Obama's new TV ad: "Dishonest."

You decide who's being dishonest:



First, the ad accuses Romney of being dishonest in stating "I'm not in favor of a $5 trillion tax cut," but there's no information about why it's not true. The ad simply goes on to the next subject, saying "Romney's being dishonest here too."

Now, we see a clip from a Romney TV ad with the words on screen "Who will raise taxes on the middle class?" and the voice-over saying "According to an independent non-partisan study, Barack Obama and the liberals will raise taxes on the middle class." We see a picture of Obama with Nancy Pelosi and then "$4,000 higher taxes on middle class." This section of the ad is risky for Obama. It's the Romney ad, and it's scary and effective. If Obama wants to show that, he'd better crush it hard.

What we're told though is only "The Chairman of that so-called independent group is from Romney's former company. Dick Cheney's on its board. Newt Gingrich was there too. It's not independent. It's just not true." So... what's not true? The only thing I'm seeing denied is the independence of some unnamed "group," but independence is a matter of opinion. Who else was on the board other than Cheney? Gingrich was "there." Do they mean "on the board"? On the board of what?

Look at what isn't denied! At least Romney denied that he's in favor of a $5 trillion tax cut (and the ad publicizes his denial). Obama's ad fails to deny that he'd stick middle class people with a $4,000 tax rise. We're supposed to focus on Romney as "dishonest" because he used that study. Is there some counter-study establishing something else? If the "group" — whatever it is — is technically independent and non-partisan, it's dishonest to say "dishonest." And I still don't know the name of the "group" so I can't check what it is. This whole ad depends on residual loathing of Dick Cheney!