Campaign Ad Wars

TERENCE SMITH:

If you live in one of the so-called battleground states in the presidential sweepstakes, chances are you have already seen scores of political ads for both President Bush and Sen. John Kerry.

With six months still to go before the election, the two campaigns have already spent more than $100 million on television advertising.

Here with me to discuss the factual accuracy of those ads is Brooks Jackson, director of FactCheck.org, a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. Brooks, welcome. $100 million by this stage of the campaign. Is that a record?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Absolutely. We've never seen anything like this. What's happening is the donation limits have gone up under McCain-Feingold from $1,000 to $2,000 per donor, so there's more money available to the candidates.

Kerry did not accept public money during the primary campaign, so he is not subject to any spending limits and he's continuing to raise and spend tens of millions after the primary period. And the whole campaign started perhaps a month earlier than any previous campaign because Democrats had moved their primary schedule up.

TERENCE SMITH:

All right. Let's talk about some of the ads that are and have been running across the country in different markets. The first is a Kerry ad that began airing in 20 markets today.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (Ad):

We are a country of the future. We're a country of optimists. We're the can-do people.

KERRY AD SPOKESMAN:

For John Kerry, a stronger America begins at home. Real plans to create jobs here, not overseas; lower health care costs; independence from Middle East oil; and in the world, a strong military and strong alliances to defeat terror. America: Stronger at home, respected in the world. John Kerry for president.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (Ad):

I'm John Kerry and I approved this message.

TERENCE SMITH:

Well, that ad is pretty general, but there was a line in there that caught my ear, anyway, which is his plan to create independence from Middle East oil. Does he have such a plan?

BROOKS JACKSON:

That's right. Well, he does. It's on his Web site. And if you look at it carefully, it involves such things as increasing use of hydrogen vehicles by the year 2020.

Well, that's pretty much the same thing that George Bush is calling for, and it is probably not a practical plan. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology had a report out last year saying that diesel cars and hybrid vehicles are a better bet for the foreseeable future to combat global warming. They're just not going to be practical anytime soon.

TERENCE SMITH:

So this might even be a little too optimistic?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Well, it's kind of a cream puff of an ad, really. There's not many facts… factual claims made in it.

TERENCE SMITH:

All right. Let's take a look now at a Bush campaign ad that began airing last week and is still on the air. It's called "Patriot Act."

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH (Ad):

I'm George W. Bush and I approved this message.

BUSH AD SPOKESMAN:

President Bush signed the Patriot Act, giving law enforcement vital tools to fight terrorism. John Kerry? He voted for the Patriot Act, but pressured by fellow liberals, he's changed his position. While wiretaps, subpoena powers and surveillances are routinely used against drug dealers and organized crime, Kerry would now repeal the Patriot Act's use of these tools against terrorists. John Kerry: playing politics with national security.

TERENCE SMITH:

All right, what catches your eye and ear in that?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Well, first of all, it is simply not true that John Kerry is calling for repealing wiretap authority against terrorists.

What he's calling for, and by the way, so are six Republican senators — there is bipartisan criticism of the Patriot Act here — what he's calling for are amendments to the Patriot Act that would bring about greater judicial oversight for things like sneak-and-peek warrants that allow searches without informing the subject and for roving wiretaps which go to the individual and not the actual telephone number. Not repeal; he's calling for an amendment, and it's not just liberals.

TERENCE SMITH:

And there's a big difference. Now let's look… here's the last half of actually a one-minute Kerry ad we've edited to the second half to be fair here. It's essentially a biography ad. It's called "Lifetime."

KERRY AD SPOKESMAN:

For more than 30 years, John Kerry has served America.As a tough prosecutor, he fought for victims' rights. In the Senate, he was a leader in the fight for health care for children. He joined with John McCain to find the truth about POW's and MIA's in Vietnam.

He broke with his own party to support a balanced budget; then, in the 1990s, cast the decisive vote that created 20 million new jobs. A lifetime of service and strength. John Kerry for president.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (Ad):

I'm John Kerry and I approved this message.

TERENCE SMITH:

A decisive vote to create 20 million new jobs?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Of course, this is one of those classic biographical ads to make John Kerry look good, and he just couldn't resist going a little over the line. What he's talking about there is a vote for Bill Clinton's 1993 deficit reduction package, mostly tax increases. It did pass by a single vote, so every senator who voted for it, I suppose, cast a decisive vote.

But not even Bill Clinton claimed that that package was the sole thing that created the jobs that followed. Even Clinton gave a little credit to businessmen and workers and people in the economy.

TERENCE SMITH:

So every vote that was for it was decisive.

BROOKS JACKSON:

Exactly, and it wasn't just John Kerry or that package that created 20 million new jobs.

TERENCE SMITH:

All right, here's another ad. This Bush campaign ad is entitled "Troubling," and it raises a number of allegations and questions about John Kerry.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH (Ad):

I'm George W. Bush and I approved this message.

