Can I ask if one can summary, link to a transcript, and/or fact check this? (Say, what bill does it allude to, what did the bill actually cover, and who actually voted for it?) I can't always play video, especially at work, and I'm guessing I'm not alone. Otherwise, you see, I won't really know what you're talking about and how to reply to it. Thanks!

John 

http://www.haberarts.com/

The references given in the ads are to NIH grants. Congress doesn't vote to approve specific grant applications- they fund the NIH, where panels send out proposals for peer review to decide whether to fund them. The Congressional action would be to approve the appropriations bill for HHS, which includes the NIH- are the Republicans suggesting we defund the NIH?

Or, if that's not the angle, if this ad is legitimate to run against any member of Congress, couldn't it be run against all of them?

Totally bogus. I hope the Dems are hitting back really, really hard on these totally ridiculous ads.

The Dems in those districts should just run the exact same ad, only instead of their own name, they could use "the GOP majority in Congress." I'm sure they voted against some military funding, and they definitely approved NIH funding. That's how fake these ads are -- anyone on either side of the aisle could run the exact same ad.

Lol! Consider this a public service. :P

The narrator in both ads is the same though the text of the narration is slightly varied. The images used, other than those of the specific candidates being attacked, are the same.

There's an irony in a couple of differences in the ads.

From the Nelson ad:
..................................................
That's right. Instead of spending money on cancer research Ron Kind voted to spend your money to study the sex lives of Vietnamese prostitutes.
..................................................

From the Robinson ad:
..................................................
That's right. Instead of spending money on sickle-cell research Brad Miller voted to spend your money to study the sex lives of Vietnamese prostitutes in San Francisco.
..................................................

Robinson is an African-American and so the sickle-cell reference implies a disregard for African-Americans. You can decide for yourself the significance of the San Francisco reference.

Do the later changes by Nelson imply that he doesn't care about African-Americans and does have an affinity people of San Francisco?

================== Paul R. Nelson ad =============
With our service men and women facing death every day what kind of congressman would try to gut military spending.

The wrong kind.

Ron Kind.

That's right. Congressman Ron Kind has repeatedly voted to deprive our troops of the funding they need to fight for us.

..................................................
[Vertical scrolling text during narration.]

Roll Call Vote 158, 10 May 2003
(AGAINST National Defense Authorization Act)

Roll Call Vote 141, 9 May 2002
(AGAINST bunker buster research)

Roll Call Vote 214, 7 June 2000.
(AGAINST 3.7% pay raise for military personnel)

Roll Call Vote 194, 18 May 2000.
(tried to GUT spending across-the-board)

Roll Call Vote 208, 18 May 2000.
(Defense Authorization Bill AGAINST 7% increase)

Roll Call Vote 183, 21 May 1998.
(AGAINST weapons, research, and construction)

Roll Call Vote 214, 19 June 1997.
(tried to GUT Defense Authorization Bill by 5%)
..................................................

But Ron Kind has no trouble spending your money. He .. he would just rather spend it on sex.

[XXX in full screen lettering]

That's right. Instead of spending money on cancer research Ron Kind voted to spend your money to study the sex lives of Vietnamese prostitutes.

[NIH Grant # RO1DAO1386 displayed]

Instead of spending money to study heart disease Ron Kind spent your money to study the masturbation habits of old men.

[NIH Grant # RO3HDO39206 displayed]

Ron Kind spent your tax dollars to study something called the bisexual, trans-gendered and two spirited Aleutian Eskimos. Whoever they are?

[NIH Grant # RO1MH065871 displayed]

Ron Kind even spent your tax dollars to pay teenage girls to watch pornographic movies with probes connected to their genitalia.

[Roll Call Vote #352
10 July 2003
Amendment to the Appropriation
for the
National Institutes of Health
displayed]

Ron Kind pays for sex but not for soldiers.

[Image of Ron Kind with red lettered XXX superimposed followed by images of soldiers.]

If Ron Kind had better priorities you wouldn't be having to hear this. Ron Kind is out of touch and soon he'll be out of Congress.

I'm Paul R. Nelson and I approve of this message.

