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A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center

Obama ‘Road’ Film Takes Some Detours

Obama ‘Road’ Film Takes Some Detours

An Obama campaign film, narrated by actor Tom Hanks, casts the president, not surprisingly, in the best light. But the 17-minute video lacks context and take liberties with some facts on health care and the auto bailout: The film says …

Truth-Twisting Tweets

Truth-Twisting Tweets

In tweets to her followers, Nevada Rep. Shelley Berkley claims her Republican opponent for U.S. Senate voted to “kill Medicare” and to “effectively ban contraception.” Both statements are untrue.
Sen. Dean Heller supported failed Republican legislation that would have substantially changed Medicare — in 2022 — to a program that subsidizes private insurance plans for seniors. But the entitlement would not have ended. Heller also voted for the so-called “Blunt amendment,” which would have allowed an employer to deny coverage of specific items or services contrary to the employer’s religious beliefs or moral convictions.

Spotlight On: Hugh Haines

Spotlight On: Hugh Haines

Hugh “Spike” Haines said his math background can explain why he gets so angry during the political debates and television ads.
“Things don’t add up,” the 74-year-old said. “I was a math major. And the thing that disturbs me is the lack of facts.”
Haines, who said he’s a registered Republican, recently cast his mathematical gaze on statements made by Republican Congressman Dan Lungren of California, whose congressional district is just outside Haines’ hometown of Sacramento.

GOP’s ‘Job-Killing’ Whopper, Again

GOP’s ‘Job-Killing’ Whopper, Again

The exaggerated Republican claim that the new health care law “kills jobs” was high on our list of the “Whoppers of 2011.” But the facts haven’t stopped Republicans and their allies from making the “job-killing” claim a major theme of their campaign 2012 TV ads: Five ads by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce …

The Gingrich Counterattack in Florida

The Gingrich Counterattack in Florida

Now comes the counterattack.
After weeks of taking it on the chin in Florida without throwing a punch, the Gingrich side has  finally begun to fight back with TV attack ads of its own.
Among the new ads is one from a pro-Gingrich super PAC that takes the personal attacks to a new level, suggesting Romney was associated personally with “illegal activity” in a massive Medicare fraud in the 1990s. The fact is Romney was never accused of wrongdoing in that case.

South Carolina Smackdown

South Carolina Smackdown

Facts were sometimes used as blunt instruments as the four remaining GOP presidential candidates hammered away at each other in the last debate before Saturday’s South Carolina primary. Santorum and Romney tangled …

New Hampshire Debates, Take 2

New Hampshire Debates, Take 2

Less than 12 hours after the ABC News/Yahoo! debate in Manchester ended, the Republican presidential candidates were at it again — debating on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” As they did the night before, the candidates at times distorted the truth on a variety of topics, including Medicare, job creation, gasoline prices and environmental regulations.
Gingrich vs. Romney on Attack Ads
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich claimed The Washington Post had found “virtually nothing accurate”

A Guide to the New Hampshire Debates

A Guide to the New Hampshire Debates

The remaining Republican presidential candidates meet Jan. 7 for a prime-time ABC News/Yahoo!/WMUR-TV debate at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire. Less than 12 hours later, they meet again for an NBC News/Facebook debate on “Meet the Press.”
Here are some possible lines of attack to expect, based on what the candidates, their campaigns and their surrogates have been saying lately.
‘Timid vs. Bold’
A major storyline heading into New Hampshire has been former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s stepped-up attacks on former Massachusetts Gov.

Neurological ‘Death Panels’?

Q: Does Obama plan to deny emergency brain surgery for patients over 70?
A: No. A man claiming on a radio talk show to be a brain surgeon lied about that, and about a meeting of two associations of neurological surgeons, those associations say.

Promises, Promises

Promises, Promises

President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign is circulating a video of promises the then-candidate made during an Iowa caucus victory speech in January 2008, claiming he kept the promises he made that night. Not quite.
To be sure, the president signed a major health care law, ended the long war in Iraq and signed multiple “middle-class” tax cuts, just as his campaign boasts.
But the health care law isn’t expected to make insurance “affordable and available to every single American,”