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After the 1988 campaign, academic conferences around the country raised the question, Why did the press not point out the distortions and the false inferences invited by the 1988 presidential candidates’ ads? Among these were the implications of a Dukakis ad that Bush would all but eliminate Social Security, and the implications of a Bush ad that Dukakis had released a large number of first-degree murderers and rapists to kill and rape again.
Newspapers responded to the perceived problems in the 1988 campaign by printing the texts of 1990 ads in their entirety and then documenting the facts as the reporters knew them. For example, when an ad for Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ann Richards claimed that her opponent had “mountains of debt,” the Dallas Morning News boxed the following information: “The Midland entrepreneur has borrowed extensively over the years to develop his oil, ranching, and long distance telephone enterprises. And he has seen his net worth fall by almost two-thirds since 1982, according to a review of his business dealings by the Dallas Morning News. Still, the News puts Mr. Williams’ net worth at about $116 million, concentrated in oil and gas properties.”
In 1992, for the first time, the advertising of a presidential campaign was monitored for fairness and accuracy by both print and broadcast reporters. The most systematic work was done by Brooks Jackson of CNN. On National Public Radio, Andy Bowers led analyses of radio advertising, an important move because the most serious distortions of the campaign were found in the final weeks on local radio. Eric Newberg of CBS and Jackson of CNN performed yeoman service in locating and analyzing the radio ads on television. Thomas Sabo
Reporters approved of press coverage of ads. Of the reporters surveyed in a Times Mirror poll, 77 percent approved of these policing efforts. One television newsperson told Times Mirror that the debunking of the ads “is the primary reason why no Willie Horton ads or their cousins have appeared in this campaign. Our coverage is keeping the bastards honest.” Another editor told the surveyors, “We’ll need a Teddy White to come along later to see if those who planned commercials really sat around worrying about whether we’d criticize them or not.”11 In 1996, print ad watching continued, but network news all but abandoned the monitoring of ads. When asked why, news producers indicated that the presidential race was not close enough to justify the effort.
Responding to Last-Minute Attacks
The difficulty in dealing with last-minute attacks is compounded by the fact that an attack ad can run for a full day or more before the attacked candidate knows about it. Once alerted to its existence, the campaign staff must spend time securing a copy. Additional time is required to document its falsity. If the attack campaign includes many ads, the burden increases proportionately.
If the candidate decides to use a news conference to expose and reply to the attack ads, schedules must be cleared, an appropriate location must be secured, and the media must be alerted. All these activities take time. Meanwhile, the candidate’s staff must develop a strategy to counter the ads. Under such pressure, strategic errors are likely to occur. Perhaps the candidate will panic and waste valuable time refuting ads that have reached few voters. Such a move enlarges the opponent’s audience. Perhaps the candidate’s rebuttal will seem histrionic and will discredit him or her. Finally, given the time pressure, there is a danger that even if the attack ads are exposed as false by journalists, they will have reached more people than the rebuttal. There may not be time for a backlash to build against the attacker, and the sight of two candidates battling it out over the truth of the ads may drive voters to a third candidate not contaminated by the controversy.
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