Jac VerSteeg: Manufacturing lies is keeping campaigns alive

In his recent entertaining column on Context Florida my former boss, Tom O’Hara, reported from The Associated Press Legislative Planning Session in Tallahassee that Gov. Rick Scott’s central message was:

“It’s the year of the manufacturer.”

I agree with Scott. But I am not attaching quite the same meaning to his words as the governor did. O’Hara says the governor’s intention is to extend a tax break for manufacturing equipment and put plenty of fresh dollars into an incentive pot to lure companies to Florida.

When I agree that the upcoming 12 months will be “The year of the manufacturer,” I’m taking a different tack. As we approach the 2016 elections, we will see candidates from the presidential election on down to the municipal level “manufacturing” campaign claims, both those intended to pat themselves on the back and those intended to slit the competition’s throat.

Most of the political campaign shops already have got their manufacturing facilities humming along.

Many of the “manufacturers” have Florida ties. Take Donald Trump (Insert Henny Youngman joke here). Trump, who has a home on Palm Beach, claimed recently that when Jeb Bush was governor, Florida established “sanctuary cities” for illegal aliens. Sanctuary cities are a hot topic because conservative Republicans opposed to immigration leniency consider them a travesty. Criticism became even more heated after the recent murder in San Francisco of a woman by an illegal immigrant. That city has an ordinance that bars it from cooperating with federal attempts to detain illegal immigrants.

Trump obviously is trying to paint Jeb with an “amnesty” brush. But, says Factcheck.org, “We could find no clear or convincing evidence to corroborate Trump’s claim.” In other words, Trump just manufactured it.

Also on immigration, Ben Carson – who lives in Palm Beach County – claimed that a “lot” of the people being released after being captured attempting to cross into the United States are from Iraq, Somalia and Russia. Wrong, says Factcheck. “Statistics show that number is less than 1 percent.”

Then there’s Marco Rubio. He claimed recently that the Iran nuclear deal states that “if any other country tries to undermine (Iran’s) nuclear program, we have to help them defend themselves against Israel, Egypt, Saudis, our own allies.” PolitiFact labeled that “False.”

On to Jeb Bush, who, in yet another ill-advised defense of his brother, claimed the tax policies of George W. Bush “created a dynamic effect of high growth.” PolitiFact rates this claim “Mostly False.”

I single out these Republicans first because they have the strongest Florida ties. But the various fact-checking organizations – and thank God for them – also pan many things that the Democratic candidates allege to be true.

Hillary Clinton said during the Dems’ CNN debate that the gun industry is “the only business in America that is wholly protected from any kind of liability.” PolitiFact rated that “False,” both because the gun industry is not “wholly protected” and because there are other industries that enjoy substantial immunity as well.

FactCheck.org took Bernie Sanders to task for claiming several times that Social Security never contributed “one nickel” to the federal deficit. Wrong. Try $73 billion in 2014.

How about the other Democratic candidates? Well, I’d say the very fact that they call themselves “candidates” is a form of manufactured truth.

Note that all of this comes even before the true onslaught of political ads which, even when they might be technically true, often twist the truth so badly that they essentially constitute a lie.

This is why it will be essential, going forward, for people listening to the debates and viewing the ads to turn to outside sources when reviewing their veracity.

And by the way, while attempting to spot the upcoming year’s “manufacturers” of bogus political messages, be sure to keep an eye on Gov. Scott, Mr. Manufacturer himself.

Take just one recent instance. Asked by reporters whether he can protect public education while at the same time delivering on his promise to cut more taxes next year on top of the $400 million cut during this year’s legislative session, Scott said, “We have the highest funding in (the) K-12 system in the history of the state.”

But when you include inflation and other factors, PolitiFact rates the claim “Mostly False.”

Scott and other Republicans have made that claim over and over. No doubt they’ll make it again. Likewise, the panoply of candidates will repeat their claims, a sickening number of them false, over and over again.

Just remember: Repeating a lie does not manufacture a truth.

Jac Wilder VerSteeg is a columnist for The South Florida Sun Sentinel, former deputy editorial page editor for The Palm Beach Post and former editor of Context Florida. Column courtesy of Context Florida.