Embeded for emphasis: <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/l63SRpGXBHE&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/l63SRpGXBHE&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> Hilarious how eerily similar that was to last night.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-10-15-fact-check_N.htm Fact check: Context of key debate claims By Richard Wolf and Ken Dilanian, USA TODAY A look at the claims made by Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama at the third and final presidential debate Wednesday: Tax cuts The claim: Obama said his tax plan offers three times the tax relief as McCain's plan does for the middle class. The facts: The non-partisan Tax Policy Center shows that is the case for the first year of Obama's plan, but not over the long haul, and only for a narrow slice of the "middle class" — those making between $37,595 and $66,354. The group says Obama's plan would save those families $1,042 in the first year, compared to McCain's $319. In later years, the difference is not nearly as great. In 2012, the last year of the next president's term, the difference is smaller: a $2,197 tax cut under Obama's plan compared with $1,441 under McCain's. And for people earning more but who still consider themselves middle class — those earning up to $112,000 — Obama's plan would cut their tax bill by $1,264 in 2009, McCain's plan by $994. Bill Ayers The claim: McCain criticized Obama's association with former Chicago radical Bill Ayers, whom McCain called "a guy who in 2001 said he wished he would have bombed more." The facts: Ayers was a member of the Weather Underground, a radical group that engaged in domestic bombings to protest the Vietnam War. He was in hiding for years after three Weathermen died in 1970 when bombs they were making exploded. Federal charges against him for crossing state lines to incite riots and conspiracy were dropped because of prosecutorial misconduct. In a New York Times story published by coincidence on Sept. 11, 2001, about his memoirs, Fugitive Days, he said, "I don't regret setting bombs … I feel we didn't do enough." These days, Ayers is a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago who has drawn kind words from the city's mayor. Ayers and Obama have moved in some of the same circles. Ayers was a founder of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a school-reform group. Obama chaired its board from 1995 to 1999. In 1995, Ayers hosted a brunch for Obama, who was running for the Illinois Senate. In 1997, they were on a juvenile justice panel sponsored by the University of Chicago. Ayers gave $200 to Obama's 2001 state Senate campaign, and the two were on a 2002 panel on intellectualism that was co-sponsored by the Chicago Public Library. Spending The claim: Obama said he has proposed "a net spending cut," adding "every dollar that I've proposed, I've proposed an additional cut so that it matches." The facts: The non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that Obama's spending and savings policies would emerge in 2013 with $144 billion in net savings. However, that's dependent on a phased withdrawal from Iraq over 16 months, leaving only 30,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan by 2010. It also relies on several less-than-specific spending cuts and changes. And Obama's overall economic policies still would lose money, because his tax cuts would cost $360 billion and his health care plan would cost $65 billion over that period, the group says. Voter-registration fraud The claim: McCain said the Obama campaign has contributed to an organization that is perpetrating "one of the greatest frauds" in American campaign history. The facts: The organization — the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN — says it has registered 1.3 million people this year. Obama's campaign paid an ACORN affiliate, Citizens Services Inc., $832,000 this year for get-out-the-vote efforts in the Democratic primaries, according to the non-partisan CQ MoneyLine, which tracks campaign spending. Republicans have repeatedly accused the group of submitting fraudulent registrations; Obama said it had hired some people who "just filled out a bunch of names." What's not clear is whether any of the fraudulent registrations can lead to fraudulent votes. Negative advertising The claim: Obama said McCain's television advertisements have been "100% negative." McCain said that wasn't true. The facts: Obama's claim apparently was based on an analysis released Oct. 8 by the Wisconsin Advertising Project at the University of Wisconsin. The report said, "During the week of Sept. 28-Oct. 4, nearly 100% of the McCain campaign's advertisements were negative. During the same period, 34% of the Obama campaign's ads were negative." But the report also said that overall 73% of McCain's ads and 61% of Obama's have been negative. The study used information obtained from TNS Media Intelligence/Campaign Media Analysis Group, which analyzes data on the airing of every presidential ad in the top 186 TV markets in the country. The McCain campaign last night released its own tally of TNS Media Intelligence/Campaign Media Analysis Group data based on total ad spending, saying that the Obama campaign had spent $42 million on negative ads to McCain's $27 million, and that Obama had run 81,638 negative ads to McCain's 59,835. Iraq The claim: McCain said Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden had proposed dividing Iraq into three countries. He called it a "cockamamie idea." The facts: In 2006, Biden, as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, proposed partitioning Iraq into three regions — Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni — with a central government in Baghdad. He said it would "maintain a united Iraq by decentralizing it, giving each ethno-religious group … room to run its own affairs, while leaving the central government in charge of common interests." He did not propose that it become three separate countries. Supreme Court The claim: McCain said that Obama voted against Associate Justice Stephen Breyer and Chief Justice John Roberts. The facts: Obama voted against Roberts, but he was not in the Senate when Breyer was approved by the Senate in 1994. Obama became a senator in 2005. McCain's health care plan The claim: In discussing his $5,000-per-family tax credit for health care, McCain said the average cost of a health care plan is $5,800. The facts: The average cost of a family plan purchased by employers this year hit a new high, $12,106, according to an annual survey of nearly 2,000 employers by the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation, a research group based in Menlo Park, Calif. Individual coverage premiums averaged $4,479. Obama's health care plan The claim: McCain said that under Obama's health care plan, a small business could be fined for not offering coverage to its employees. The facts: The key to this charge is what defines a "small" business, and the Obama campaign has not said. Obama has said he would exempt small businesses from having to contribute to their employees' health coverage or pay into a national fund. He has not, however, said what size company he has in mind for the exemption. In August, Obama adviser Jason Furman said companies with 10 or fewer employees would likely be exempted, but he did not limit it to that size. Obama did not directly address the charge from McCain that parents would be fined for not insuring their children. Obama has not said how he would enforce his requirement that parents get coverage for their children. Abortion The claim: McCain said: "Sen. Obama, as a member of the Illinois state Senate, voted in the Judiciary Committee against a law that would provide immediate medical attention to a child born of a failed abortion. He voted against that." Obama said he opposed the bill as a threat to abortion rights, knowing that state law already required doctors to care for babies born alive. The facts: FactCheck.org, a non-partisan project of the University of Pennsylvania, found that Obama opposed Illinois legislation in 2001, 2002 and 2003 that would have defined any aborted fetus that showed signs of life as a "born alive infant" entitled to legal protection, even if doctors believed it could not survive. Obama opposed the 2001 and 2002 "born alive" bills as backdoor attacks on a woman's legal right to abortion, but he said he would have been "fully in support" of a similar federal bill that President Bush had signed in 2002, because it contained protections for Roe v. Wade, FactCheck.org found. FactCheck also found that Illinois law already required physicians to protect the life of a fetus when there is "a reasonable likelihood of sustained survival of the fetus outside the womb, with or without artificial support." Alaska budget The claim: McCain said his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, "cut the size of government." The facts: Palin has not cut the size of government. State spending under Palin has grown dramatically, fueled by an explosion of revenues thanks to Palin's multibillion-dollar tax increase on the oil and gas companies that fund most of the budget. In 2007, Palin vetoed about $231 million in projects sought by legislators in a proposed $1.8 billion capital budget. Even after her cuts, the total capital budget was about $1.54 billion — "a lot more than the level of state spending she outlined when she took office in December," the Anchorage Daily News reported. The operating budget she signed in 2007 grew to $6.6 billion from $6.2 billion the year before. This year, Palin signed an operating budget that had grown to $11 billion, according to the Daily News. She vetoed about 10% of the proposed capital budget, but that budget nonetheless grew to $2.7 billion. While Palin was mayor of Wasilla from 1996 to 2002, the budget grew 55%, according to PolitiFact.com, a joint project of the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly. Oil drilling The claim: Obama said a key way to expand domestic oil production would be by "telling the oil companies the 68 million acres that they currently have leased that they're not drilling, use them or lose them." The facts: Offshore drilling leases run for five to 10 years because that's how long the government expects it to take to find and begin producing oil or natural gas. Leases are extended if oil companies are making progress and not renewed if the area is totally dormant. So not nearly all of the 68 million acres Obama refers to can be drilled immediately. Willard Green, past president of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, has said Democrats "are suggesting that there's a great big lake of oil under that acreage, and all the companies have to do is dig a hole down and produce it."
