Campaign-Promises.com

Obama’s Infomercial

Popularity: 32% [?]

By CALVIN WOODWARD
Wed Oct 29, 9:18 pm ET

WASHINGTON – Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was less than upfront in his half-hour commercial Wednesday night about the costs of his programs and the crushing budget pressures he would face in office.

Obama’s assertion that “I’ve offered spending cuts above and beyond” the expense of his promises is accepted only by his partisans. His vow to save money by “eliminating programs that don’t work” masks his failure throughout the campaign to specify what those programs are ‚Äî beyond the withdrawal of troops from Iraq.

A sampling of what voters heard in the ad, and what he didn’t tell them:

THE SPIN: “That’s why my health care plan includes improving information technology, requires coverage for preventive care and pre-existing conditions and lowers health care costs for the typical family by $2,500 a year.”

THE FACTS: His plan does not lower premiums by $2,500, or any set amount. Obama hopes that by spending $50 billion over five years on electronic medical records and by improving access to proven disease management programs, among other steps, consumers will end up saving money. He uses an optimistic analysis to suggest cost reductions in national health care spending could amount to the equivalent of $2,500 for a family of four. Many economists are skeptical those savings can be achieved, but even if they are, it’s not a certainty that every dollar would be passed on to consumers in the form of lower premiums.

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THE SPIN: “I also believe every American has a right to affordable health care.”

THE FACTS: That belief should not be confused with a guarantee of health coverage for all. He makes no such promise. Obama hinted as much in the ad when he said about the problem of the uninsured: “I want to start doing something about it.” He would mandate coverage for children but not adults. His program is aimed at making insurance more affordable by offering the choice of government-subsidized coverage similar to that in a plan for federal employees and other steps, including requiring larger employers to share costs of insuring workers.

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THE SPIN: “I’ve offered spending cuts above and beyond their cost.”

THE FACTS: Independent analysts say both Obama and Republican John McCain would deepen the deficit. The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates Obama’s policy proposals would add a net $428 billion to the deficit over four years ‚Äî and that analysis accepts the savings he claims from spending cuts. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, whose other findings have been quoted approvingly by the Obama campaign, says: “Both John McCain and Barack Obama have proposed tax plans that would substantially increase the national debt over the next 10 years.” The analysis goes on to say: “Neither candidate’s plan would significantly increase economic growth unless offset by spending cuts or tax increases that the campaigns have not specified.”

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THE SPIN: “Here’s what I’ll do. Cut taxes for every working family making less than $200,000 a year. Give businesses a tax credit for every new employee that they hire right here in the U.S. over the next two years and eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas. Help homeowners who are making a good faith effort to pay their mortgages, by freezing foreclosures for 90 days. And just like after 9-11, we’ll provide low-cost loans to help small businesses pay their workers and keep their doors open. ”

THE FACTS: His proposals ‚Äî the tax cuts, the low-cost loans, the $15 billion a year he promises for alternative energy, and more ‚Äî cost money, and the country could be facing a record $1 trillion deficit next year. Indeed, Obama recently acknowledged ‚Äî although not in his commercial ‚Äî that: “The next president will have to scale back his agenda and some of his proposals.”

Popularity: 24% [?]

By Adam Ziegler

While not keeping promises is a common criticism of many politicians, studies show presidents generally do an above-average job of fulfilling their campaign goals.

A large amount of research has been done on the topic, all of which this same result, said Michael Wagner, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Between 1912 and 1948, presidents fulfilled about 72 percent of their promises, Wagner said. That number rose to around 75 percent between the 1950s and 1970s, and even though it’s dropped recently, Wagner said, presidents still have a fairly high success rate.

“Typically, presidents work very hard to keep their campaign promises,” Wagner said.

President Bill Clinton had the highest rate of successful campaign promises of the last seven presidents, Wagner said. President Richard Nixon had the lowest rate of fulfilled promises with a 56 percent success rate.

President Bush has an average promise fulfillment rate, Wagner said, and he’s been able to deliver on some of the major promises from his 2000 and 2004 campaigns.

The No Child Left Behind Act is probably the biggest campaign promise Bush has been able to deliver, said John Hibbing, a political science professor at UNL. During his 2000 presidential campaign, passing the No Child Left Behind Act was a major part of Bush’s education platform.

Despite his average success rate, Bush has failed to deliver on some campaign promises, Hibbing said – the most obvious being his promise to work with Democrats in Congress. Bush’s ability to work with Democrats while governor of Texas was one of his key selling points during the 2000 election, Hibbing said, but that level of cooperation disappeared after Bush was elected president.

