3:26 p.m. on Jan. 28, 2004, but the very next minute – 3:27 p.m. – the records show another number was dialed. The second number was identical except for the three-digit area code, and was the number of the New York State Department of Criminal Justice Services. It was Sean Byrne, executive director of the New York Prosecutors Training Institute, who made both calls, according to Arcuri and Byrne. Both were attending a meeting of the New York State District Attorneys Association. The hotel’s charge for the misdialed “fantasy” line call was $1.25.

Un-Indicted Rapist

Another NRCC-produced ad hammers Arcuri with a claim that an accused rapist was freed after Arcuri’s office “failed to indict him in time.” Why? According to the local newspaper, the scheduled indictment hearing couldn’t go forward because the 13-year-old victim didn’t appear and a key witness had been admitted to a psychiatric facility. The ad doesn’t mention that the accused man was indicted several days later. His freedom lasted eight days. Eventually he pleaded guilty to a reduced charge (Arcuri’s case was weakened because the young victim was reluctant to cooperate) and was sentenced to 18 months to 3 years behind bars. The same ad says the “percentage of felony convictions” in Oneida County, where Arcuri is district attorney, “has fallen dramatically since 1998.” That’s false, according to our calculations from statistics available from New York State’s Division of Criminal Justice Services. In 1998, 88.1 percent of felonies prosecuted in the county resulted in convictions. In 2005, it was 90.3. That’s an increase of 2.2 percentage points, not a decrease, much less a dramatic one.

Name-Calling

The NRCC ads show a tendency to turn policy differences into name-calling attacks on personal character. An NRCC ad in Arizona called Democratic candidate Gabrielle Giffords “a hypocrite on taxes.” The ad misrepresents her actual position on federal taxes, however. It says she falsely claims to favor tax cuts, when in fact she supports repealing some of the tax cuts Republicans gave to corporations and wealthy individuals. She does favor extending “middle class” tax breaks such as a deduction for college tuition.

In Iowa, another name-calling ad characterizes Democratic candidate Bruce Braley as a “greedy trial lawyer.” The ad complains that he “supported the suit for a woman spilling hot coffee on her lap.” But the famous lawsuit against McDonald’s was actually more substantial than late-night comics made it out to be. Stella Leibeck, the 79-year-old plaintiff, suffered third-degree burns over 6 per cent of her body, spent eight days in the hospital and required skin grafts, and McDonald’s served its coffee at a scalding 180 and 190 degrees Fahrenheit, much hotter than coffee served at home.

Still more name-calling NRCC ads refer to Wisconsin Democrat Steve Kagen as “Dr. Millionaire,” and one even calls him “Dr. Millionaire Know-It-All.” Kagen is certainly a prosperous physician. But if being a millionaire disqualifies somebody from serving in the House of Representatives a slew of members will have to resign – 136, to be precise, or almost one-third, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Eighty-seven of them are Republicans, versus 49 Democrats. The “know-it-all” line refers to Kagen’s desire to scrap President Bush’s Medicare prescription drug benefit for one of his own design.

More Smears

Democrats are not innocent when it comes to making false or misleading attacks on personal character, as regular readers of this site are well aware. For one example see our Oct. 18 article on a DCCC ad accusing Florida Republican Clay Shaw of profiting from a “drug deal” by trading in a pharmaceutical company’s stock, which we found to be based on flimsy evidence at best.

But the pattern of deceptive and unfounded personal allegations contained in this year’s NRCC ads is one we judge to be truly remarkable. Other examples:

• Sued his patients. NRCC ads say Dr. Kagen “took legal action against eighty former patients.” Misleading. It’s true that Kagen hired a collection agency that took a total of 80 patients to small claims court for arbitration of unpaid bills, but that was over the course of a 25-year career in which Kagen estimates he has seen 50,000 patients. Kagen says the agency deemed them all able to pay.
• “Not paying his taxes on time.” A North Carolina ad says of Democratic candidate Heath Shuler, “He’s been caught again not paying his taxes on time.” False. The unpaid taxes weren’t “his” and payment wasn’t his responsibility. The delinquent taxes were the fault of businessmen who bought a real-estate brokerage from Shuler and his brother in 2003. It’s true that The Associated Press found that the brokerage, which still bears Shuler’s name, owed $69,000 and had been chronically behind in paying local taxes, but Shuler at that point retained only a minority interest and no management chores. The taxes and penalties were paid after Shuler’s lawyer threatened to sue the current managers if they didn’t, according to The AP.