FactChecking Debate No. 3 October 16, 2008 Sorting out fact and fiction in the presidential candidates' final debate. Summary Spin and hype were apparent, once again, at the third and final debate between McCain and Obama: * McCain claimed the liberal group ACORN “is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history ... maybe destroying the fabric of democracy.” In fact, a Republican prosecutor said of the first and biggest ACORN fraud case: “[T]his scheme was not intended to permit illegal voting.” He said $8-an-hour workers turned in made-up voter registration forms rather than doing what ACORN paid them to do. * McCain said “Joe the plumber” faced “much higher taxes” under Obama’s tax plan and would pay a fine under Obama’s health care plan if he failed to provide coverage for his workers. But Ohio plumber Joe Wurzelbacher would pay higher taxes only if the business he says he wants to buy puts his income over $200,000 a year, and his small business would be exempt from Obama’s requirement to provide coverage for workers. * Obama repeated a dubious claim that his health care plan will cut the average family’s premiums by $2,500 a year. Experts have found that figure to be overly optimistic. * McCain claimed that Obama’s real “object” is a government-run, single-payer health insurance system like those in Canada or England. The McCain campaign points to a quote from five years ago, when Obama told a labor gathering that he was “a proponent of a single-payer health care program.” But Obama has since qualified his enthusiasm for Canadian-style health care, and his current proposal is nothing like that. * Obama incorrectly claimed all of McCain’s ads had been “negative.” That was true for one recent week, but not over the entire campaign. And at times Obama has run a higher percentage of attack ads than McCain. * McCain described Colombia as the "largest agricultural importer of our products." Actually, Canada imports the most U.S. farm products, and Colombia is far down the list. * Obama strained to portray himself as willing to break ranks with fellow Democrats. His prime example was his vote for a bill that was supported by 18 Democrats and opposed by 26. Congressional Quarterly rates him as voting with his party 97 percent of the time since becoming a U.S. senator. http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/factchecking_debate_no_3.html
Can someone who isn't as lazy as me go back and check this part of the debate. I thought I remembered Obama calling McCain's recent attacks negative, not the entire campaign.
Here is the "ZERO?" moment: <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ao5V66m5FaA&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ao5V66m5FaA&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
He left out "recently." Guess it depends on one's window for "have been." Stretching to be charitable, it could be correct if you connect it with the previous sentence's time frame of "just did." CNN transcript
I'd like to see that on TV instead of just youtube. The **** faced grin he has while saying it makes it so much sweeter.
It was weird watching McCain last night... I didn't understand why he went off the subject at some points, i.e. autism. Obama definitely won this one. Welcome to the white house, Barack Obama.
I was really surprised by this debate. McCain started strong, with Obama playing it more safe. But in the last 40 minutes, McCain kept veering off course, and Obama got stronger and stronger. His answers were more to the point and more crisp. He also came off as the much more positive, forward-looking candidate. Two moments in particular will stick with me. 1. In talking about abortion, Obama's answer (love or hate his position) was well stated, and he again said we have to find the common ground and work there together (i.e. fewer and fewer abortions in America). McCain put "health of the woman" in finger quotes, with a negative looking expression that looked like a sneer (?). That can't help him with women voters. What's sad is I know what he meant, that the term can be broadly or poorly defined, but it came off looking like he was dismissing women's health. 2. During the negative campaigning segment, Obama wrapped up his comments saying that to solve problems, republicans, democrats, and independents are definitely going to have to work together. They're going to have to move away from political tit-for-tat to tackle the big problems that the government has been avoiding for decades. This transitioned right to McCain going back to Ayers, making him look, by comparison, kind of small-minded and petty. I know Ayers has to be one of his attack points, but it was really terrible timing I thought. This is the debate that, for me, was most conclusively Obama's. In the 2nd debate, I didn't like that he avoided some of the questions. He looked fine and all, but he played it too safe.
Obama the first with an ad based on the debate last night. My favorite part is the end when McCAIN HIMSELF says that he voted with Bush more than 90% of the time... BE-YOU-TEE-FUL. <embed src="http://services.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f8/1185304443" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" flashVars="videoId=1859660952&playerId=1185304443&viewerSecureGatewayURL=https://console.brightcove.com/services/amfgateway&servicesURL=http://services.brightcove.com/services&cdnURL=http://admin.brightcove.com&domain=embed&autoStart=false&" base="http://admin.brightcove.com" name="flashObj" width="486" height="412" seamlesstabbing="false" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" swLiveConnect="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed>
Another example of erratic off-the-cuff decisions with potentially dire consequences. I feel sorry for the man. He has fallen so far from the myth we saw in 2000.
Yea, I was very surprised to hear Obama claim that "100%" of McCain's ads were negative. He's smarter than that. More importantly, and I haven't seen this touched on yet in this thread, I'm having trouble figuring out why the distinction isn't being made between ad hominem character attacks and policy attacks. McCain quipped during the debate last night about Obama attacking his health care plan - so?? that's fair game. it's a policy distinction to differentiate between the two candidates. i am having a hard time understanding how obama's attacks on mccain's policy positions can be characterized as 'negative' especially within the context of the character assasination the mccain campaign has indulged in. even more strange is that in polls, a pretty good percentage of the public also finds obama's campaign to be negative. correct me if i'm wrong, but all i see is one candidate trying to convince the american public that the other is an anathema, while the other is trying to make policy distinctions.
bush doesn't vote in congress. most of those votes are resolutions supporting the boy scouts anyway. I've never understood that argument.
