FactCheck.org Bush's Gas Attack: Does Good Policy Make Bad Politics?
Factcheck.org is non-partisan, and their main page critiques every attack ad from either side and researches the statements made. Their summary of this ad:
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Kerry once voiced support for a 50-cent increase in the gasoline tax. Bush calls that "wacky," but Bush's chief economist praised the idea.
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and later,
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By saying that Kerry "supported higher gasoline taxes 11 times" this ad could give you the idea that Kerry voted for 11 different tax increases, which isn't true. Actually, a close look at the Bush campaign's own count shows that nine of the eleven were about a single increase. Five of those votes came in the manuevering that led to a single 4.3-cent-per-gallon increase in 1993, as part of President Clinton's economic package. Four more votes for "higher" taxes were actually cast against Republican attempts to repeal that same 4.3-cent increase in 1996, 1998 and 2000. (On one of those votes most Republicans voted against repeal, too.) The Bush campaign also counts a vote in 2000 against a proposal to suspend the federal gasoline tax entirely for six months -- which left gasoline taxes unchanged, not "higher." The 11th instance cited by the Bush campaign wasn't a vote at all -- just that Kerry quote from 1994 that he'd once supported a 50-cent increase.
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A new low? No, just a continued low. And I'm sure it will drop further from here.