2006 November 02 | Lean Left

A Cool Election-Tracking Gizmo

November 2nd, 2006

But Both Parties Do It!

November 2nd, 2006

(Alt title: The Sky is Blue, Part III)

When the subject of attack ads comes up, we on the left often complain about just how bad the GOP has gotten in this regard. And the response is almost always something along the lines of “everyone knows that both parties do it.” Most recently, I saw that response from David O in this thread. And my response is always something along the lines of “just because they both do it doesn’t mean they’re both equally bad about it.” My favortie way of putting it is to note that a guy who drives 60 in a 55 and a guy who robs a liquor store have both broken the law, and thus are both “criminals.” But that doesn’t mean that those offenses are equal.

Enter FactCheck.org:

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.

That’s right, kids. While both parties spend more on negative advertising than on positive advertising, the Democrats do it at a 5:1 ratio, while the Republicans do it at an 8:1 ratio. But the difference is even more stark when put in terms of absolute dollars. Nationwide, Republicans spend more than 2.3 times as much money on negative advertising than their Democratic opponents.

But it gets worse when you delve into the details. More FactCheck:

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.

It’s worth noting here that FactCheck has been scrupulously non-partisan, and unafraid to criticize Democrats and Republicans alike when they play loose with the facts. Case in point:

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.

I think it’s safe to say they have a great deal of credibility on these issues. If you read their whole article, you’ll see that even they seem surprised at just how personal and negative the GOP has become.

So the next time somebody tells you “both parties do it” as if they somehow canceled each other out, don’t be afraid to call “Bullshit.”

Categories: Politics | 13 Comments

The Sky Is Blue, Revisited

November 2nd, 2006

Another breaking news flash from Captain Obvious:

Two federal agencies are investigating whether the Bush administration tried to block government scientists from speaking freely about global warming and censor their research, a senator said Wednesday.

…snip…

In February, House Science Chairman Sherwood Boehlert, R-N.Y., and other congressional leaders asked NASA to guarantee scientific openness. They complained that a public affairs officer changed or filtered information on global warming and the Big Bang.

The officer, George Deutsch, a political appointee, had resigned after being accused of trying to limit reporters’ access to James Hansen, a prominent NASA climate scientist, and insisting that a Web designer insert the word “theory” with any mention of the Big Bang.

A report last month in the scientific journal Nature claimed administrators at the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration blocked the release of a report that linked hurricane strength and frequency to global warming. Hansen had said in February that NOAA has tried to prevent researchers working on global climate change from speaking freely about their work.

Oh, come on. Next you’re going to try telling me that the Earth is roughly spherical, and that it orbits around the sun instead of the other way around…

Categories: Environment, Politics, Science | No Comments

Bush Scales Back Search for Kidnapped US Soldier

November 2nd, 2006

And he did it on the orders of the political ally of the people we suspect kidnapped the man:

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki demanded the removal of American checkpoints from the streets of Baghdad on Tuesday, in what appeared to be his latest and boldest gambit in an increasingly tense struggle for more independence from his American protectors.

Mr. Maliki’s public declaration seemed at first to catch American commanders off guard. But by nightfall, American troops had abandoned all the positions in eastern and central Baghdad that they had set up last week with Iraqi forces as part of a search for a missing American soldier. The checkpoints had snarled traffic and disrupted daily life and commerce throughout the eastern part of the city.

Perhaps this was the best option available to the US. US Armed Forces are trained to never leave anyone behind, but perhaps the damage done to the occupation by the blockade was far too much to allow it to continue and the US had to do this. But the fact remains that it is Bush’s policies that have left us with the choice: abandon one of our own or put more troops in danger through the anger caused by the blockade required to search for our missing soldier. It is Bush’s policies that have lead to the resistance being as strong as it is. It is Bush’s policies that have lead to an occupation so reviled that the search for a man in danger of being tortured to death engenders anything other than sympathy from the local population.

