TIPA - Truth In Political Advertising

ACCURACY = 4.6 out of 10.0. This advertisement generally was inaccurate, misled viewers, and misstated facts while having only a few portions which were accurate. It did not meet the TIPA's minimal standards for accuracy.

FAIRNESS = 3.9 out of 10.0. This advertisement was rated as scurrilous and quite unfair in many respects. This is another reason to terminate the ad.

RELEVANCE = 4.2 out of 10.0. This advertisement was considered mostly to be irrelevant to the primary issues of the campaign.

OVERALL = 4.3 out of 10.0. This advertisement fails to meet any reasonable standards of practice to which the TIPA would like to see candidates adhere. The TIPA believes the advertisement should not have been run and should be pulled immediately, if it still is in rotation anywhere.

Environmentalists and state employees, beware. According to "Kitchen Sink,” a harsh missive against Ken Salazar sponsored by the Pete Coors campaign, Salazar supports polluters and is a Christmas Scrooge who attempted to fire “hundreds” of employees right before the holidays during his tenure in the Attorney General’s office.

In the ominous “Kitchen Sink” ad, the Coors campaign claims Salazar “represented” a mining company which had been cited 22 times for pollution. The truth is that Salazar has never represented the company, although it has contributed to his campaign.

The advertisement also claims Salazar represented a company fined for a river dump that killed thousands of fish. In fact, a news report indicates the company was never fined. The particular irony here – certainly not lost on the Coors’ strategists – is that Pete Coors has been attacked during his candidacy because of accidental spills by the Coors Brewing Company which killed tens of thousands of fish.

The “fish” attack on Salazar is seen as an attempt to negate the negative image being portrayed about Pete Coors when it comes to killing fish. The TIPA staff would surmise this may be the first campaign in the history of the United States Senate where each candidate’s possible responsibility for killing thousands of fish is at issue. The truth is, in both cases, neither candidate took any action or failed to take an appropriate safety or other mitigating action which resulted in the death of thousands of fish.

Anyone working for the State of Colorado might be outraged by the ad’s claim that Salazar tried to fire hundreds of employees in the Attorney General’s office right before Christmas. According to the office’s spokesperson, Ken Lane, Salazar did ask for the resignations of all attorneys in the office. This is a common procedure when a new Attorney General takes office, and Salazar later rehired all but eleven of them. The criticism of Salazar regarding his timing, however, remains valid and, at the time, even his supporters agreed he looked bad. He had been elected in November of 1998 and, just a few weeks later, indicated his desire to have staff resignations en masse. From a management and timing perspective, few could argue that Salazar should have made the announcement immediately upon his election. The Coors’ criticism of Salazar is valid in the sense that the resignations were requested during the holiday period.

Based on the ratings provided by Advisory Panel members and weighted so Democrats and Republicans were equal in number from a statistical averaging perspective, the TIPA has compiled a set of scores for the advertisement “Kitchen Sink”.

The TIPA uses a "1" to "10" rating scale for Accuracy (with greater accuracy reflected by a higher rating), Fairness (with a higher rating indicating a greater degree of fairness), and Relevancy (with a higher rating meaning the advertisement was most relevant to the U.S. Senate campaign). The Rating System is presented in detail on the TIPA Web site.

ACCURACY RATING. Not surprisingly, “Kitchen Sink” received a low accuracy score of 4.6 out of 10.0. More than one significant fact was misstated and clearly several established facts were omitted. This is a factually misleading advertisement. One Republican Advisory Panel member opined, “I have a suspicion that the quotes from the papers were taken out of context.”

Another Republican Advisory Panel member was unequivocal and said, “Phrases like ‘linked to’ and ‘tried to’ always are half truths designed to mislead. They probably are in this ad, too.”

One Democrat’s response was similar. “This ad takes Ken Salazar's passive guilt by association and misleadingly portrays his role as active. In addition, yes, we know that Coors employs many people, but we also know that he's laid off hundreds and his Molson deal would have laid off quite a few people as well.” The interesting aspect of this observation is that Coors has campaigned as a “Job Creator” but the actual numbers are contradictory and do not support that assertion in any definitive way.

An independent member of the Panel had similar thoughts. “The old ‘he's linked to a company that has done bad things’ is overblown and suggests his compliance. Further, calling Coors a ‘proven job creator’ is a falsehood, based on Denver Post story about net loss of jobs at Coors while he has run the company.”

Another Democrat adds, “Most of the abuses came under Gail Norton -- they don't tell you that.”

