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Bush’s campaign chairman Marc Racicot on Feb. 22 accused Kerry of “voting against the weapons systems that are winning the War on Terror” and says Kerry was for "canceling or cutting funding for the B-2 Stealth Bomber, the B-1B, the F-15, the F-16, the M1 Abrams, the Patriot Missile, the AH-64 Apache Helicopter, the Tomahawk Cruise Missile, and the Aegis Air-Defense Cruiser." Another Bush campaign spokesman said Kerry has a "32-year history of voting to cut defense programs and cut defense systems" (a clear impossibility since Kerry has been in office less than 20 years.)

It's true Kerry expressed opposition to those weapons 20 years ago as a candidate, voted against Pentagon budgets several times as a senator in the early and mid-1990's, and proposed cuts in military and intelligence budgets as deficit-reduction measures as recently as 1996.

But Kerry's votes against specific military hardware were mostly against strategic nuclear weapons including the B-2 bomber, Trident missile and anti-missile items, not against conventional equipment such as tanks. And Kerry has a point when he says “I've voted for some of the largest defense and intelligence budgets in our history,” which is correct. He's voted for military spending bills regularly since 1997.

Twenty years ago, as a candidate battling another liberal for the Democratic nomination for the Senate in Massachusetts Kerry advocated terminating many strategic and tactical weapons.

In this 1984 campaign memo (which a Kerry spokesman confirms is genuine) the candidate called for cutting Ronald Reagan’s military budget by between $45 billion and $53 billion through (among other things) cancellation of the MX missile, B-1 bomber, anti-satellite weapons, and the “Star Wars” anti-missile program, along with several conventional weapons that have become mainstays of the present-day military, including the AH-64 Apache helicopter, the Aegis air-defense cruiser, and the F-14 and F-15 fighters. He also called for a 50% reduction in the Tomahawk cruise missile.

And during the same campaign, according to the Boston Globe, Kerry also advocated reductions in the M-1 Abrams tank, the Bradley Fighting Vehicle and the F-16 jet.

"No Excuse"

"There's no excuse for casting even one vote for unnecessary weapons of destruction, and as your senator I will never do so," Kerry said in the memo.

In 1985, Kerry's first speech in the Senate was against President Reagan's proposal to build MX ballistic missiles, and also in 1985 he introduced a "nuclear freeze" resolution calling on the President to negotiate a "verifiable" halt to testing, production and deployment of nuclear weapons. It attracted no co-sponsors and died without a hearing in committee.

Throughout Kerry's early Senate years he often voted against specific weapons systems and sometimes against the entire Pentagon budget. He voted repeatedly to cancel the B-2 Stealth bomber, for example, in 1989 , 1991 (twice ) and 1992 . He voted against the Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missile in 1994 and 1995. And he voted repeatedly to cut funds for the Strategic Defense Initiative (ballistic missile defense) in 1991, 1992, 1993 , 1995, and 1996. He also voted for across-the-board cuts in the military budget in 1991 and 1992, as Congress struggled to deal with mounting federal deficits and the former Soviet Union disintegrated.

Republicans shouldn't make too much of these votes, however, since President Bush's own father announced in his 1992 State of the Union address that he would be ceasing further production of B-2 bombers and MX missiles, and would cut military spending by 30 percent over several years.

Voting Against M-1 Tanks? Not Really.

And Republicans go too far when they claim that Kerry voted against such mainstay weapons of today's military as the M-1 Abrams tank, the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, and the Patriot missile. (See this Republican National Committee "fact sheet," for example.) These claims are misleading because they rest on Kerry's votes against the entire Pentagon appropriations bills in 1990 and 1995. Kerry also voted against the Pentagon authorization bills (which provide authority to spend but not the actual money) in those years and also in 1996. But none of those were votes against specific weapons systems. Kerry's critics might just as well say he was voting to fire the entire Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps.

