Tuesday, October 8, 2024

AR-Sen: One-Sixtieth Of The Truth

The Blanche Lincoln camp launched a new ad today, entitled “We Can Again.”  (Apparently, they thought “Yes, We Can Again” would be too obvious.)

Take a gander:

As recent political ads go, this one is pretty well done, at least insofar as it (a) doesn’t demean or attack (or even mention) Bill Halter, (b) it doesn’t butcher an automotive metaphor, and (c) it doesn’t quote Larry The Cable Guy.  Oh, and it’s not racist, which is nice.

There’s something, though…let’s go back to the tape…

That’s why I cast the deciding vote to pass health care reform.

Interesting.

After all, as you may well remember, Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) was the last Democrat to say that he would assent to the bill in mid-December, and his 60th vote was needed to break the filibuster.  During the role call vote on Christmas Eve when the bill was actually passed, John Tester (D-MT) was the 51st vote and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) was the 60th vote.  Sure, Lincoln was part of the block of Senators who effectively killed the public option before they would agree to support the bill, but she did not represent the “deciding vote” to pass the bill.

Unless, of course, she’s saying that, because 60 votes were needed to defeat the GOP filibuster and the Democrats managed exactly 60 votes, every Senator technically cast the deciding vote.  Which, while semantically true, is kind of misleading within the context of the ad.

Of course, misleading TV ads touting things that really aren’t exactly true are not new for Ms. Lincoln in this campaign cycle.

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