Let Freedom Ring: “Gas Price Hypocrisy”

An ad from Let Freedom Ring accuses President Obama of “gas price hypocrisy,” suggesting that a clip of Obama speaking on the campaign trail in 2008 contradicts remarks he made in March 2012. In both speeches, however, Obama espoused the same position: that there is no “silver bullet” for an immediate reduction in gas prices, and that instead we must develop alternate energy sources in order to end America’s dependence on foreign oil. Even so, under President Obama, domestic oil production and exports are up, but since oil is traded on a global market, increased domestic drilling doesn’t have much of an impact on gas prices.

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American Crossroads: “Public Equity”

In an ad titled “Public Equity,” American Crossroads counters President Obama’s criticism of Mitt Romney’s business record by claiming the Obama administration’s “failed investment strategies” are to blame for lost jobs and wasted tax dollars. Crossroads starts by maligning Obama’s auto bailout, which is widely credited for saving the automotive industry; in fact, the industry has gained over 100,000 jobs under the Obama administration. The ad goes on to attack the government’s investment in Solyndra while obscuring the facts about Department of Energy’s loan guarantee program, using clips of a factually flawed news report to overstate the riskiness of the government’s investments.

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Americans For Prosperity: “Wasteful Spending”

Cherry-picking details from news reports, Americans For Prosperity bills the Recovery Act as a wasteful boondoggle funneling money to foreign projects instead of creating American jobs. In reality, Recovery Act sustained millions of American jobs and boosted the economy, while a closer look reveals that AFP’s stories about stimulus money going to Mexico, Finland, and China quickly fall apart

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Crossroads GPS: “Hole”

Accusing Berkley of “voting for tax hikes” that will worsen Nevada’s high unemployment rate and struggling housing market, Crossroads GPS offers no evidence stronger than a pre-recession vote from 2007 on a never-enacted budget that proposed to let the Bush-era tax cuts expire. The ad also hits Berkley on a vote for a clean energy bill — the American Clean Energy and Security Act, also never enacted – which it claims would cost American families $1,600 a year. But that figure (as the very article Crossroads cites kindly explains) isn’t an estimate of ACES; it’s for a generic cap-and-trade program. CBO’s estimate for the actual legislation Berkley voted on was closer to $175 per household per year, and it found that the bill could actually save low-income households money. Finally, the ad blames Berkley for supporting a 2009 budget that supposedly “pushed deficits sky high,” a nonsensical accusation given that the deficit was already projected to skyrocket before President Obama took office thanks to a variety of Bush-era policies.

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American Energy Alliance: “Nine Dollar Gas”

An ad from the American Energy Alliance (AEA) lambasts President Obama for gas prices that have “nearly doubled” since the start of his administration, but the ad’s claims rest on a series of distortions obscuring the fact that the president has little control over globally determined oil costs. Obama didn’t, as the ad claims, categorically write off Alaskan energy. A loan to a clean energy company has nothing to do with gas prices. Approving the Keystone pipeline wouldn’t bring energy prices down to pre-recession levels. Finally, Energy Secretary Steven Chu has recanted his 2008 statement about driving up gas costs, citing the recession and saying that “there are many, many reasons why we do not want the price of gasoline to go up.”

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