Midterm political distortions of the facts



How wrong can you be?

 If you haven’t visited FactCheck.org, you should, if only to experience the wide array of subjects covered on this site. Their 2010 FactCheck Awards were published today and the political ads they cover are a cross between the bizarre and the ridiculous. From the use of dog excrement to make a point, to the Alabama Tea Party hillbilly candidate that clearly doesn’t know his Tea Party history. They are worth an after-election laugh or two.

At the same time, Newsweek did an excellent article on midterm “misstatements” that is a must-read. One of their quotes is that, due to undisclosed, unaccountable sources of campaign financing from corporations, “…the amount of deceit in political advertising is at least as high as we’ve ever seen.”

Health Care – Misrepresentations by Republicans on this issue have been common throughout the campaign with false claims like: Medicare patients would lose their doctors, or that the Dems favored giving Viagra to sex offenders, or Seniors would lose some of their benefits.

Social Security – Democrats in certain states claim that Republicans want to abolish or “privatize” Social Security. Mostly a serious overstatement since what the GOP has really said was to allow younger workers to invest a portion of their payroll tax in the stock market.

Read the Newsweek article here.

More to come.