• “Seven-year olds! Tased!” An NRCC ad in Ohio includes a charge that Democratic Challenger John Cranley “voted to allow children as young as seven to be tased. Seven-year-olds, tased! With 50,000 volts of electricity.” Misleading. Cincinnati police regulations already permit use of the X26 Taser, designed as a non-lethal weapon to incapacitate rather than kill, to subdue resisting suspects between the ages of 7 and 70. The ad refers to Cranley’s vote on the Cincinnati City Council against raising that age minimum to 10. The Council voted 5-4 against raising the age after opponents cited concerns that batons or pepper spray would be more likely to harm a resisting subject.
• “Fixed ticket.” An Indiana ad includes a claim by a local prosecutor that Democratic challenger Brad Ellsworth tried to get his daughter’s speeding ticket “dismissed” because of his “position” as sheriff of an adjoining town. The ad includes an on-screen graphic that says, “Fixed Ticket.” False. The ticket was paid. The prosecutor alleging that Ellsworth sought special treatment is a Republican who broached the issue for the first time in mid-October, a year and a half after the fact, and who says he does not recall Ellsworth’s exact words. Ellsworth says he was seeking to get his daughter into an existing program that allowed first-time offenders to keep their driving records clean in return for paying higher fines. In any event, the prosecutor said his daughter did not qualify and the ticket stood.

   Attack Ads Work

Both the NRCC and the DCCC are running negative ads because they believe they work. When the New York Times asked the NRCC’s Chairman Reynolds why he wasn’t running more positive ads, he burst out laughing. “If they [positive ads] moved things to the extent that negative ads move things, there would be more of them,” the Times quoted him as saying.

As we said earlier, negative ads can convey information that is useful to voters – provided they avoid distortion. Many of the NRCC’s ads fall well short of that standard.

– by Brooks Jackson, Viveca Novak, Justin Bank, James Ficaro and Emi Kolawole

Media

Watch NRCC Ad: “Bad Call”

Watch NRCC Ad: “Bizarre”

Watch NRCC Ad: “Speeding Ticket”

Watch NRCC Ad: The Thinker”

Supporting Documents

View 29 NRCC Ads Deemed Personal Attacks by FactCheck.org

View a List of House Members with A Net Worth of $1 Million or More, According to CRP

Sources

Gary Craig, “Fighting for Rochester’s Future/Campaign 2003: DA foes grapple over ad on crime,” Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, 31 Oct 2003.

Mark Weiner, “Sex-Call Spot is Called a New Low,” The Post-Standard, 21 Oct 2006.

“Ad Watch: Arcuri 1995 Rape Prosecution,” Observer-Dispatch. 12 Oct. 2006.

Kagen 4 Congress, “The Kagen Public Health Policy: Steve Kagen – On the Problems We Face Together,”  Issue Brief, 2006 (PDF).

Nicole Duran, “Kagen, Target of NRCC Ad, Hits Back,” Roll Call. 14 Sept 2006.

Director of State Courts, “Guide to Small Claims Court,” Wisconsin Court System, July 2006. (PDF)

“Participating Physicians Directory,” US Department of Health & Human Services, Updated: 19 Oct. 2006.

Tim Whitmire, “Heath Shuler-Linked Firm Pays Back Taxes,” The Associated Press, 22 Sep 2006.

Gavin Lesnick, “Prosecutor, Ellsworth Spar,” Evansville Courier & Press, 15 Oct 2006.

Ryan Lenz, “GOP accuses Ellsworth of intervening in daughter’s traffic ticket,” Associated Press, 15 Oct 2006.

Greg Korte, “Cincinnati Council defeats Teaser ban on kids a 3rd time,”The Cincinatti Enquirer, 27 Jan 2005.

Kevin Osborne, “Council Locks 4-4 on Taser Limit,” The Cincinnati Post, 6 Jan 2005.

McNair, James. “Erpenbeck Bankers Hope for Mercy,” The Cincinnati  Enquirer, 25 Jan. 2005.