It is true as Republicans say that in 1993 (Bill Clinton's first year as President) Kerry specifically proposed cutting the size of the military, including reductions in numbers of submarines, jet fighters and soldiers. But what Republicans fail to mention is that it was a very broad measure aimed at cutting federal spending by $85 billion at a time when the federal deficit was roughly $300 billion. Kerry's measure -- the "Budget Deficit Reduction Act of 1993" -- targeted not only military spending but also would have eliminated federal subsidies for cotton, wool and mohair production, eliminated the superconducting super collider and the space station, and raised fees for grazing or mining on public land. That bill died without a hearing in the Senate Finance Committee.

It is also true that Kerry proposed in 1995 another measure that -- among other things -- would have cut the US intelligence budget by $300 million per year for 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000. Republicans fail to mention, however, that this was another broad, deficit-reduction measure that didn't just target military spending. When he introduced it Sept. 29, 1995, Kerry said it would cut $90 billion in federal spending, of which $10 billion would come from defense spending, and $11 billion from terminating the international space station program.

Republicans also point to a 1996 bill Kerry introduced to cut $6.5 billion from defense spending. What Kerry's critics fail to mention is that Kerry proposed to use the money to hire an additional 100,000 police officers (above the 100,000 President Clinton already was proposing to fund.) Kerry called it the Safer Streets Act of 1996.

Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, in a telephone conference call with reporters arranged by the Bush campaign Feb 21, went way over the top when he accused Kerry of "a 32-year history of voting to cut defense programs and cut defense systems." That's not possible since Kerry's first vote was cast in 1985. It also implies that Kerry has continued to vote for cuts over his entire career, which isn't true.

A "New Kerry?"

Since 1996, the John Kerry who once opposed the Apache helicopter and wanted to cut Tomahawk cruise-missile funds by 50% has evolved into a steady supporter of military budgets. Starting in 1997 Kerry voted for every regular Department of Defense appropriations bill and for every authorization bill as well.

Kerry says he's changed. He still defends his opposition to the MX missile and the "Star Wars" strategic defense initiative, but concedes that opposing some other weapons was a mistake.

This was not in evidence Feb. 21, when Kerry lashed out at the Bush campaign's criticism of his voting record. In a letter to President Bush he said -- wrongly -- "you and your campaign have initiated a widespread attack on my service in Vietnam," which is not the case. In fact Bush spokesmen at the White House, the campaign and the Republican National Committee have gone out of their way repeatedly to distinguish between Kerry's military service, which they call honorable, and his legislative record.

But Kerry was less defensive and more candid in a June, 2003 interview with Boston Globe reporter Brian Mooney. The reporter quoted Kerry as conceding that some of his positions 20 years earlier were "ill-advised, and I think some of them are stupid in the context of the world we find ourselves in right now and the things that I've learned since then. . . . I mean, you learn as you go in life."

The Globe quoted Kerry as saying his subsequent Senate voting record on defense has been "pretty responsible."

Marc Racicot "Bush-Cheney '04 Campaign Chairman Governor Marc Racicot’s Letter to Senator John Kerry" 22 Feb. 2004.

Nedra Pickler “Kerry Blasts Bush Over Attacks on Record” Associated Press 21 Feb. 2004.

John Kerry "John Kerry addresses Bush/Cheney campaign attacks," 21 Feb. 2004.

Glen Johnson, “Kerry admits to an error in boast about 1st speech,” The Boston Globe, 1 May 2003.

Brian C. Mooney, “Taking One Prize, Then A Bigger One,” The Boston Globe 19 June 2003 : A1.

S.1500 "Comprehensive Nuclear Weapons Freeze and Arms Reduction Act of 1985" Introduced 25 July 1985.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 101st Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.859 Vote #203 26 Sept. 1989.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt. 1017 Vote #174 1 Aug 1991 .