Perhaps the Army made the best choice available to it. I cannot know, from here, how the generals balanced the desire to find their lost man and the need to protect their remaining men and their mission. But I do know they are in this terrible position, and that one of our soldiers has been essentially abandoned to his fate, because Bush has created the situation that lead to such a horrible choice having to be made.

Categories: Iraq, Politics, Terrorism | 7 Comments

Bwah!

November 2nd, 2006

If they had any balls, somebody ought to run this.

Categories: Humor, Politics, Satire | No Comments

How I Voted

November 2nd, 2006

Kevin filled you in last week on how he voted. I did my early voting today, so I guess it’s my turn:

Issue #1, “Gays Are Icky” Amendment: Since there was no “hell, no” button, I was forced to settle for a plain “no.”
Issue #2, Property Tax Freeze for Seniors Amendment: This was a reluctant “no.” I’m not totally opposed to the idea of a property tax rate freeze/cap for fixed income seniors on their primary residence if those seniors have lived in the residence for a certain amount of time. But ultimately, the amendment was still too vague, and didn’t require some of the things I would have wanted to vote in favor. For one thing, it not only left the income restrictions undefined, it even made such restrictions optional. That is, it allowed the legislature to limit the rate freeze to lower-income seniors, but did not require such a limit. Also, there was no length-of-residence requirement. I’m sorry, but if you can afford to buy a new home, you can afford to pay property taxes like everyone else. (The amendment would freeze/cap the rate at whatever it was at the time you made the purchase, if you purchase over 65.) If the amendment had been worded to freeze/cap the property tax rates for fixed-incomeseniors (especially those for whom social security is the primary income source) who have lived in their primary residences for at least 5 years, I likely would have voted “yes.” But this amendment fell well short of that.
US House, TN District 9: I voted for Steve Cohen. It’s a win-win: If Cohen wins, we finally get a real Democrat in the seat, and the seat is out of Ford family hands. Cohen’s appeal is broad, even winning many moderate Republicans. But with Jake Ford running as an independent, I still worry that Cohen might not get it.
US Senate: Let’s face it: In this race, both candidates suck. Despite all the Corker ads about how “liberal” Ford is, his record in that regard is actually quite spotty. He’s anything but a solid progressive. One need look no further than his vote for the awful Military Commissions bill to see that. And, as Kevin notes, he’s part of a political family dynasty, and a corrupt one at that, which makes me even more uncomfortable with him. But at the end of the day, Corker is no better, and is arguably worse. Ford’s ties to corruption are largely guilt-by-association, given his family name. Jr. himself has managed to keep his hands relatively clean, at least as far as we can tell. Corker, on the other hand, appears to have the stench of corruption on him directly. And setting aside personal issues, just limiting things to the issues, Corker is still objectively worse in almost every measurable way. On virtually every issue where I’ve disagreed with Jr.’s voting record, Corker would vote the same way. And on those issues where I’ve agreed with Jr., Corker would generally vote the opposite way. Ultimately, it was a choice between “bad” and “worse,” so I went with “bad.”
Governor: Bredesen. I’m with Kevin in thinking that Bredesen has been anything but a solid progressive. But a wishy-washy progressive is still better than a Southern conservative, and I’m too paranoid to follow Kevin’s lead and abstain. Admittedly, Kevin’s probably right, and Bredesen’s going to win easily. But I wasn’t willing to risk it. As much as I’d like to punish Bredesen, it’s not something I could do in the general. (I did vote against Bredesen in the Democratic primary, however.) Given a choice between Bredesen and a real progressive, I’d pick the latter. But that choice wasn’t offered here.
TN General Assembly, District 93: Mike Kernell. He’s a solid progressive with a good record (and again, one who has done well with the moderates), and his opponent, Tim Cook, is running solely on the simplistic “taxes are eeeeevil” platform; Cook is the kind of one-trick pony that I’d like to think would be appealing to absolutely no one not named Say Uncle, but this being Tennessee at all, and people being as bad at math as they are, I can of course see a lot of people saying “I hate taxes, too! I’ll vote Cook! Hey, why do the roads and schools suck, and why are the police understaffed?”