With less than a week remaining before the 2014 elections the airwaves have been inundated with political advertisements. For Michigan residents this has meant a heavy does of ads for the debating the qualifications of Rick Snyder and Mark Schauer.
Unfortunately these ads are often full of manipulated information that, at best, offer a clear distortion of the facts. A good example of this is the recent ad by the "Rick for Michigan" campaign titled 'Everyone'.
The ad starts by stating "Governor Rick Snyder has reversed Michigan's decline". With the general economic improvement that the US has experienced that past few years taking credit for Michigan's economic gains seems questionable.
University of Michigan economist Don Grimes says that of the 300,000 or so jobs the governor attributes to his leadership only around 15,000 of these jobs are not explained by the resurgence of the auto industry and the national economic recovery. It's possible Rick Snyder's policies contributed to these 15,000 jobs but the governor has presented no data to connect his actions to these jobs.
Given his business background, the fact that Rick Snyder hasn't presented a correlation between Michigan's job growth and his job creation strategies suggests the governor is well aware of the infinitesimal impact he has actually had because no titan of industry offers up a $1.8 billion loss of revenue without a definitive cause and effect on any potential return on investment.
The ad then continues "the press reports are remarkable" followed by a number of quotes from various new sources which include the following:
"deliver what he promised" - Lansing State Journal - 10/17/14
"gutsy, pragmatic leader" - Crain's Detroit Business - 10/5/14
"Michigan is better off today" - Detroit News - 10/16/14
"K-12 spending has increased" - Lansing State Journal - 10/17/14
Then the ad finishes by stating "Mark Schauer's claim the governor cut education has been repeatedly..."
"Discredited" - Off the Record - 6/20/14
"False" - Detroit News - 10/16/14
"Big and persistent lie" - Lansing State Journal - 9/30/14
While this may appear to be an impressive collection of support for the governor there is more than meets the eye with these quotes. First it should be noted that many of these citation are editorials from conservative sources. Crain's for example is one of the few major publications to endorse Terri Lynn Land, while the Lansing State Journal supports Republicans for all three of the top state positions. The Detroit News - long considered the most conservative newspaper in Michigan - recently stated that their instinct is to "side always with the conservative candidate". The only surprise here would be if these sources didn't find nice things to say about Rick Snyder.
Having said that some of these quotes are taken out of context to seem more effusive than they really are. The article that the "deliver what he promised" quote was pulled from also contains the quotes "Snyder's overhaul has not yet prompted as much job growth", "Snyder needs to show more direct leadership", "his tax overhaul being hard on working families and seniors", and "Snyder disappointed some voters".
The Crain's quote while powerful is specifically referring to Rick Snyder "orchestrating Detroit's bankruptcy" instead of his entire leadership. Leaving this information out helps Snyder because many do not think this was a gutsy or pragmatic move. In fact in a Reuter's article from 2/21/13 experts warned that "bankruptcy could taint other struggling municipalities, worsening the problem." and "Chapter 9 is time-consuming, uncertain, expensive and unpredictable."
But perhaps the worst part of this television spot is the defense of Rick Snyder's education spending. First it should be noted that three of the four quotes all come from one writer. It can hardly be said that Mark Schauer's claims have been "repeatedly" anything when you use the same person for 75% of your quotes.
Second the Lansing State Journal article referenced for the "Big and persistent lie" quote was amended shortly after publication to "Big and persistent untruth" because there is a set of data from the non partisan Senate Financial Agency that does in fact show the $1 billion cut. The Snyder campaign asked local television stations to remove these ads because of this supposed lie yet all stations refused because of the reality that there is data that proves this correct. The claim may be disingenuous but it is absolutely not a lie.
Ironically by insisting on using language that the newspaper itself refuses to stand by it could be said that Rick Snyder is lying. It's also important to remember that back when Rick Snyder said he would be "happy to go fishing, go teach or do something else." and leave the 2015 governor seat to "better, smarter people" he also admitted that "we cut K through 12" spending.
This is a reality that a number of fact checkers agree with. Mlive determined that the governor's claim that he increased per pupil funding by $660 is an inaccurate portrayal of the data. Michigan Radio reports that the governor cut between $235 million and $393 million from the education budget his first year. Bridge Magazine the per pupil foundation allowance has fallen by $661 under the governors watch. Representative Jeff Irwin has presented data showing that schools are missing out on as much as $1 billion of funding because of Rick Snyder.
While most of the statements in this ad are insincere distortions, the most important question Michigan voters should be asking is not what about Rick Snyder did but what Rick Snyder is going to do. The governor has spent an awful lot of money on "victory lap" ads that purport a remarkable level of success but what you haven't heard is what Rick Snyder plans to do with the next four years.
In 2011 Rick Snyder said if he accomplished what he set out to accomplish he wouldn't run for a second term. Given that he is obviously running for re-election it would seem that the governor agrees that his first term was a failure because if it was a successful as his commercials suggest, he should be out fishing right now. Of course it's also possible that the Rick Snyder did in fact accomplish all of his goals and that his previous statement was a lie, or rather, an untruth. Either way Michigan residents shouldn't be surprise since a 4/23/14 Detroit News article said "the governor failed to keep his word" - which is likely something that 'Everyone' already knows.
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