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.1193 Vote #206 25 Sept. 1991.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 2nd Session S.Amdt.3041 Vote #216 18 Sept. 1992.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 103rd Congress - 2nd Session S.Amdt.2489 Vote #274 10 Aug. 1994.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 104th Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.2398 Vote #393 11 Aug. 1995.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.980 Vote #171 1 Aug. 1991.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 2nd Session S.Amdt.2918 Vote #182 7 Aug. 1992.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 103rd Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.785 Vote #251 9 Sept. 1993.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 104th Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.2087 Vote #354 3 Aug. 1995.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 104th Congress - 2nd Session S.Amdt.4048 Vote #160 19 June 1996.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 1st Session S.Amdt.81 Vote #49 25 April 1991.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 102nd Congress - 2nd Session S.Amdt.1768 Vote #73 9 April 1992.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 101st Congress - 2nd Session HR5803 Vote #319 26 Oct. 1990.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 104th Congress - 1st Session HR2126 Vote #579 16 Nov. 1995.

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 104th Congress - 2nd Session HR2320 Vote #279 10 Sept. 1996.

The Bush campaign sent an e-mail Feb. 12 to six million supporters with a link to an Internet video attacking Kerry for being "unprincipled." The ad claims Kerry got "more special interest money than any other senator," which is false.

While it is true that Kerry got $640,000 over the past 15 years from individual lobbyists, that's only one type of special-interest money. And the Bush campaign itself has reported raising $960,000 from individual lobbyists in the past year alone.

The ad says Kerry got "millions from executives at HMO's, telecoms, drug companies," which is true -- for Kerry's entire political career. But so far Kerry's presidential campaign has received a small fraction of what the Bush campaign has received from those particular sources. By any definition, Bush's "special interest" money greatly exceeds Kerry's.

The ad starts by misquoting a Washington Post newspaper story from Jan. 31.

An image of the Post's website is shown as a soft female voice -- supposedly reading aloud -- says "John Kerry . . . More special interest money than any other senator." But that's not what the Post story said. What the newspaper really said was that Kerry “has raised more money from paid lobbyists than any other senator over the past 15 years.” There's a big difference.

Individual lobbyists are only one category of donor normally classified as "special interests," as the Bush ad itself indirectly acknowledges later on. And Kerry refuses to take any money at all from political action committees (PACs), which are often controlled by lobbyists and which give far more in total than the individual lobbyists themselves. So far, for example, Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist reported $1,022,063 in PAC donations for his 2004 campaign alone, according to online tallies available as of Feb. 13 at the Center for Responsive Politics . Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican whip, reported getting $1,316,670, Democratic Senate Leader Tom Daschle got $1,533,069 and Democratic Whip Harry Reid got $1,580,627. So the Bush ad's claim that Kerry got more special interest money than other senators is simply false.

In fact, Bush himself has raised far more from special interests than Kerry. Look at the following table -- based on figures tallied by the Center for Responsive Politics from reports filed with the Federal Election Commission by the Bush and Kerry campaigns.

Special Interest Money
(Selected Industries)
(Donations to 2004 Presidential Campaign)
	Bush	Kerry
Paid Lobbyists	$960,154	$234,920
Lawyers & Law Firms	$7,085,942	$3,474,264
Real Estate	$6,678,976	$787,124
Securities	$4,820,780	$1,087,925
Health Professionals	$3,010,576	$392,187
Insurance	$1,850,532	$134,250
TV/Movies/Music	$522,725	$475,050
Pharmaceuticals	$393,100	$55,650
Telephone Utilities	$285,250	$10,000
Health Services/HMOs	$171,450	$33,950
Tobacco	$107,500	$5,300
Source:www.opensecrets.org

Looking only at individual lobbyists, Bush has reported getting four times as much as Kerry in this presidential race.

Looking at the other categories of "special interests" mentioned specifically in the ad, Bush has received five times as much from HMO's, seven times as much from the pharmaceutical industry, and 28 times as much from telephone utilities.

Bush has even edged out Kerry -- so far -- for Hollywood money, a traditional source of financial strength for Democrats. Bush took in more than half a million from the TV/Movies/Music sector, while Kerry reports getting $475,000.

