Americans For Prosperity Bunk Ad De-Bunked

Sorry folks , I’ve been away and haven’t posted lately.  I’ve been devoting time to find gainful employment and taking care of medical issues.  This doesn’t mean, however, that I have kept my head in the sand and given up on the fight.
 

So now, on to the heart of the matter…

American’s for Prosperity recently released a new TV attack ad against President Obama (late April 2012).  Now if you’re not paying attention to what is ACTUALLY being said you could easily be misled.

So to make sure NO American is misled, I will deconstruct this false attack ad.  

Let’s begin, shall we?

(first let me note that I own no rights, intellectual or otherwise, to the videos featured in this post)

Okay.  So the very first line opens with 

“Washington promised to create American jobs if we passed their stimulus.”

 (video from 0:00 to 0:05)

• Washington means Repuglics and Democrats…NOT JUST PRESIDENT OBAMA.  Oh, and isn’t it the NEO-CONS who piss and moan that GOVERNMENT (“Washington”) CAN’T CREATE JOBS???

• WE passed THEIR stimulus?  Who is “we” and who is “their”?  “WE” assumes Republicans since this is an anti-Obama ad, and “THEIR” assumes the President and Democrats for the same reasons.

• Only 3 Repuglics in Washington voted for the “831 billion dollar stimulus”, and AFP (Americans for Prosperity) would have you believe that ZERO HOUSE REPUBLICS (all 177 of them) and 3 (out of 41) Republic Senators equals “WE”?  Not hardly, right-wingers! 

You see how this will go, right?  I mean really, the very first sentence is a crock of $hit!

But I digress.  Let’s continue.

“But that’s not what happened” 

(video from 0:05 to 0:06)

• Whoa there, right-wingers.  Before we continue, according to a CBO (NON-PARTISAN Congressional Budget Office) report from 2011, it created between 550,000 and 3.3 million jobs.

• So - can AFP prove that no jobs were created?  Or prove that very few jobs were created?  Note: watching unemployment numbers, I’ve noticed that anything over 250,000 jobs added per month can affect the unemployment rate by a percentage point.  Nice try, AFP.

Roll tape.

“Fact: Billions of taxpayer dollars spent on ‘green energy’ went to jobs in foreign countries” 

(video from 0:08 to 0:14)

• 11 of the total number of wind farms used their grants to purchase 695 of 982 turbines from overseas wind suppliers.  Let’s put this in context: one wind farm, Goshen Wind Farms in Idaho, employs 150 turbines.  So if there are 30 wind turbine farms in the U.S. (onshore only) with an average of 150 turbines each, that total is 4500 turbines.  That’s a third of the wind farms spending about 70% of their grants on turbines.  Isn’t that akin to a hospital purchasing X-ray machines from Germany?  The fact is that American trucks moved the turbines.  American workers erected and installed the turbines.  The power generated is American…for America…and isn’t traded on the world market as futures like petroleum is.  

• HEY AFP!  MAYBE IF REPUGLICS SUBSIDIZED WIND TURBINE MANUFACTURING INSTEAD OF BIG OIL, THE U.S. COULD LEAD THE WAY IN WIND ENERGY PRODUCTION SUPPLIES!

This next part of the attack ad is priceless…meaning, it isn’t worth $hit.

“$1.2 billion to a solar company that’s building a plant in Mexico”.

(video from 0:25 to 0:30)  

• Note the wording here.  NOT $1.2 billion TO build a plant in Mexico…but $1.2 billion to a company that is, by the way, building a plant in Mexico.

More bunk to de-bunk...

“Half a billion to an electric car company that created hundreds of jobs in Finland”.

(video from 0:31 to 0:36)

• Here’s what the AFP ad doesn’t tell you, according to ABC News: “Henrik Fisker said the U.S. money has been spent on engineering and design work that stayed in the U.S., not on the 500 manufacturing jobs that went to a rural Finnish firm, Valmet Automotive.”  SO ZERO OF THAT MONEY WENT TO EMPLOY FINNISH WORKERS.

And still a little more de-bunk of the Repuglics bunk:

“And tens of millions of dollars to build traffic lights in China”.

(video from 0:37 to 0:41)

• I searched and searched the Pittsburgh Tribune (triblive.com) but found nothing.  However, according to an Obama Campaign video the a fore mentioned lights were manufactured in the U.S.  

“President Obama wasted $34 billion dollars on risky investments – the result, failure”.

(video from 0:42 to 0:49)

•  This one is interesting, because the photo shown during this part of the video is of the President with a Solyndra banner in the background.  Subtle Repuglics dog whistle there for those who missed it.

“American taxpayers are paying to send their own jobs to foreign countries"

(video from 0:49 to 0:53)

• So let me get this straight.  Out of $800 billion, no good has come of it?  Wait - Let me re-phrase that.  President Obama is responsible for the American companies that outsource jobs overseas?  Yeah, not so much.

“Tell President Obama, ‘American tax dollars should help American taxpayers’”

(video from 0:54 to 1:00) 

• If we (Americans) “Tell President Obama” anything, it should be that American tax dollars should help American taxpayers – NOT big oil companies.

Remember voters, that this is TV advertising.  And like many TV advertisements, you can’t always trust what the advertiser is trying to sell. 

(do you actually believe a gecko can talk?  No.)  

Caveat emptor, America – it means “buyer beware", America.

Now that you've read my "de-bunk" of AFP's junk, here, check out the official de-bunk vid from the Obama Campaign:



4 more years!  Vote Obama 2012!!!