An independent Panelist was even more detailed in critiquing the ad. “The accuracy of charges in this ad are addressed for the most part in Salazar's favor, ironically, in the Denver Post article ( 09-12-04 ) cited in the ad. The ad contains some gross distortions. Salazar did not represent the mining company that exceeded EPA limits, though he did take contributions from it, for example. What's interesting about this ad is how it operates on two levels, constantly bringing negative information to the viewer. Visually, it shows Salazar with the words ‘Lawyer Ken Salazar’ superimposed over his image. The audio track alternates between male and female voices describing "facts" supposedly backed up by stories in the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News, with partial quotations from the stories on the screen. The use of newspaper information is a classic political advertising tactic, an attempt to bring print and, apparently, footnote credibility to the information used.”

One Democratic Panel member was equally critical. “1. Salazar never represented the mining polluter. This statement is simply untrue. And they didn't mention which company killed the fish. It wasn't Coors by any chance, was it? 2. 389 of the 400 attorneys in the Attorney General’s office were rehired immediately thereafter. In effect this was a way to reorganize and perhaps remove some deadwood. President Bush and John Ashcroft did the same thing in 2001. Also, how many people has Pete Coors effectively fired or laid off in his career? I gave it a 2 for accuracy since they apparently didn't misspell anyone's name. 3. Pete has been widely challenged by the Press as a 'job creator.' In fact there are 900 fewer Coors employees under his watch.”

The claim that Salazar fired a whistleblower and it costs the State of Colorado a $400,000 settlement is accurate although Salazar appeared to only be proceeding with the recommendations of his managers and did not directly manage the fired employee. Nevertheless, this did occur on his watch and, as the Attorney General, he ultimately has the responsibility for what happens and for what is done in his office.

Overall, Republicans rated the Accuracy of the advertisement (6.6) at more than twice the level of Democrats (3.2). At the 6.6 level, the Accuracy rating would be a combination of the following definitions (i.e., for 6.0 and 7.0):

6.0 = Nominally accurate (approximately 80%) but with one to three key facts subject to misinterpretation or misunderstanding and such misinterpretation or misunderstandings likely to have been intentional as part of a “smokescreen of truth” used to pursue a falsified argument.

7.0 = Generally accurate (approximately +90%) with one or two key facts subject to misinterpretation or misunderstanding – and they clearly should have been corrected before the advertisement was used.

At the 3.2 level, Accuracy would be defined much differently, as follows: Generally inaccurate with a plurality of key facts misstated and/or intentionally omitted, giving the observer the impression something false is true or vice versa.

Independent panelists rated the advertisement very low in Accuracy – 3.5 – and, in general, appeared to view it with the same negative perspective held by the Democratic panelists.

FAIRNESS RATING. Since several important facts were omitted, this advertisement received an exceptionally low score for fairness -- 3.9 out of 10. This ad was meant to severely harm Salazar’s reputation through the use of mistruths. It intentionally distorts the facts while mixing just enough half-truths to keep the ad from outright lying about Salazar’s past record.

One Republican Advisory Panel member noted, “Lawyers cannot control who the firm they work for takes as clients all the time.” Another Republican member of the Panel made almost the exact same statement: “It’s not fair to judge a lawyer by the allegations against his clients.”

A Democratic panelist argued, “Such a blatant attack on an opponent's character should be reserved for public debates which give the accused an opportunity to respond. I am familiar with the accusations described out-of-context in this ad. It would have been more accurate to say: "Ken Salazar knows, has worked with and has accepted contributions from people representing special interests. So has Pete Coors.”

A Democratic response included the following analysis of how the construction of the advertisement made it unfair. “The cut-outs of Salazar are meant to distance the viewer from him. Taken out of his surroundings and natural video backgrounds, he visually looks odd, out of place, and thus, untrustworthy. Many of the cut-outs are overexposed, further increasing the feeling of distance to the viewer.”

An Independent Advisory Panel member also was displeased. “This is the usual sleaze and innuendo. Must all Colorado Senate races take this downward path?”

Another independent panelist summarized the advertisement in similarly negative terms, “Lots of exaggeration, distortion and incomplete information.”

A Republican member of the Advisory Panel discussed fairness analyzing the guilt-by-association and similar linkage inferences made in the advertisement. “The commercial points out how Salazar's law firm is ‘linked’ to polluters. According to the Denver Post, Salazar's law firm did defend those charged with polluting. This makes that statement true in the literal sense but it's mostly stretched. If he'd been a criminal defense attorney, they could say his firm was linked to drunk drivers, child molesters and murderers. Or if he worked for the legal department in an insurance firm, he could be linked to people who fall asleep while driving or who aren't paying attention while talking on their cell phones.”