It is just as the Post story said in a sentence not quoted in the Bush ad: “All the presidential candidates take money from special interests. . . . And Bush has far outpaced them all.”

(Note: Kerry also has reported raising and spending more than $2 million through a separate political organization, the "Citizen Soldier Fund." But even counting that group's special-interest donations still don't bring Kerry's totals close to the Bush campaign's totals in any category).

"Brought to you by special interests"

The voice in the Bush ad goes on -- supposedly reading from the website of a watchdog group, the Center for Public Integrity . "Fact. Kerry. 'Brought to you by the special interests.'"

Bush-Cheney '04 Ad: "Unprincipled"  Female Voice: John Kerry. Kerry (giving speech after New Hampshire victory): I have a message for the influence peddlers and the special interests. We're coming, you're going. Female Voice: Sounds good. (Types "special interests" into computer search engine) Special In-ter-ests. (Reading Washington Post story on Internet) More special interest money than any other senator. How much? (Figure $640,000 appears) Ohhh. For what? (Reads news story) Nominations and donations coincided. Wait. Watchdog Groups. (Center for Public Integrity website appears) Fact. Kerry - "Brought to you by the special interests." Millions from executives at HMOs, telecoms, drug companies. Ka-Ching! Unprincipled? Kerry (giving speech): I have a message for the influence peddlers, and the special interests, and the special interests, and the special interests..."

It's true that the Center for Public Integrity's executive director Charles Lewis was quoted in the Post article as saying, "The note of reality is he has been brought to you by special interests." He was commenting on Kerry's acceptance of money from lobbyists while denouncing special interests.

But Lewis has been even more critical of Bush's campaign funding. At a news conference Jan. 8 to announce release of the book The Buying of the President 2004, for example, Lewis said scandal-plagued Enron Corp was Bush's "top career patron," having donated more than $600,000 to him over the course of his political career.

And last October Lewis released a study that said companies that won federal contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan had contributed more than $500,000 to Bush's 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns - more than to any other politician over the last dozen years. "These two wars in two years and their aftermaths have brought out the Beltway Bandit companies in full force, and there is stench of political favoritism and cronyism surrounding the contracting process in both Iraq and Afghanistan," Lewis said.

Bush campaign officials said their attack ad is a response to months of Kerry ads that have at times said harsh things about President Bush.

Jim VandeHei, “Kerry Leads in Lobby Money: Anti-Special-Interest Campaign Contrasts With Funding,” Washington Post 31 Jan. 2004: A1.

Bryan Bender, “Rebuilding Iraq; Study Finds Cronyism In Iraq, Afghanistan Contracts Globe Correspondent,” Boston Globe 31 Oct. 2003: A1.

President Bush slipped up in his hour-long interview with NBC's Tim Russert over the weekend, claiming that the growth of discretionary federal spending has slowed markedly since he took office. But in fact, annual growth has been in double digits for the past three years, far higher than in any year of the Clinton administration.

A Bush spokesman said the President meant to refer to discretionary spending minus military spending and spending for homeland security. But what the President actually said was wrong.

Figures recently released by the Office of Management and Budget show the Bush Administration's explosion of discretionary federal spending. Here is a chart based on historical figures from the U.S. Budget showing percentage increases in discretionary outlays:


Source: Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government: Fiscal Year 2005: Analytical Perspectives and Historical Tables table 8.7 —OUTLAYS FOR DISCRETIONARY PROGRAMS: 1962–2009

That's an average annual growth rate of 2.4% during Clinton's eight years, compared to an average of 11.8% during Bush's first three.

So in his Feb. 8 interview the President erred in this exchange:

Russert: But your base conservatives -- and listen to Rush Limbaugh, the Heritage Foundation, CATO Institute, they're all saying you are the biggest spender in American history.

President Bush: Well, they're wrong.

Russert: Mr. President

President Bush: If you look at the appropriations bills that were passed under my watch, in the last year of President Clinton, discretionary spending was up 15 percent, and ours have steadily declined.

