Sadly, Mostly True

Summary
On the eve of their second presidential debate, McCain and Obama released TV ads accusing one another of untruthful attacks. Both are essentially accurate, though each tells only half the story.

McCain's ad cites Obama spots that have falsely accused him of supporting a 50 percent cut in Social Security benefits, that twisted his words about deregulating health insurance markets and that falsely accused him of opposing stem-cell research.

Obama's ad says McCain is resorting to "smears that have been proven false." It quotes news articles contradicting Palin's accusation that Obama is "palling around with terrorists" and calls that attack an attempt to distract voters from economic issues.

We won't attempt to assess which side is more deceitful, a task that would require subjective judgments about the degree of untruthfulness and the relative importance of each misleading statement. But, sadly, each side is correct to say the other has used false attacks.

Analysis
TV spots released Oct. 7 by the McCain-Palin and Obama-Biden campaigns each accuse the other candidate of untruthfulness. Both were set to run on national television in the hours prior to the second of three scheduled presidential debates between Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama.

McCain-Palin Ad: "Hypo"
Announcer: Who is Barack Obama?
KMOV TV Anchor (video): Obama's presidential campaign is asking Missouri law enforcement to target anyone who lies or runs a misleading television ads.
Announcer:How hypocritical.
Obama's Social Security attack was called "a falsehood."
His health care attack ... "misleading".
Obama's stem cell attack ... "not true".
Barack Obama. He promised better. He lied.
McCain:I'm John McCain and I approve this message.

"He Lied"
The McCain ad starts with a clip of a Missouri TV news anchor who said on Sept. 23 that the Obama campaign is asking state law enforcement officials to "target anyone who lies or runs misleading television ads." The ad then accuses Obama of being "hypocritical," cites Obama ads that have been called untruthful by FactCheck.org and ABC News, and concludes, "He promised better. He lied."

Whether or not Obama "lied" is a matter we'll leave to others to judge for themselves, since we have no way of reading minds or divining anyone's intent. It is true that on Sept. 19 we called an Obama ad "a falsehood" for saying McCain supported cutting Social Security benefits in half, and it is also true that on Sept. 22 we called another Obama ad "misleading," because of the way it twisted McCain's words about deregulating health insurance markets to allow policies to be purchased across state lines. And it is also true that ABC News' Senior National Correspondent Jake Tapper said an Obama radio ad was "not true," when it said McCain  "opposed stem cell research." (We also said that ad was "wrong.")

While the ad criticizes Obama for being "hypocritical," it fails to mention that the very ABC News article that the McCain campaign cites actually criticizes McCain for misleading voters, too. And a casual look at our own Web site also reveals criticisms of both candidates.