BUSH AD SPOKESMAN:

John Kerry's record on the economy? Troubling.

He opposed tax relief for married couples 22 times; opposed increasing the child tax credit 18 times. Kerry supported higher taxes over 350 times. He even supported increasing taxes on Social Security benefits and a 50-cent a gallon tax hike for gasoline. Now, Kerry's plan will raise taxes by at least $900 billion in his first 100 days. Kerry and the economy? Troubling.

TERENCE SMITH:

So, have you looked at these numbers?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Oh, yes.

TERENCE SMITH:

$90 billion, et cetera.

BROOKS JACKSON:

Absolutely. Absolutely. It says John Kerry voted for higher taxes 350 times. They have a list of more than 350 votes.

If you look carefully at them, some of those votes… most of them are to keep taxes the same. When he voted against a proposed tax cut, some of them are for lower taxes, if he voted for a Democratic alternative to a larger Republican tax cut.

What they mean is — but they never make clear to the viewer — he voted for higher taxes then, the alternative that happened to be offered at the time. Most people hear that as a vote to raise taxes above current levels.

That's false, leaves a false implication.

The gas tax? It's true, ten years ago Kerry said in a newspaper interview that he had supported a 50-cent a gallon gas increase, that he didn't get enough credit as a deficit hawk, and he should be given credit for that. But he never sponsored a bill to do that, never voted for it, doesn't support it now and yet other commercials from Bush says Kerry has plan the raise gas tax 50 cents a gallon. And it's just not true.

TERENCE SMITH:

Okay. Here's a Kerry ad that is entitled "Ten Million Jobs." Let's look at it.

KERRY AD SPOKESMAN:

While jobs are leaving our country in record numbers, George Bush says sending jobs overseas makes sense for America. His top economic advisers say moving American jobs to low-cost countries is a plus for the U.S.

John Kerry's proposed a different economic plan that encourages companies to keep jobs here. It's part of a detailed economic agenda to create ten million jobs. John Kerry, a new direction for America.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (Ad):

I'm John Kerry and I approved this message.

TERENCE SMITH:

All right, Brooks.

BROOKS JACKSON:

Well, where that one goes too far is saying Bush says it makes sense to send jobs overseas. George Bush never said that. His chief economist said that in a very voluminous report that, my guess is, the president never even read.

But it just… they would have been all right if they said the Bush administration says that it makes sense to send jobs overseas. That was an economic argument in favor of fair trade and something no sensible politician would be saying in an election year.

But it's just wrong to put those words in the president's mouth.

TERENCE SMITH:

Okay. Finally, this Bush ad is entitled "Wacky."

BROOKS JACKSON:

Oh, yes.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH (Ad):

I'm George W. Bush and I approved this message.

BUSH AD SPOKESMAN:

Some people have wacky ideas, like taxing gasoline more so people drive less. That's John Kerry. He supported the 50-cent a gallon gas tax. If Kerry's gas tax increase were law, the average family would pay $657 more a year. Raising taxes is a habit of Kerry's. He supported higher gasoline taxes 11 times. Maybe John Kerry just doesn't understand what his ideas mean to the rest of us.

TERENCE SMITH:

So, as you said before, that's taking a ten-year-old proposal and then applying today numbers to it.

BROOKS JACKSON:

And casting it in the present tense, "Kerry's plan." And they even have a little calculator on their Web site you can figure out how much it's going to cost you, depending on how much you drive. Well, it's just silly and it's wrong.

TERENCE SMITH:

Finally, what's the impact of this advertising? Is there polling or surveys done to determine whether people believe what they see and hear?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Well, alarmingly, yes. The Annenberg Center conducts an enormous poll during elections, the National Annenberg Election Survey, and we took a look at this, surveying in those battleground states and also other states. And what we're finding is that people tend to get… even people who say they don't learn much from ads — they, of course, aren't going to be influenced by those — a large number of people actually have some of this false information stuck in their brains as being true or probably true.

And those numbers are higher by four, five, six, seven percentage points in the battleground states where these ads are running than they are in other states where people are just picking up these things from the general campaign rhetoric.

TERENCE SMITH:

And is there anyway to estimate or analyze how these ads impact the relative standing of the two candidates in the polls?

BROOKS JACKSON:

Well, it's… we have some information, again, from the Annenberg survey. What we've found is that during the period when these ads have been running heavily, those..

Well, I should say first that Bush's ads have been predominantly negative attacks on Kerry, trying to define Kerry before the public can get their information from Kerry. Kerry, as you saw in some of these ads, is running mostly positive ads and leaving the attacks on Bush to independent Democratic groups.

What we've found, though, is that Bush's favorable ratings have gone down and Kerry's have gone up during the period these ads are running. So it looks like Bush's ads may be back-firing.

TERENCE SMITH:

Okay. Brooks Jackson, FactCheck.org. Thank you very much.

BROOKS JACKSON:

My pleasure, Terry.