Discretionary spending -- meaning spending that is subject to annual legislative appropriations, as opposed to spending for entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare -- actually grew only 5.6% in Clinton 's last budget year (fiscal year 2001, which began October 1, 2000 ).

Since then discretionary spending has not "steadily declined" as the President said, but has gone up. In fact, the growth has been much faster than under Clinton . In the first year for which President Bush signed the spending bills discretionary spending growth soared to 13.1%, and annual growth remained in double digits through the current fiscal year.

How could the President be so wrong in a nationally televised interview? White House spokesman Dan Bartlett said the President meant to refer not to discretionary spending overall, but only to the portion of it not attributable to military spending or homeland security. That would exclude well over half of all discretionary spending this year.

It is true that military and security spending have risen much faster under Bush than spending for domestic programs.

What the President meant to echo was testimony his Budget Director Joshua Bolton gave on Feb. 5 to the Senate Budget Committee:

Bolton : In the last budget year of the previous administration (2001), discretionary spending unrelated to defense or homeland security soared by 15 percent. With the adoption of President Bush’s first budget (2002), that growth rate was reduced to six percent; then five percent the following year; and four percent for the current fiscal year.

Even that is somewhat misleading: Bolton failed to mention that the growth of all discretionary spending was below 4% for six of Clinton's eight years, as shown in our first table.

The figures that Bolton referred to are in table S-2 of the administration's budget document. (Actually, the figures don't refer to "spending" as Bolton said, but to amounts appropriated and legally available to be spent. The technical term for that is "budget authority," sometimes called "funding." It includes some amounts which are not spent immediately but may be spent in future years.)

Using Bolton's own figures, FactCheck.org calculates that the discretionary sums contained in appropriations bills signed by Bush for the current fiscal year -- including the $87 billion supplemental appropriation for Iraq -- amount to nearly a 36% increase over Clinton's last year.

Most of the increase has indeed come from military spending (including wars in Iraq and Afghanistan) and activities that the administration classifies as homeland security. But that still leaves a 16% increase in funding for other discretionary programs.

Discretionary budget authority:	3-year increase
Homeland Security (non-Defense)	180.0%
Department of Defense	52.5%
Other Operations of Government	16.0%
Total, Discretionary budget authority	35.7%
Source: Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government: Fiscal Year 2005: Summary Tables Table S-2 — Discretionary Totals

As Clinton's budget surpluses have turned to deficits, Bush has come under criticism from all sides, liberals complaining about tax cuts and, lately, conservatives complaining about spending.

A Cato Institute analyst wrote Jan. 23 calling the increase "The Republican Spending Explosion,” and said discretionary spending increases signed by Bush -- once adjusted for inflation -- "are 3 of the 10 biggest annual increases in the last 40 years.”

A Heritage Foundation analyst wrote that "spending has increased twice as fast under President Bush as it did under President Clinton," and attributed the spending surge less to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 than to a lack of "self-discipline required to balance fiscal priorities."

But Richard Kogan of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says that even with the big increase in spending overall, Bush still is “modestly shortchanging, and maybe not so modestly in some cases, some domestic programs that have worked well.”

Kogan adds, “It’s true that Bush is a small spender, but only if you ignore the increases in military spending and anti-terrorism spending.”

And only if you consider a 16% increase over 3 years to be "small."

Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government: Fiscal Year 2005: Analytical Perspectives and Historical Tables table 8.7 —OUTLAYS FOR DISCRETIONARY PROGRAMS: 1962–2009

Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government: Fiscal Year 2005: Summary Tables Table S-2 — Discretionary Totals 5 Feb. 2004 :366.

Testimony ofOMB Director Joshua B. Bolten, “President’s FY 2005 Budget Request” Committee on the Budget, United States Senate 5 Feb. 2004.

Alison Fraser, "The State of Spending" WebMemo #398, Heritage Foundation website 21 Jan. 2004.

Veronique de Rugy, " The Republican Spending Explosion," Cato Institute briefing paper 23 Jan. 2004.