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An extensive accounting of more than 50,000 commercials by Kantar Media’s Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks political advertising, has determined that the single most-aired campaign ad of the past 10 years was a 30-second spot for Sen. Barack Obama attacking Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on his health-care plan.
The ad featured a simple ball of yarn.
“We knew uncovering the details of McCain’s health care plan was a political imperative, but we needed to do it in a way that broke through the advertising clutter,” says AKPD Message and Media, which produced the ad. “We wanted an image that was unique and powerful enough to stick in voters’ heads, even if they were watching TV with the sound turned down.”
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, senior policy adviser to McCain, remembers the ad well. “I have PTSD from that ad,” he said. “I thought I saw it a thousand times a day. It left me just numb. I still see that yarn in my sleep.”
In 2008, our colleagues at FactCheck.org were not that impressed with the commercial’s claims, reviewing it as part of an article titled “Health Care Spin.” They noted that the ad highlighted the fact that McCain proposed a tax on health benefits but never mentioned that he also proposed a tax credit that, for many Americans, would offset any tax increase.
Of course, McCain did not become president. And Obama, who has argued against adopting an individual mandate, as proposed by Hillary Clinton, ended up embracing exactly that option—and even accepted a variation of an idea from McCain that he criticizes in this ad.
Politicians change their minds—and their policies—all the time, sometimes for political reasons but also because circumstances change. But within the benefit of hindsight, could McCain have made the same attack ad against Obama? The Truth Teller Video above also examines the claims.
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