Q: Are presidential signing statements unconstitutional?
A: Probably not. But they don’t have much impact, either.
Year: 2008
Huckabee’s Attack Ad Runs After All
Summary
The ad Huckabee said he decided not to run has now appeared at least three times in Iowa anyway. It accuses Romney of being "dishonest" but shades the facts in the process.
Update, Jan. 4: The ad ran at least 10 times on four different stations in Davenport and Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The Huckabee campaign called those airings a mistake.
In another ad Huckabee claims to have signed the most broad-based tax cut in Arkansas history.
Obama’s Creative Clippings
Summary
Obama's ad touting his health care plan quotes phrases from newspaper articles and an editorial, but makes them sound more laudatory and authoritative than they actually are.
It attributes to The Washington Post a line saying Obama's plan would save families about $2,500. But the Post was citing the estimate of the Obama campaign and didn't analyze the purported savings independently.
It claims that "experts" say Obama's plan is "the best."
Huckabee Cut Crime and Taxes?
Summary
In the run-up to the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, Huckabee is running a TV ad featuring graphics that claim he was "tough on crime" and "brought Arkansas' crime rate down," and that he "cut taxes over 90 times as governor."
In fact, the violent crime rate was higher at the end of his tenure than it was the year he took office. And the tax cuts he claims credit for were minor compared with the large increases he approved,
Romney’s Ridiculous Hyperbole
Summary
Romney says in a TV ad that the U.S. will see more change in the next 10 years "than in the last 10 centuries." More than since the Dark Ages? More changes than the advent of the printing press, railroads, constitutional democracy, penicillin, electricity, telecommunications and the Internet all put together? We don't think so.
A Romney spokesman said he didn't mean what he said as fact, calling the statement "a metaphor." We call it a ludicrous exaggeration.
Holocaust Curriculum Suspended in UK?
Q: Did the U.K. suspend its Holocaust curriculum because it offended Muslim students?
A: No, neither the United Kingdom nor the University of Kentucky has suspended teaching the Holocaust.
How Many Have Bachelor’s Degrees?
Q: What percentage of the U.S. population has at least a bachelor's degree?
A: According to the Census Bureau, the figure is 27 percent of adults.