http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20080913/news_1n13claims.htmlAmazingly the San Diego Union Tribune ran this NYT article on its front page today, a day with train wrecks, hurricanes and local scandal.
McCain's ads widely flagged for distorting Obama stances
By Michael Cooper and Jim Rutenberg
NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE
September 13, 2008
While harsh advertisements and negative attacks are a staple of presidential campaigns, Sen. John McCain has drawn an avalanche of criticism this week from Democrats, independent groups and even some Republicans for stretching the truth in attacking Sen. Barack Obama's record and positions.
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First the McCain campaign twisted Obama's words to suggest that he had compared Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, to a pig after Obama said, in questioning McCain's claim to be the change agent in the race, “You can put lipstick on a pig; it's still a pig.” (McCain once used the same expression to describe Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's health plan.)
Then he claimed that Obama supported “comprehensive sex ed” for kindergartners. (Obama supported teaching them to be alert for inappropriate advances from adults).
Those attacks followed weeks in which McCain repeatedly asserted that Obama would raise taxes on the middle class, even though analysts say Obama would cut taxes on the middle class more than McCain would, and misrepresented Obama's positions on energy and health care.
A McCain advertisement called “Fact Check” was itself found to be “less than honest” by FactCheck.org, a nonpartisan group. The group complained that the McCain campaign had cited its work debunking various Internet rumors about Palin but implied in the advertisement that the rumors had originated with Obama.
“The last month, for sure, I think the predominance of liberty taken with truth and the facts has been more McCain than Obama,” said Don Sipple, a Republican advertising strategist.
Assaults on the truth haven't just come in negative campaigning. McCain yesterday again lauded Palin as a budget cutter, but he erroneously asserted that as governor of Alaska she had not sought congressional earmarks for her state.
Appearing on ABC's “The View,” McCain was pressed on Palin's record of seeking such targeted money for Alaska. “Not as governor she didn't,” McCain said.
“They just keep stirring the pot, and I think the McCain folks realize if they can get this thing down in the mud, drag Obama into the mud, that's where they have the best advantage to win,” said Matthew Dowd, who worked with many top McCain campaign advisers when he was President Bush's chief strategist in the 2004 campaign, but who has since had a falling out with the White House. “If they stay up at 10,000 feet, they don't.”
Sipple, the Republican advertising strategist, voiced concern that McCain's approach could backfire.
“Any campaign that is taking liberty with the truth and does it in a serial manner will end up paying for it in the end,” he said.
The fact that the San Diego Union Tribune, a major Republican outlet, ran this on the front page should be understood by McCain that he may want to go into the mud but that there are alot of other Republicans that are not going to follow him in.
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