Facts go all slippery during final presidential debate

By Calvin Woodward

and Jim Kuhnhenn

WASHINGTON

Facts went astray on tax cuts, negative campaign advertising and oil exports Wednesday when Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain engaged in their third and final presidential debate. Some examples:

Obama: "Every dollar that I've proposed, I've proposed an additional cut, so that it matches."

The facts: The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that his proposed programs would add $281 billion to the deficit at the end of his first term. The analysis includes Obama's proposals for saving money.

McCain: "We have to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't like us very much."

The facts: This is a reference to U.S. spending on oil imports. McCain has repeatedly made this claim. But the figure is highly inflated and misleading. According to government agencies that track energy imports, the United States spent $246 billion in 2007 for all imported crude oil, a majority of it coming from friendly nations including neighboring Canada and Mexico. An additional

$82 billion was spent on imported refined petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel and fuel oil. Most of the refined products come from refineries in friendly countries.

Obama: "One hundred percent, John, of your ads - 100 percent of them - have been negative."

The facts: The statement is true when it comes to McCain's current commercial spots. But by saying McCain's ads "have been" 100 percent negative, Obama ventures into misleading territory. McCain is currently running all negative ads, according to a study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison. But he has run a number of positive ads during the campaign.

McCain: "Sen. Obama is spending unprecedented amounts of money in negative attack ads on me."

The facts: Obama is spending unprecedented amounts of money on ads, period - negative or otherwise. Obama is outspending McCain and the Republican Party by more than 2-to-1 in presidential ads. At one point in August, 90 percent of the ads Obama was airing were against McCain. A study conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that about 34 percent of Obama's ads are now negative.

Obama: "I want to provide a tax cut for 95 percent of working Americans, 95 percent."

The facts: Obama constantly says this. But the independent Tax Policy Center says his plan cuts taxes for 81.3 percent of all households in 2009.

McCain: "Now, we have allocated $750 billion. Let's take 300 of that billion and go in and buy those home loan mortgages and negotiate with those people in their homes, 11 million homes or more, so that they can afford to pay the mortgage, stay in their home."

The facts: Ordering the government to buy up bad mortgages to cut homeowners' monthly payments might sound good, but experts are skeptical. They say the plan McCain is promoting is unlikely to solve the housing crisis that's pushing the economy toward recession.

McCain: "Sen. Obama, as a member of the Illinois state Senate, voted in the Judiciary Committee against a law that would provide immediate medical attention to a child born in a failed abortion. He voted against that."

Obama: "If it sounds incredible that I would vote to withhold lifesaving treatment from an infant, that's because it's not true."

The facts: As a state senator, Obama opposed three bills, in 2001, 2002 and 2003, to give legal protections to any aborted fetus that showed signs of life. The 2003 bill was virtually identical to one President Bush signed in 2002; it passed before Obama was in the U.S. Senate, but Obama said he would have supported it. Illinois already had a law to protect aborted fetuses born alive and considered able to survive. Among those opposed to the state effort was the Illinois State Medical Society, which argued that the bill would interfere with the doctor-patient relationship and expand liability for doctors. Critics said the bill would have undermined the Supreme Court Roe v. Wade ruling in ways the federal law would not.

McCain: "Sen. Obama talks about voting for budgets. He voted twice for a budget resolution that increases the taxes on individuals making $42,000 a year."

The facts: The vote was on a nonbinding resolution and did not increase taxes. The resolution assumed that President Bush's tax cuts would expire, as scheduled, in 2011. If that actually happened, it could mean higher taxes for people making as little as about $42,000.

Obama: "We can cut the average family's premium by $2,500 a year."

The facts: If that sounds like a straight-ahead promise to lower health insurance premiums, it isn't. 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.

McCain: Warned a small business owner that he would be fined under Obama's health care plan if he did not provide health insurance for workers.

The facts: Obama's health care plan does not impose fines on small business. He would provide small businesses with a refundable tax credit of up to 50 percent on premiums paid on behalf of employees. Large and medium-sized businesses that do not offer meaningful coverage or contribute to it would be required to pay a percentage of payroll toward a public insurance plan. Small businesses would be exempt.