Tom Duffy, “The enduring legend of McDonald’s coffee,” Lawyers Weekly USA, 22 Nov 2004.

The post Republican Mudslinging On An Industrial Scale appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Well over a dozen Democratic ads claim incumbent GOP lawmakers voted against benefits and funding for the nation’s military. The Republicans are accused variously of opposing a $1,500 bonus, expanded health care, trauma care, and job assistance for troops. Some of the ads are false. The rest are true, but don’t tell the whole story.

The ads stop short of telling voters that  National Guard and Reservists already get the same healthcare coverage as active-duty troops while they are on active duty and for a considerable time before and afterward. They also fail to mention that the maximum death benefit for troops had already been doubled the previous year, that the increase proposed in trauma care would have been only a small boost to an already significant funding amount, and that job assistance for troops already exists.

Analysis

The claims below are taken from 18 political ads that appeared in 14 districts across the country between Sept. 29 and Oct. 19.  All of the ads are from Democratic candidates or groups.  Some are misleading or false, and those that are true paint only part of a larger picture. Voters might get a different impression once informed of other relevant facts.

Media

Watch Shuler for Congress Ad: “Troops”

Watch DCCC Ad: “Bonuses”

Watch DCCC Ad: “Troop Healthcare”

Watch the Committee to Bring Back Baron Ad: “Vet Support”

Sources

Plummer, Anne. “House Backs More Military Spending,” Congressional Quarterly Weekly. 28 May 2005.

Kapp, Lawrence. “Reserve Component Personnel Issues: Questions and Answers,” Congressional Research Service. 28 Jan 2006.

Dagett, Stephen. “Defense: FY2006 Authorization and Appropriations,” Congressional Research Service. 20 Jan 2006.

McCutcheon, Chuck. “Senate Committee Approves Defense Spending Bill, Adding $4.1 Billion for Overseas Missions,” Congressional Quarterly Weekly. 29 May 2000.

Ives-Halperin, Benton and Gayle S. Putrich. “Bill to Speed Up Materiel Acquisitions Passes in House,” Congressional Quarterly Today. 14 June 2004.

Plummer, Anne. “House Democrats Likely to Push Military Health Care Extension for Reservists,” Congressional Quarterly Today. 26 May 2005.

Plummer, Anne. “House Adds ‘Buy American’ to Defense Bill; Health Care Measure Rejected,” Congressional Quarterly Today. 25 May 2005.

Burrelli, David F. and Jennifer R. Corwell. “Military Death benefits: Status and Proposals,” Congressional Research Service. 24 Jan 2006.

The post Hurting the Troops? appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Republican Rep. Ron Lewis of Kentucky attacks his opponent, retired Army Col. Mike Weaver, with an ad saying the Democrat is “not fit for duty in Congress” because of a National Guard pay-for-promotion scandal that goes back 14 years. The ad accuses Weaver of “disgraceful conduct,” and Lewis even said at a campaign stop that Weaver “broke the law.”

But Lewis offers no proof. In fact, multiple investigations by the FBI and the Army Inspector General’s office resulted in criminal convictions of two Kentucky National Guard officials but never accused or implicated Weaver, who was the only career Army officer on a three-man National Guard board charged with recommending veteran officers for retention or retirement. Furthermore, a review by the Kentucky Department of Military Affairs concluded that Weaver specifically “took no part in the fund-raising or other political activities” that were involved in the scandal.

Analysis

When Rep. Lewis announced this ad in an Oct. 13 news conference he called for Weaver to drop out of the race saying he “shouldn’t be elected dogcatcher.” As evidence, however, he offered reporters only a fistful of old newspaper clips, none of which even suggested Weaver had engaged in anything illegal or unethical.

Scandal in the Guard

Weaver was the only career Army man on a three-man “Selective Retention Board” (SRB), there as the US Army’s senior adviser to the State of Kentucky. His two colleagues were selected by the commander of the state National Guard. The board recommended 32 National Guard officers be forced to retire to make way for younger personnel, more than had been listed in previous years. Some of those forced out complained that they were being punished for not contributing to the campaign of Brereton Jones, a Democrat who had been elected governor in November 1991.