================== Vernon Robinsos ad ============

What kind of congressman would try to deny our soldiers the body armor they need to save their lives? The answer is your congressman Brad Miller. That's right. Brad Miller did not vote for the appropriation that paid for improved body armor for our troops. But Brad Miller has no trouble spending your money.

[Horizontal scrolling text: Roll Call Vote #601, 31 Oct 2003; Emergency Appropriations for Defense]

He .. he would just rather spend it on sex.

[XXX in larger orange-red letters superimposed over image of Brad Miller]

That's right. Instead of spending money on sickle-cell research Brad Miller voted to spend your money to study the sex lives of Vietnamese prostitutes in San Francisco.

[NIH Grant # RO1DAO1386 displayed]

Instead of spending money on cancer research Brad Miller spent your money to study the masturbation habits of old men.

[NIH Grant # RO3HDO39206 displayed]

Brad Miller spent your tax dollars to study something called the bisexual, trans-gendered and two spirited Aleutian Eskimos. Whoever they are?

[NIH Grant # RO1MH065871 displayed]

Brad Miller even spent your tax dollars to pay teenage girls to watch pornographic movies with probes connected to their genitalia.

[Roll Call Vote #352
10 July 2003
Amendment to the Appropriation
for the
National Institutes of Health
displayed]

Brad Miller pays for sex ..

[Image of large red-orange XXX letters displayed]

.. but not for body armor for our troops.

[Images of troops apparently in battle.]

If Miller had better priorities you wouldn't be having to hear this.

I'm Vernon Robinson and I approved this message because Brad Miller is out of touch and soon he'll be out of Congress.

==================================================

Note:

See here for a posted rebuttal of the Vernon Robinson ad.

The sex studies are related to National Institute of Health research into AIDS and quality of life issues for the elderly. Brad Miller apparently missed a military appropriations bill vote. He was traveling to Iraq at the time. Also at the time the supply of military body armor exceeded manufacturing capabilities. That is, no amount of extra funding would have made any difference.

I haven't been able to do much checking on the Ron Kind military spending votes since Google isn't terribly useful with "Roll Call NNN" strings, the numbers being repeated each year. I'd guess that these are misrepresentations based on multiple votes with varied amendments. The same theme as the "John Kerry voted to raise taxes 350 times!!" ads.

Anyone can check what these grants are and what their research focus is. The NIH has a query page where you can search for grants and find every (I guess) grant that has been funded since 1972. Most grants have abstracts to tell you what they are.

The website is: http://crisp.cit.nih.gov/crisp/crisp_query.generate_screen

The first one, R01DA01386, as far as I can tell, is bogus or mis-entered. It's missing the last number and the one grant that comes up with those numbers (R01DA013866)is an AIDS grant ("ROLE OF CD4 DOWNMODULATION DURING HIV INFECTION")with no abstract. I searched from 1985-present.

The second grant R03HD039206 ("Longitudinal Trends in the Sexual Behavior of Older Men") is pretty much what the title says. They're looking at quality of life effects, not making a porno or anything.

The third grant, R01MH065871 is also an actual NIH grant proposing to study the mental health risks of this particular underserved population. It was written in response to a program announcement from the NIH whose purpose is summarized in part as:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is committed to supporting research that will increase scientific understanding of the health status of various population groups and lead to more effective health interventions and services for individuals within those groups. High priority is placed on
research with groups that appear to have distinctive health risk profiles but thus far have received insufficient attention from investigators. This Program Announcement (PA) highlights a particular set of such groups: lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and related populations (designated
here as LGBT populations).

You know, sometimes "health" involves sex and sexuality.

If anyone is wondering about the financial commitments to these grants, an "R03" is typically pretty small, maximum of $50,000 per year for two years max. So these jokers allowed the government to spend up to $100,000 dollars out of the NIH's $30 billion annual budget on that. An "R01" is much bigger (on the order of $250,000 per year but they can be significantly bigger or smaller), is renewable, and the initial term is typically 4-5 years, so those Native Americans are being studied fairly intensely.

I'm sure these two politicos had such a big hand in these studies. Anyone who voted for the NIH appropriation "voted to spend money on these studies".

Do we want politicians having a hand in what science does or doesn't get funded? I sure don't.