Who Stretches the Truth?
TIME lays out the facts behind what both candidates said during the first match-up
By
JYOTI THOTTAM
Monday, Oct. 04, 2004
Kerry
ON HOMELAND SECURITY: "The President hasn't put one nickel ... into the effort to fix some of our tunnels and bridges and most exposed subway systems. That's why they had to close down the subway in New York when the Republican Convention was there."
In fact, Bush has spent 2.3 billion nickels ($115 million) on transit security in the past two years, even if that is chump change compared with the aviation-security budget: 106 billion nickels ($5.3 billion this year alone). As for New York City subway trains, they ran normally during the Republican National Convention, except for a few occasions when trains were not allowed to stop at stations near the venue because of bomb scares.
ON THE COST OF WAR IN IRAQ: "$200 billion that could have been used for health care, for schools ... for prescription drugs for seniors. And it's in Iraq."
It isn't all in Iraq yet. The $200 billion figure includes money spent since the war began in March 2003 ($157 billion) plus money allocated through September 2005.
ON NORTH KOREA: "Today there are four to seven nuclear weapons in the hands of North Korea. That happened on this President's watch."
There is no evidence that North Korea has built any nuclear weapons since Bush took office. Before then, the CIA suspected that Pyongyang had a weapon or two but had no firm proof. Over the past two years, experts believe, Pyongyang has significantly stepped up its nuclear program. A former director of the U.S. nuclear laboratory at Los Alamos, N.M., who visited the country this year confirmed that North Korea has removed 8,000 spent fuel rods from its nuclear reactor, enough to make as many as seven weapons. But no outside observer knows whether North Korea has actually finished the job.
ON NUCLEAR PROLIFERATION: "There are some 600-plus tons of unsecured materials still in the former Soviet Union, in Russia. At the rate that the President is currently securing it, it'll take 13 years to get it."
Even Russian security experts are alarmed by the nuclear material still floating around the region: nearly 600 tons of highly enriched uranium and plutonium under minimal security. A 2003 report by Harvard researchers concluded that under Bush's existing policies, Russia's excess stockpiles would be destroyed by 2018. Bush countered during the debate that he had increased funding for combatting nuclear proliferation by 35%. In fact, he has not increased that funding at all. The 35% boost was for safeguarding nuclear sites within the U.S.
ON MILITARY SPENDING: "The President is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to research bunker-busting nuclear weapons."
The current research budget for those weapons, designed to penetrate underground caches of chemical or biological weapons, is only $35 million.
Bush
ON AFGHANISTAN: "Ten million citizens have registered to vote. Forty-one percent of those ... are women."
Afghan government officials support Bush's claim, but outside experts say the 10 million figure is greatly inflated by people who registered more than once. In some areas, the number of registered voters exceeds the local population, according to a report released last week by Human Rights Watch. The group says the 41% figure for women is also overstated, noting that in some regions less than 10% of those registered are female.
ON NUCLEAR PROLIFERATION: "The A.Q. Khan network has been brought to justice."
In fact, Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf pardoned Abdul Qadeer Khan the day after the Pakistani scientist publicly admitted to selling nuclear secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea. Khan remains under house arrest, but nearly all his associates are free. The U.S. has not gained access to Khan to figure out what he sold to whom.
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