What followed were three investigations, one by the Army Inspector General which resulted in no action, another by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and yet another by the Army IG. A National Guard colonel named Clifford Childers pleaded guilty in federal court to promising career-enhancing opportunities to a fellow officer in exchange for a $500 campaign contribution for Jones. And Robert DeZarn, who was Kentucky’s Adjutant General (commander of the state’s National Guard) when the 1992 SRB met, was convicted of perjury in connection with the first Army probe. However, none of those investigations produced any public showing that Weaver acted improperly. The  FBI showed no interest in him. He wasn’t even interviewed, he said.

“I Was the One”

The attack ad is correct when it says Weaver stated that he was “instrumental” in firing the Guardsmen. However, there’s no evidence that Weaver was motivated by politics. His job was to clear out the weakest officers to allow promotion of younger or more competent officers, and he says he did that with vigor. In 1995, Weaver told the Courier-Journal that “I was the one pushing the hardest” to remove the 32 officers. But he also said that politics played no part in his own decisions, and we’ve seen no evidence that would contradict him. Weaver had good reason to look critically at officer performance. In the Gulf War the previous year, some units of the National Guard were criticized for their lack of combat readiness, a failing that was laid at the feet of the Guard’s officers.

The Army IG’s second probe relied in great part on the FBI’s investigative work and information that came to light as a result of Childers’ cooperation with authorities and DeZarn’s trial. The Army IG eventually concluded that several state Guard officials, besides the two who were convicted, had engaged in misconduct as part of a fundraising effort for Gov. Jones, and that some had given false information in an attempt to cover up their deeds. But the Army investigation didn’t find any wrongdoing by the SRB on which Weaver sat:

Army IG Report: Testimony/evidence gained as a result of the FBI investigation and subsequent Federal grand jury trial [sic] did not corroborate a connection between solicitation/collection of campaign contributions and the results of the SRB.

Notwithstanding the findings of all these investigations, 15 of the officers who had been forced to retire applied to the Army Board for Correction of Military Records for reinstatement, back pay and other relief. The Correction Board did not conduct its own investigation, but simply reviewed material that was submitted by the aggrieved applicants. In 1999, it found in the case of one of the applicants that the Kentucky National Guard leadership’s “entanglement of partisan politics, official military duties, and obstruction [of the first IG’s] investigation into the relationship between those illegal political activities and the 1992 Selective Retention Board constitutes grounds for a loss of confidence in the fairness of the administration of the 1992 [Kentucky National Guard] SRB.” The Correction Board found in favor of 14 of the applicants.

We’d note that even the Correction Board’s review of evidence handpicked by the officers who felt they’d been wronged did not conclude there had been misconduct by the members of the SRB, though it did say there was grounds for a “loss of confidence” in its work.

The Kentucky National Guard, as it turned out, had not even been notified that the Correction Board was doing a review. When it was informed of the results, the new Adjutant General, Brig. Gen. D. Allen Youngman, ordered a review of all the evidence available from all the investigations. His office, Kentucky’s Department of Military Affairs, produced a 2002 memo refuting the Correction Board’s results.

The Department of Military Affairs memo noted that:

DMA Memo: Applicants were unsuccessful in convincing the FBI or the [Inspector General] of a connection between the obvious criminal misconduct that occurred in the 1990-91 fund-raising and the 1992 SRB. As the [Inspector General] concluded in its 28 January 1999 final report to the Vice Chief of Staff, Army, “the preponderance of evidence did not support the allegations that senior officials of the [Kentucky National Guard] had acted improperly in conducting the 1992 SRB.”

The memo also stated that “there were valid reasons for the non-retention of each of the Applicants and….their right to fair treatment was in no way violated.”

And regarding Weaver specifically, the memo said that:

DMA Memo: [W]hile Applicants may argue (despite the lack of supporting evidence) that one or both of the other two members were improperly influenced by political matters, no such accusation can be made concerning Colonel Weaver who took no part in the fund-raising or other political activities. It is equally clear that he took seriously his responsibility as Senior Regular Army Advisor to assist the Kentucky Army National guard in maintaining the best possible officer corps.

The memo also said that “clearing out deadwood,” which is what Weaver told another officer he wanted to do on the SRB, was “the precise purpose of the Selective Retention Program,” and didn’t indicate any improper motives on Weaver’s part.

