It seems as if fewer and fewer things bear that label anymore

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It seems as if fewer and fewer things bear that label anymore. In 2007, Toyota outsold two of Detroit's big three automakers. Our televisions and DVD players are mostly made elsewhere. And Walmart imports about 50,000 pounds of merchandise every 45 seconds. As if that's not bad enough, American companies are shipping many jobs overseas. Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards wanted to stop U.S. companies from moving jobs offshore, and a group called Working 4 Working Americans ran an ad in support of his plan. But the story the ad tells doesn't quite give the whole picture. You would be examining the facts behind this potentially misleading ad.

Objectives

• Examine an ad from Working 4 Working Americans that supports John Edwards' plan to end tax incentives for companies that move U.S. jobs offshore.
• Research the history of the Maytag plant in Newton, Iowa, to determine whether or not those jobs really were moved offshore.
• Assess whether Edwards' tax policy really will help to keep U.S. jobs from leaving the country.

Background

Working 4 Working Americans (W4WA) is a political action committee (PAC) sponsored by the International Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners, a union that endorsed 2008 Democratic presidential hopeful and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards. As a PAC, Working 4 Working Americans could run advertisements in support of particular policy positions, though its ads could not, by law, directly advise voting for a specific person. In this case, the ad (which was running in Iowa shortly before the Iowa caucuses) highlights the recent closing of the Maytag plant in Newton, Iowa. The ad goes on to criticize "tax breaks" for companies that move American jobs offshore. It strongly implies that those tax breaks are to blame for the Maytag plant closure.

Exercise #1 - Asking the Right Questions

The W4WA ad does not make any false claims. But good reasoners understand that it is sometimes possible to mislead with true claims - what we might call the literally true falsehood. It's true that the Newton, Iowa, Maytag plant closed and that 1,800 people lost their jobs. But the ad strongly implies that the plant closed because the jobs were sent overseas. And that's not true at all. You are required to review the W4WA ad and to discuss what the ad says - and what it implies.

See the W4WA ad, so that you will have the precise language of the ad in front of you. the questions:

·     Does the ad offer any suggestions for ways to keep jobs from being moved overseas? What does the ad say to make you think that? (Again, press for specifics.)

·     Does the ad offer any evidence that John Edwards' plan to end tax breaks for companies that move good jobs offshore would actually help to keep jobs from moving offshore?