
Prime-time promises
By Angie Drobnic Holan
Published on Thursday, October 30th, 2008 at 06:23 p.m.
SUMMARY: We check Obama's infomercial and find some truth and some stretching.
Barack Obama unveiled a unique campaign ad six days before the election, a 30-minute prime-time ad on seven networks.
The ad featured Obama speaking to the camera about his proposals interspersed with the stories of ordinary voters and their concerns about the country's direction. Elected officials from around the country also spoke positively about Obama.
We checked several items from this ad:
• Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri said Obama "changed the rules in Washington. Gone are the free gifts from lobbyists. Gone are the fancy airplane rides for nothing." We found that he worked on ethics reform, but wasn't the driving force. We rated her statement Half True.
• Obama said his health care plan could save a typical family "$2,500 a year." We found that number is based on estimates and projections of what he hopes will happen once all the pieces of his plan are in place. We rated his statement Half True.
• Obama also said he finds a way to pay for all of his spending plans. We found that he offers proposals to pay for his direct spending, but he's sometimes vague on the details. And that spending doesn't include his proposed tax cuts. We rated this statement Barely True.
The ad also touched on a few statements we've checked previously:
• Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio said in the ad that Obama would "cut taxes for the struggling families." We looked into a similar claim that Obama would cut taxes for "95 percent of working families" and found it to be True, based primarily on Obama's proposal to give a $500 tax credit to workers.
• Obama said that there are 47 million people in the U.S. without health insurance. That's correct. We've run across that number many times when checking statements about health care.
• Vice presidential nominee Joe Biden praised Obama's work in the Senate, saying he "reached across the aisle to Dick Lugar, one of the leading guys in America for the past 20 years on arms control, to keep loose nukes out of the hands of terrorists." We looked into Obama's work with Lugar a few months ago and rated a similar statement True.


Sources:
See individual items for sources
Researchers: Angie Drobnic Holan, Shawn Zeller, Robert Farley
Personalities: Barack Obama
Related rulings:
Barack Obama on Health Care, Wednesday, October 29th, 2008. Ruling: Half-True | Details
Barack Obama on Campaign Finance and Political Influence, Thursday, October 30th, 2008. Ruling: Half-True | Details
Barack Obama on Government Spending and the Federal Budget, Wednesday, October 29th, 2008. Ruling: Barely True | Details

No, we don’t want to take your money. But we are more than willing to listen if you know of any facts or story ideas for the Truth-O-Meter. truthometer@politifact.com
PolitiFact is a project of the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly to help you find the truth in the presidential campaign. Every day, reporters and researchers from the Times and CQ will analyze the candidates' speeches, TV ads and interviews and determine whether the claims are accurate. >> More