In fact, FactCheck’s analysis of numbers provided in the Department of Military Affairs’ memo shows no pattern of promoting donors and punishing non-donors. One hundred and forty three officers, all of whom had served for twenty or more years, were considered by the 1992 SRB. Our calculations show that of the 111 who were recommended for retention, about 9 percent had donated to Brereton. Of the 32 who were recommended for non-retention, about 9.4 percent had given. Numbers are only part of the story, but these don’t support a conclusion that those who gave financial support to Brereton were rewarded and those who didn’t were punished.

Other Errors

There are other problems with the ad. For instance, it’s incorrect to call the SRB “Weaver’s retention board.” Weaver was no more powerful than the two other members of the panel. As for the sentence “Weaver’s superiors go to jail and Weaver admits he was instrumental in firing the Guardsman,” the implication – that Weaver is ‘fessing up to something having to do with the conduct that sent others to jail – is simply false.

The reference to officers’ non-retention, which is what it’s called in the military, as “dismissal” and “firing” would make many a Guardsman bristle. Technically, an officer who is non-retained must either retire or transfer to the Army’s Individual Ready Reserve.

In addition, while DeZarn and Childers held higher rank than Weaver, they weren’t his “superiors” in that they didn’t have authority over him, since they were part of the National Guard and he was in the regular Army. And only DeZarn went to prison, as far as we have been able to discern. Childers received home detention, community service and a fine.

Pressing the Point

Lewis, who has said that he began pursuing this issue after he was contacted by one of the officers who was non-retained in 1992, held a press conference when he released the ad, calling for Weaver to withdraw from the race. “That was dirty politics that Mr. Weaver was participating in,” Lewis said. “It was illegal politics.” A couple of days later, Lewis said that because of the scandal, Weaver “shouldn’t be elected dogcatcher.”

According to a story in the Owensboro, KY News-Enterprise about the incumbent’s news conference, Lewis provided scant information relevant to Weaver’s role.

News-Enterprise: Information provided by the Lewis campaign Friday included 17 photocopied pages of newspaper articles detailing the charges, investigation and conviction of DeZarn and Childress. Weaver is mentioned in only one story in which he calls himself “the independent member of the board” who had no political stake in the outcome.

In a campaign stop on Oct. 16, Lewis said Weaver “broke the law” and he “broke his oath,” according to a newspaper report. But there’s no evidence that Weaver was involved in any dirty politics, nor that he did anything illegal, and Lewis couldn’t name what laws he might have broken, according to newspaper accounts.

“Disgraceful conduct?” “Not fit for duty in Congress?” We repeat: Evidence of misconduct by Weaver in this matter isn’t thin, it’s nonexistent. The only  “disgraceful conduct” we see here is the ad itself.

Media

Watch Lewis ad “Not Fit for Duty”

Sources

Maj. Gen. Raymond R. Rees, Memorandum to Under Secretary of the Army and Transmittal of Request from the Adjutant General, Kentucky, 24 October 2002.

Adjutant General D. Allen Youngman, Memorandum in support of request by the Kentucky Army National Guard to review and amend the actions of the Army Board for Correction of Military Records, 16 October 2002.

Stamper, John and Ryan Alessi “Lewis calls on Weaver to leave race: Cites 1991 guard officer firing scandal,” The Lexington Herald-Leader, 14 October 2006.

Alessi, Ryan, “Weaver fires back at ad’s personnel claims,” The Lexington Herald Leader, 15 October 2006.

Lawrence, Keith, “Lewis, Weaver trade barbs: Challenger says he’s closing gap,” Messenger-Inquirer, 17 October 2006.

Sheroan, Ben, “Lewis raises issue from Weaver’s past,” Elizabethtown News-Enterprise, 14 October 2006.

Loftus, Tom, “Guard colonel admits illegal fund raising,” The Courier-Journal, 20 September 1996.

Loftus, Tom, “Probe continues into contributions by Guard members,” The Courier-Journal, 20 November 1995.

Wolfe, Charles, “Former Guard officer sentenced in money-for-promotions scandal,” The Associated Press as published by The Courier-Journal, 18 December 1996.

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