“He’s become perhaps the most polarizing president in terms of Republican support and Democrat opposition,” Hibbing said.

Bush’s promise to pass a Constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage during the 2004 campaign is another example of a promise that never came through, Wagner said.

Even though presidents put a lot of work into fulfilling their campaign goals, a variety of factors, including a president’s popularity and a lack of Congressional support, can lead to promises going unfulfilled, Hibbing said.

Lack of support in Congress is one of the most common reasons presidents’ don’t fulfill all their campaign promises, Hibbing said. If the opposing party controls Congress, they generally don’t support the president’s legislation, which makes it increasingly difficult for presidents to accomplish their campaign goals.

“If Congress is not supportive of what they’re trying to do, I don’t see how you can hold it against them,” Hibbing said.

Hibbing said while John McCain and Barack Obama have run on some hard-to-quantify goals, such as promising change and reform, the specifics of their promises on issues like taxes and the Iraq war seem fairly feasible and could continue the presidency’s high rate of successful campaign promises.

“A lot of their promises have been pretty vague, but if you look at what they propose, it’s all in the realm of possibility,” Hibbing said.

Popularity: 42% [?]

(CNN) — You may have heard that Wednesday night Barack Obama will be on five different TV networks speaking directly to the American people.

He bought 30 minutes of airtime from the different networks, a very expensive purchase. But hey, he can afford it. Barack Obama is loaded, way more loaded than John McCain, way more loaded than any presidential candidate has ever been at this stage of the campaign.

Just to throw a number out: He has raised well over $600 million since the start of his campaign, close to what George Bush and John Kerry raised combined in 2004.

Without question, Obama has set the bar at new height with a truly staggering sum of cash. And that is why as we approach this November, it is worth reminding ourselves what Barack Obama said last November.

One year ago, he made a promise. He pledged to accept public financing and to work with the Republican nominee to ensure that they both operated within those limits.

Then it became clear to Sen. Obama and his campaign that he was going to be able to raise on his own far more cash than he would get with public financing. So Obama went back on his word.

He broke his promise and he explained it by arguing that the system is broken and that Republicans know how to work the system to their advantage. He argued he would need all that cash to fight the ruthless attacks of 527s, those independent groups like the Swift Boat Veterans. It’s funny though, those attacks never really materialized.

The courageous among Obama’s own supporters concede this decision was really made for one reason, simply because it was to Obama’s financial advantage.

On this issue today, former Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, an Obama supporter, writes in The New York Post, “a hypocrite is a person who puts on a false appearance of virtue — who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings. And that, it seems to me, is what we are doing now.”

For this last week, Sen. Obama will be rolling in dough. His commercials, his get-out-the-vote effort will, as the pundits have said, dwarf the McCain campaign’s final push. But in fairness, you have to admit, he is getting there in part on a broken promise.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Campbell Brown.

Popularity: 29% [?]

He also is giving an interview to a prominent network news anchor, and appearing with fellow Democratic star Bill Clinton at a rally that is timed to hit the late-evening news.

So that line in Obama’s stump speech about how parents need to turn the television off more at home? He might make an exception this day.

The TV campaign comes as Obama, ahead in national and swing-state polls over Republican John McCain, tries to win over teetering voters right from the comfort of their couches.

The election is six days away.

The centerpiece of the effort is Obama’s infomercial. It is rare for a candidate to buy a block of prime-time real estate to tell his story. Plenty costly, too.

The ad is expected to be a video montage of typical people talking about the challenges they face, with Obama explaining how he can help. A campaign adviser said the taped ad will feature a live cut-in to Obama, who is scheduled to be at a rally in Florida at the time.

The Obama team bought time on CBS, NBC and Fox for about $1 million per network. The spot airs at 8 p.m. ET. It is also scheduled to run on Univision, BET, MSNBC and TV One.

Flush with cash from his record-shattering fundraising, Obama uses that advantage by buying up media time in ways that McCain cannot.

McCain is purchasing loads of ad time, too. But the disparity between Obama and the Republicans is so wide that it has allowed Obama to spend in more states than McCain, appear more frequently in key markets and diversify his messages — some positive, some negative.

And negative is the tone for the latest Obama ad, a 30-second spot aimed at key states that uses McCain’s own words against him and mocks running mate Sarah Palin. Three quotes, one from 2005 and two from 2007, play off McCain’s acknowledgment that he knows less about economic matters than other issues. In the last quote, McCain says he might have to rely on his vice president for expertise ‚Äî and then the spot cuts to a winking Palin.

