MediaWatch: October 1992
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: October 1992
- Watching the Ad Watchers
- NewsBites: Attacks off Limits?
- Revolving Door: Democratic Revolver Sees Bias
- Markle Foundation Funds Slanted Campaign Coverage
- Media Still Defend Aspiring First Lady
- Time, Corporate Tool
- Post's Deficit Solution
- Janet Cooke Award: NBC: Liberal Public Relations
Watching the Ad Watchers
Last month, MediaWatch reported that in August, the networks, especially NBC, aimed their correction squads exclusively at the Bush campaign, and ignored the claims of the Clinton campaign. Has the new media scrutiny actually improved voter understanding? Or does it continue to be used as a tool to promote the Clinton campaign and add to misunderstandings about campaign claims?
To investigate the "Ad Watch" patrols, MediaWatch analysts viewed every ad screening from September 1 to October 5 on four network news shows (ABC's World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, CNN's Inside Politics, and the NBC Nightly News). Reporters again charged the Bush campaign with negativity and inaccuracy, while letting most of Clinton's ads and other campaign claims go unchallenged. What follows is a blow-by-blow analysis of the ad watch.
August 30: The Clinton campaign released an ad on his Arkansas record and his economic plan. The ad made several dubious claims about Clinton's record in Arkansas, and then asserted: "People making over $200,000 will pay more. The rest of us get a break." Only CNN's Brooks Jackson analyzed the ad. Even he did not point out that Clinton also says he will tax the top two percent, which begins below $90,000 for single taxpayers. While Clinton's plan claims it can raise $150 billion from the top two percent (and foreign corporations), only CBS reporter Richard Threlkeld (on September 10) let an economist say that Clinton might have a hard time raising $150 billion from such a small group.
But on September 8, ABC reporter Jeff Greenfield was still perturbed with Bush's convention claims: "Campaigns are not supposed to be exercises in objectivity. We expect them to put their own spin on facts and figures. But even in politics, some facts are more suspect than others...Where did that number [128 Clinton tax hikes] come from? The Bush campaign says it simply looked in the Arkansas legislative handbook and added up every tax and fee hike during Bill Clinton's governorship. But every independent examination of that statistic has called the Bush figures misleading, distorted, or false." But how false could Greenfield call it when Clinton's campaign listed 127 tax and fee hikes? At the same time, nothing in Clinton's ads seemed to warrant any scrutiny from the truth squad at ABC.
September 9: Clinton releases an ad on welfare reform, claiming that 17,000 Arkansans had been moved off the welfare rolls into jobs and training programs. State officials admitted that many of those 17,000 rotated back on to the welfare rolls, but none of the networks analyzed the ad's claims. September 22: The Clinton campaign releases an ad juxtaposing optimistic Bush statements on the economy with claims about his opposition to unemployment benefit extensions. The next day, CNN's Brooks Jackson did the only analysis, pronouncing the ad true, but noted the ad juxtaposes Bush statements with statistics from different months and even years.
September 24: The Bush campaign releases a humorous ad charging Clinton with raising the sales tax 33 percent in Arkansas. This marked the beginning of intense interest in the accuracy of Bush's ads. That day, CNN's Brooks Jackson asserted: "The total Arkansas tax burden is still low. In fact, it ranks 46 out of 50." But as a percentage of family income, Arkansas is rated 25th and rising. CNN listed their source as Citizens for Tax Justice (CTJ), but didn't mention the agenda of this liberal group, or that David Wilhelm, the Clinton campaign manager, was a leader of CTJ before the campaign began.
On September 23, Dan Rather announced: "The Clinton-Gore campaign began running new advertising today. The ads, airing in Texas, blame Mr. Bush for the loss of 160,000 jobs in the energy industry." CBS turned to reporter Eric Engberg, who not only didn't critique the Clinton ad, but picked on Bush's claims on the campaign trail. Engberg sounded like Clinton rhetoric: "It is true that the Arkansas sales tax has gone from 3 to 4.5 cents. Clinton had little choice, given a state constitution that effectively blocks income tax hikes. Bush didn't mention that Arkansas taxes are among the lowest in the nation."
