More AlGore the Junior Lies:
TEXAS GOVERNOR
May 2, 2000; Washington Post
CLAIM: "You know [Bush] has never put together a budget. The governor of Texas is by far the weakest chief executive position in America and does not have the responsibility of forming or presenting a budget. He's never done that."
TRUTH: Texas law defines the governor as "the chief budget officer of the state" and orders him to distribute his budget to every member of the legislature. And Bush, in fact, has formed and presented budgets as governor.
BUSH CRIME RECORD
May 2, 2000; Atlanta YWCA speech
CLAIM: "Under Bush, Texas' recidivism rate has increased by 25 percent."
TRUTH: Nobody knows what has happened to the recidivism rate under Bush because those figures haven't been published, due to extensive lag times in reporting. The most recent numbers are from 1994, according to the Texas Criminal Justice Policy Council.
BUSH DEBT PLAN
April 25, 2000; Association for a Better New York speech
CLAIM: "He provides for no reduction in the debt — and no reduction in interest on the debt."
TRUTH: By promising to reserve excess revenues generated by Social Security payroll taxes for Social Security, Bush essentially promises to retire federal debt with this money.
BUDGET SURPLUS
May 2, 2000; Washington Post
CLAIM: Describing the Clinton administration plan outlined in the 1999 State of the Union address to have the federal government invest some of the budget surplus in the stock market: "We didn't really propose it. We talked about the idea."
TRUTH: Page 37 of the Clinton administration budget submitted to Congress in February: "The President also proposes to invest half of the transferred amounts in corporate equities." From last year's budget: "The administration proposes tapping the power of private financial markets to increase the resources to pay for future Social Security benefits."
TOBACCO #1
March 1, 2000; San Jose Mercury News
CLAIM: “It’s not fair to say, ‘Okay, after his sister died, he continued in the same relationship with the tobacco industry.’ I did not. I did not. I began to confront them forcefully. I don’t see the inconsistency there.”
TRUTH: The same month Gore’s sister died in 1984, he received a $1,000 speaking fee from U.S. Tobacco. The next year, he voted against cigarette and tobacco tax increases three times and favored a bill allowing major cigarette makers to purchase discounted tobacco. In the 1988 campaign, Gore bragged of his tobacco background: “I want you to know that with my own hands, all of my life, I put [tobacco] in the plant beds and transferred it. I’ve hoed it, I’ve dug in it, I’ve sprayed it, I’ve chopped it, I’ve shredded it, spiked it, put it in the barn, and stripped it and sold it” (Newsday, 2-26-88).
TOBACCO #2
March 1, 2000; San Jose Mercury News
CLAIM: “My family had grown tobacco. It was never actually grown on my farm, but it was on my father’s farm.”
TRUTH: Gore had already admitted growing tobacco on his own farm: “On my farm, we stopped growing tobacco some time after Nancy died” (Cox News Service, 4-26-99). Also, Gore received federal subsidies for growing tobacco on his farm (Wall Street Journal, 8-10-95).
ABORTION #1
February 20, 2000; New York Times
CLAIM: Gore said he has “always, always, always” supported Roe v. Wade.
TRUTH: In 1977, Rep. Gore voted for the Hyde Amendment, which says that abortion “takes the life of an unborn child who is a living human being,” and that there is no constitutional right to abortion. He cast many other votes favorable to the pro-life cause and earned an 84 percent rating from the National Right to Life Committee.
CROWD ESTIMATE
February 4, 2000; New York Times
CLAIM: “We had a huge event with 3,000 people at Ohio State University.”
TRUTH: “Officials at that rally said the room where it had taken place did not hold more than 1,200 people, and, given the area needed for the staging erected for the occasion, they estimated the crowd at 500,” reported the Times.
NEW HAMPSHIRE PRIMARY
February 2, 2000; Good Morning America
CLAIM: “We won in every single demographic category” in the New Hampshire primary.
TRUTH: Bill Bradley carried male voters and voters aged 18-29, according to exit polls.
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