Obama is campaigning Wednesday in North Carolina and Florida.

During a stop in Raleigh, N.C., he will be interviewed by Charlie Gibson of ABC’s World News.

Later, in Florida, Obama will tape an appearance on Comedy Central’s irreverent The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The segment will run at 11 p.m. ET.

Obama may even be competing with himself.

During the same 11 p.m. slot, Obama is scheduled to appear at a campaign rally for the first time with Clinton, whose wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, lost to Obama in the primaries.

The uniting of the former president and the would-be president in Kissimmee, Fla., is sure to draw live local and national television coverage.

And that’s not all.

On Thursday, Obama is giving interviews to Brian Williams, anchor of NBC’s Nightly News, and to Rachel Maddow, the host of an evening show on MSNBC.

Two viewers who don’t seem excited about all the exposure are Obama’s two young daughters.

Appearing on Jay Leno’s talk show Monday, Obama’s wife, Michelle, said 10-year-old daughter Malia got a little worried to hear that her dad’s infomercial would blanket TV.

” ‘You’re going to be on all the TV? Are you going to interrupt my TV?’ ” her mother said Malia asked.

Michelle Obama said the presidential candidate assured his daughter that he hadn’t bought time on the Disney Channel.

Popularity: 22% [?]

By ANNA WILDE MATHEWS

Both presidential candidates say their plans would provide health insurance to millions of people who lack it. The problem is cost: With the federal budget deficit growing, Congress is likely to look at more limited and incremental moves to expand coverage.

Outside analysts have come up with widely varying numbers. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center projected that in the first year of full implementation, about 1.3 million uninsured people would gain coverage through the McCain plan and about 18 million would under Sen. Obama’s structure. Lewin Group, a consulting firm that is a unit of health insurer UnitedHealth Group Inc., gave Sen. McCain credit for 21 million and Sen. Obama for 26.6 million people.

The candidates’ plans would likely reach different subsets of the uninsured. Sen. McCain’s would change a key aspect of the employer-based health-insurance system that has long prevailed in the U.S. He would make workers pay income tax on health benefits they get from their employers, while providing tax credits of $2,500 per person, or $5,000 per family, to defray the cost of health insurance.

Sen. McCain’s plan may particularly help young, healthy people who lack insurance. Because they are inexpensive to insure, the tax credit might be enough to allow them to purchase insurance on the individual market. Sen. McCain has said he also will help those who can’t get coverage because of a pre-existing illness.

Sen. Obama would require large and midsize employers to offer health benefits, or pay a fee. He wants to create a health-insurance marketplace that would include a new federal plan as a coverage option. He would force insurers to sell a plan to anyone who applies for coverage. He would provide subsidies for lower- and middle-income people to buy coverage and expand programs for the poor, making these groups among the biggest beneficiaries of his plan.

The Tax Policy Center projects that Sen. McCain’s proposal would cost $185 billion in its first year, and $1.3 trillion over a decade; the numbers for Sen. Obama’s plan were $86 billion and $1.6 trillion, respectively. The Lewin 10-year-cost estimate for Sen. McCain was $2.05 trillion and for Sen. Obama $1.17 trillion.

Jonathan Gruber, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who has advised Democratic candidates including Sen. Obama, said the McCain plan, with its tax credits, amounts to a “vast new expenditure.”

Mr. Holtz-Eakin, the McCain adviser, said the Republican candidate’s plan is “budget neutral” because it anticipates savings from new efficiencies in health care including attacking fraud in Medicare. “The notion that somehow it falls short [of budget neutrality] is something we would contest,” he said. “We do believe we have something that will be fiscally responsible and get lots of people into coverage.”

The Obama campaign has said it plans to use money from ending the Bush tax cuts for wealthier Americans to help pay for its plan. It also cites savings from better technology and other improvements to the health-care system.

If the victorious candidate presents his health-care plan to Congress, such optimistic projections will face a stern test at the Congressional Budget Office, Congress’s fiscal scorekeeper. The office’s estimate of the actual cost of the plans would form the basis for debate, and legislators would face a huge barrier approving any plan assigned a $1 trillion-plus price tag over 10 years.

In the short term, Democrats in Congress may focus on more limited steps such as expanding the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, which is jointly funded by federal and state governments. A bill that would have increased funding for the program by $35 billion over five years was vetoed last year by President Bush. The legislation would have paid for the spending by raising the federal tobacco tax.

Popularity: 16% [?]