Engberg also attacked Bush on his claim that Clinton didn't get a civil rights law passed: "Arkansas and Alabama are the only two states without a civil rights law, but time out: George Bush's civil rights record is less than pristine. He vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1990, and when he ran for the Senate in 1964, he campaigned against the Civil Rights Act. He built his 1988 campaign around the Willie Horton issue." Engberg left out that Bush signed a "Civil Rights Act" the next year, and failed to explain what Dukakis furloughing a murderer has to do with civil rights laws.
On September 26, NBC anchor Garrick Utley tried to correct the Bush claim of a 33 percent sales tax hike: "In fact, the increase was only from 3 to 4.25 percent. And Arkansas is still a low-tax state. Third lowest in the nation." NBC put up a big graphic reading: "Only a 1 1/4 % sales tax increase." Utley was wrong about the increase (to 4.5 percent) and wrong about Arkansas. On October 3, Utley was forced to correct himself: "We incorrectly labeled that a 1.25 percent increase. Indeed, some of you, pocket calculators at the ready, noted that the real increase was 41.6 percent." Concluded Utley: "The Bush campaign got its own numbers wrong."
September 30: The Bush campaign released an ad with specific estimates of the new taxes middle-class Americans could pay under the Clinton economic plan. On October 2, three networks fired up their ad watch patrols. CNN's Jackson did his most distorted correction report of the season, asserting that "A nonpartisan group that did study both the Bush and Clinton plans sides with Clinton." Jackson's idea of a "nonpartisan" group was the Families USA Foundation, a left-wing lobby headed by Clinton supporter Ron Pollack. Jackson concluded: "So the Bush ad is misleading...The Clinton campaign is worried. They produced this rebuttal ad Friday." Jackson did no analysis of that ad.
On ABC, anchor Peter Jennings said the Bush ad had "the Clinton campaign and some independent observers crying foul." Of Bush's claim about middle class tax hikes, Greenfield asserted: "The numbers don't come from Clinton's plan at all. They come from the Bush campaign's very questionable assumptions about Clinton's plan." Greenfield also pointed out that the Clinton response ad did not cite Bush proposals in claiming Bush was preparing a $108,000 tax break for millionaires: "That figure flows not from a specific Bush proposal, but from estimates of what would happen if his capital gains tax cut became law." Greenfield did not call Clinton's claim "very questionable," even though most capital gains taxpayers are not millionaires, and would receive much less of a tax break than $108,000.
On NBC, reporter Lisa Myers critiqued both campaigns, calling the Bush ad "misleading. In fact, Clinton has proposed cutting taxes for the sort of people in this ad. The tax increase that the ad claims could result under Clinton is based on leaps of logic about how he'd pay for his promises." Myers then added: "What Clinton doesn't tell you is that Democrats have committed the very same offense...Analysts say the Clinton campaign has a knack for skillful distortions." Myers didn't critique the capital gains claim, but a Clinton radio ad about supposed Social Security and Medicare cuts.
On October 5, CBS reporter Eric Engberg took a turn: "Feel-bad ads trying to drag down Bill Clinton are regarded as the only hope. In a multi-million dollar assault, Clinton is being portrayed as a duplicitous blobhead who governs a Hee Haw back-water where only the taxes soar. The ads are cleverly worded to suggest Clinton means more taxes." After a shot of the ad, Engberg refereed: "But the tax figures jump from the screens with fact-like exactness. They were provided not by Clinton, but by the Bush staff, which admits they are based on assumptions. They assume Clinton will fail to get his program through Congress, that his proposal to tax the wealthy won't raise enough money, and that he will then tax the middle class, which he says he won't." An off-air CBS producer said, "The stacking up of assumptions like this, there's a word we use for that." "Uh, I think it's `lying,'" filled in Steven Colford of Advertising Age magazine. How would Clinton provide health care for 35 million uninsured Americans without any increase in taxes? None of the networks asked.
Engberg continued: "Clinton's ad squad, aware that the unanswered attacks look true, struck back within 24 hours." While Engberg aired the Clinton claim that "George Bush has had the worst economic record of any President in the past 50 years," he did not critique that claim (What about Carter?) or anything else in the Clinton response.
CBS followed with a Mark Phillips history of negative campaigning which ended by portraying Bush as the sole offender: "Negative campaigning is a time-honored exercise in trying to avoid responsibility and shifting blame and fears on to the other guy. The fact that the Clinton camp has responded so quickly is a testament to how well this sort of campaigning has worked in the past."