Again, the gap between how the Democrats (at a meager 2.6 level) and Republicans (at more than twice as high a rating of 5.6) was substantial. Independents echoed the Democratic perspective and also rated the advertisement’s Fairness quite low ( 2.8). These are some of the lowest Fairness ratings seen. The Rating Systems defines the two ranges as follows:

2.0 = Extremely unfair and/or inaccurate with “facts” fabricated and/or so extraordinarily distorted to vilify or otherwise severely harm the opposing candidate; containing false or highly personal yet irrelevant material which could unfairly damage the targeted candidate for life; contains one or more vicious personal attacks; truly reprehensible.

3.0 = Grossly misleading and unfair effort to stain the reputation of an opponent, meant to severely harm him or her.

4.0 = Scurrilous personal attack intentionally distorting the truth to give a false impression of an opponent, yet mixed with enough relevant or reasonable claims to soften what otherwise would be a brutal attack.

5.0 = Contains an unfounded or unjustified personal attack on a candidate which is patently unfair and which is not fair game.

6.0 = Hard-hitting but fair and reasonable; hard-edged and perhaps a bit too tough yet just within the bounds of what should be considered acceptable.

RELEVANCE RATING. Based on the election’s pertinent issues, this advertisement got a Relevance rating of 4.2 for containing subject matter that has little to do with any of the real issues of the day. This ad clearly falls short of delivering applicable information to voters who want to vote based on the relevant issues, not on distortions of the facts.

A Democratic panelist struggled with the Relevance rating. “I had a hard time with relevance on this one. Pollution and job creation are relevant, but the context in which they are discussed does not transfer to the role of Senator.”

One independent panelists assessment was that the advertisement was relevant in terms of the subject matter. “Relevance is an interesting issue here. All the topics in the ad are relevant to a U.S. Senator's work: environmental policy, campaign contributions, et cetera. The level of distortion in this ad gives a new twist to the definition of ‘relevant.’"

One Republican failed to see the relevance and unequivocally stated, “I see this as unfounded, personal character attacks.”

The range of opinion about the Relevance of the advertisement is much narrower than the Accuracy and Fairness ratings. Republican panelists rate the Relevance at 5.1, Independent members rate it at 4.3, and Democratic panelists rate it at 3.3. This relatively short range is presented, below.

3.0 = Grossly misleading effort to redirect voters, possibly including an attempt to stain the reputation of an opponent, meant to severely harm him or her; scurrilous personal attack intentionally distorting the truth to give a false impression of an opponent and avoid addressing the issues voters see as key in a race.

4.0 = Contains subject matter which has little to do with the campaign or contest at hand; obviously created to focus on a subject which casts the sponsoring or benefiting candidate in a positive light although the subject matter has little or no relationship to the political race.

5.0 = A slight majority of the material is not relevant (e.g., +50%) and, instead, unintentionally obscures those issues which are on the minds of most voters; this advertisement may be sloppier in its construction than intentionally devious (although the ultimate ramification may involve voter confusion).

OVERALL RATING. Although some people understandably would argue the advertisement simply is “hard-hitting,” others would conclude “ Kitchen Sink” verges on mean-spiritedness and is plainly an effort to cause severe damage to Salazar’s reputation. Since the advertisement relies heavily on misrepresentations of the actual facts to do this, the TIPA Advisory Panel collectively gave “ Kitchen Sink” an overall score of 4.3 -- one of the lowest ratings of all the political ads in the Coors-Salazar 2004 campaign.

Interestingly, some of the most biting criticisms of the advertisement come from the Republican members of the Advisory Panel although, as a subgroup, they rated the ad much higher than the Democratic or independent members of the Panel. Hence, in some cases the Republicans’ comments were very critical of the advertisements but their ratings still showed a significant partisan position.

Nevertheless, as the ratings from all three political subgroups demonstrate, the Advisory Panel members on both sides of the aisle continue to demonstrate their ability to separate fact from fiction and be critical of the campaigns they personally support. The TIPA believes that its success in maintaining their anonymity contributes greatly to their willingness to be what could be described as self-critical.

(C) Copyright 2004 by the Democracy & Media Education Foundation. All rights reserved. Reproduction, duplication, transmission, or conveyance of this document – in whole or in part – without the express written consent of the DMEF is strictly prohibited. Bona fide print and electronic Press organizations, however, may quote this Report as long as proper attribution is given (i.e., “The Truth In Political Advertising Project”) and the quotation or reference accurately reflects the contents and conclusions of this Report. For questions, please call Zachary Adler at (303) 449-5043 or send an e-mail to Zachary@TIPAP.org. Thank you.