New Kerry ad mislead

New Kerry ad misleads (10/5)

By Bryan Keefer

In a new ad entitled "Powerful," John Kerry levels some of the most misleading charges his campaign has made to date.


Kerry's ad features a graphic and narration both stating that "Drug companies got a $139 billion bailout." In a fact sheet released Tuesday in support of the ad, his campaign cites a report from the Boston University School of Public Health to back up its claim. But the study notes that the number is based on a calculation of the additional profits drug companies will make selling pharmaceuticals to Medicare patients over the next eight years, not the upfront subsidy implied by "bailout."

The ad also states that "They give CEOs big tax breaks for shipping our jobs overseas." Yet the tax breaks in question, according to a March article in the Wall Street Journal, provide incentives for companies to invest overseas - not tax breaks for individuals, as the invocation of CEOs implies. (The incentives in question allow US companies to pay less in taxes on income earned overseas when it is invested overseas.) Moreover, as the Journal pointed out, those incentives have been in place since the corporate income tax was first leveled in the early twentieth century, contrary to Kerry's implication that Bush created them.

It goes on to state that "The Saudi Royal family gets special favors, while our gas prices skyrocket." The Kerry ad cites a Reuters report from September 29, 2004, but that release refers only to the rising price of oil, making no mention of any "favors." Nor does the Kerry fact mention of what those special favors might be. This is simply an inflammatory attack designed to influence voters by appealing to negative perceptions of the Saudis. As the New York Times pointed out, this line of attack echoes other ad put out by independent groups, as well as Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11."

In this case, it's the deception that's powerful.

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