Have you had enough of the "he said, she said" stuff?
As the mudslinging gets more intense in the days leading up to the presidential election, each campaign is blaming the other for putting out misinformation in their advertisements.
UW Political Scientist Charles Franklin says although the ads might be slightly misleading, they are not outright lies. Voters should listen to the ads, and then do some research to seek the truth … to the extent that's possible.
"Well, seeking the truth is a tricky issue. Except for mistakes, professional campaigns never put something up that is clearly, demonstrably false."
Franklin says, although many people do pay attention to the political ads, most voters aren't really swayed by them unless their opinions already tend to lean in that direction, in which case, the ad can push the voter over the top.
We've got more than three months before Election Day, Franklin says, with 'bigger and badder' ads yet to be seen.
"Not only are they going to be bigger and badder, but because of the Obama campaign opting out of federal financing, they will have a practically unlimited ad budget; likewise the Republican National Committee has collected a very large war chest."
Franklin says we'll experience more saturation of advertisements leading up to November 7th than we saw in the previous presidential election in 2004, which was a record-breaking year. Franklin says you can expect to see many attack ads.
