Ad: "Who's He Kidding?"
About This Ad | Watch the Video »
» Candidate/Organization: Bob Corker
» Other Candidates Mentioned: Harold Ford
» Year: 2006
» State: Tennessee
» Race: Senate, District N/A (About This Race)
» Party: Republican
» Funded by: Party
» Disseminations: TV, Web
Ad Content
» Cues: Cited sources, On-screen Writing
» Issues: Crime, Homeland Security, War on Terror
» Tone: Negative
» Types: Attack, Issue
» Music: Ominous
» Characters: Harold Ford, Terrorists
» Narrator: Male
» Language: English
Analysis
By The Washington Post: Corker is accurate in that Ford voted against the Patriot Act, but Ford did vote for an alternate version, sponsored by a Republican, that became the vehicle for reauthorizing the law. While Ford voted for a 16 percent reduction in defense spending, that was in 2000, and since the 9/11 attacks, he has supported a number of measures boosting military budgets.
The ad is wrong, however, in charging that Ford voted to allow judges to turn felons loose. In 1998, he opposed a measure pushed by then-Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) that would have restricted the right of judges to release prisoners -- which the Clinton administration said might be unconstitutional -- so Ford's position amounted to no change in policy.
In a counterattack ad, which stirred controversy because it was taped inside a church, Ford accused the former Chattanooga mayor of "spending millions telling untruths" about him and other opponents.
-Howard Kurtz
