Ocassional Thoughts of an Independent Progressive Atheistic Humanist
A campaign advert, sent by the Ohio GOP, I got in the mail the other day attempts to paint Rob Portman’s challenger, Ted Strickland, as a flip-flopper on abortion. In the text of the ad it claims Planned Parenthood, which Strickland supports, is the subject of a public debate concerning ‘taxpayer funded’ abortions. The fact is that claim is a lie.
Here is an image of the mailer I got and below it is a blow-up of the part that is a lie:
I hate watching election news on TV or reading it in certain publications. It makes me angry. In a futile quest to make elections interesting, the drummed up fake balance reporting is in fact hurting our democracy.
From Media Matters:
One thing that grinds my gears every election season is the lack of effort from the members of the national journalist class. Basically most of them turn into stenographers – just repeating what political people tell them. Robin Roberts, a morning show host who thinks she is a journalist, knows what her job should be but misses the point of what it is suppose to do.
Summer repeats of TV shows are a nice time to come across things like an interview with Good Morning America host Robin Roberts on the Ellen DeGeneres show from back in February. She is asked about the 2016 Presidential election:
Everyone expects some political lying in TV ads during election season especially with all the dark money pouring into campaigns. A recent ad that supports Senator Rob Portman is the worse kind of political lying because it is aimed at the low information voter who doesn’t keep up on the issues. A small business owner is complaining about insurance costs and then Portman chimes in that “Obamacare” has cost jobs and is vague as usual that it needs to be replaced. The fact is the business owner’s insurance costs went up because they couldn’t offer the cheap, crappy coverage no longer permitted under the Affordable Care Act and there is no evidence that the ACA has cost any jobs.
Here is a brief transcript of the ad:
A political action committee, that supports Senator Rob Portman’s reelection, have a TV advertisement running that says Ted Strickland joined a liberal special interest group that claimed members of the military are paid too much and praised the VA despite veterans having died while waiting for care. But is that really true? The claims are a misleading attempt at ‘guilt by association’ and ignores Strickland’s actual views and record on veterans issues.
Here is the ad in question, produced by the Fighting for Ohio Fund, that is being run in my area: