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Before Congress, Cotton got paid handsomely working for insurance companies”

–voice over for new Senate Majority PAC ad attacking Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who is challenging Sen. Mark Pryor (D)

This attack ad attempts to connect the dots: Rep. Tom Cotton made a fortune working for insurance companies, the story goes, and so he would happily do their bidding as Republicans dismantle Medicare. The ad even helpfully provides an image of connected dots.

The problem is that these dots are as phony as a three-dollar bill. Let’s take a look, going through each of the key statements. This analysis expands on the Truth Teller treatment that the ad gets above, so be sure to watch the video as well.

“Before Congress, Cotton got paid handsomely working for insurance companies”

The core of the ad is that Cotton worked for insurance companies. Without that factoid, the ad would not hold together.

The ad cites a Politico article and Cotton’s financial disclosure report but neither mention anything about employment in the insurance industry.

As evidence, Ty Matsdorf of Senate Majority PAC pointed to a Facebook biography of Cotton. Most of the bio focuses on Cotton’s military service, but it notes that he worked as a management consultant for McKinsey and Company. “As a businessman, Tom has advised some of America’s most respected companies on business strategy, operations, finance, and marketing,” the bio says. “His industry experience includes agribusiness, health care, oil and gas, food processing, insurance, and aerospace.”

Okay, so he didn’t work in insurance. He was just a management consultant, which means he was part of a team that was hired to offer advice on efficiency and business practices, flitting from one industry to another.

But there is even less to the story. David Ray, a Cotton spokesman, says that Cotton never actually worked for an insurance company as even a consultant. Instead, Ray says the “insurance” in the bio refers to an assignment working for the Federal Housing Authority, in the office of multifamily housing programs, to improve its service in providing insurance to lenders who finance apartment buildings. In other words, he worked on an assignment to make the government more efficient. (The successful effort is described on page 10 of this McKinsey report.)

Ray provided a statement from Priam Dutta, Cotton’s boss at McKinsey: “Tom and I were colleagues at McKinsey. I was his team leader on a project in which we served the Federal Housing Authority, which represented his only insurance industry experience. He did not work for any insurance companies.”

(Note: Dutta contributed $1,000 to Cotton’s congressional campaign in 2011.)

Interestingly, the state of Arkansas, which has a Democratic governor, last year paid at least $54 million to McKinsey, suggesting that its services are valued in the state.

As for Cotton’s pay, the financial disclosure report shows he earned $85,000 from McKinsey in 2011. We will leave it to readers to decide if that means he was paid “handsomely.”

“Now Cotton wants to end Medicare’s guarantee, giving billions in profits to insurance companies…”

As we have noted before, Senate Majority PAC seems stuck in a time warp on this talking point, referring back to an older version of the House Republican plan to transform the health-care system for the elderly by offering beneficiaries help in buying private insurance, known as “premium support.”

The plan, authored by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), was substantially changed in 2012 to include an option for seniors to keep the traditional fee-for-service Medicare plan if they preferred. So the “guarantee” is now there. (Claiming a federal program has a “guarantee” is a bit odd because a future Congress can change the terms of any government program.)

Would the GOP plan give “billions in profits” to insurance companies? The ad cites as its source a 2012 article in The New Republic, which in turn was based on an analysis by an Obama campaign adviser. We won’t get into the weeds of this debate, except to note that the author states “for the record” that it would be an “over-simplification” to claim that the GOP Medicare plan “would take your money and give to the insurance companies for their profits.”

“…while costing seniors $6,000 more a year”

This is another talking point long past its due date. The $6,000 claim is based on a 2011 analysis by the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, using data from the Congressional Budget Office, regarding Ryan’s original plan. The report said that in 2022, when the premium support system was expected to go into effect, a beneficiary’s out-of-pocket expenses would double, from $6,000 to $12,000.

But when Ryan’s plan changed, so did the numbers, in part because Ryan allowed Medicare spending to grow slightly faster than the nation’s economy (+0.5 percent), the same growth rate as President Obama’s budget. (The first version had capped growth at the rate of inflation.)

The premium support payment would be based on the cost of the second least-expensive private plan or traditional Medicare, whichever is lower. Any difference in costs would need to be made up by the beneficiary. But Medicare benefits of at least one plan supposedly would be covered by the premium-support payment.

The CBO did not do the same sort of extensive analysis of the revised Ryan plan, so there are no numbers as definitive as the original estimate of a $6,000 gap. CBO did say “beneficiaries might face higher costs,” and other analyses have suggested any increase would be much lower than the earlier $6,000 estimate.

Such estimates are highly speculative. Even if enacted—unlikely as long as Democrats control the presidency or at least one house of Congress—the Republican plan would not go into effect for at least 10 years. So readers should simply ignore such hard-and-fast claims of specific cost increases.

The Pinocchio Test

None of the allegations made about Cotton or his policies are factually correct. In straining to somehow tie Cotton to insurance companies, Senate Majority PAC has managed to turn a job that Democrats might celebrate (developing a better functioning government program!) into a negative. The Medicare claims are so stale—and so repeatedly discredited—we can assume that polling indicates that the language is effective in moving voters, despite its falsity.

Four Pinocchios

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Originally posted by kpo:
One of these days Geezer will post a thread criticising Republicans.

It's not personal. It's just war.

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Originally posted by kpo:
One of these days Geezer will post a thread criticising Republicans.

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Originally posted by BIGDAMNNOBODY:

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Originally posted by kpo:
One of these days Geezer will post a thread criticising Republicans.

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He could try and beat Niki to it but that's not likely to happen.

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Originally posted by Storymark:
Here's the thing (well, one of many) you clearly don't get. Yes, Niki posts stuff about wrongdoing on the right. But she has never pretended she wasn't liberal, or claimed to not be partisan.

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Originally posted by Storymark:
Geezer, on the other hand, spends ample wordspace claiming he has no partisan bias - while defending any wrongdoing on the right, and attacking the left for anything.

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Originally posted by Storymark:
Now, having written it out - I know it still will not penetrate your amazingly thick skull - but no one can claim I didn't try.

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Originally posted by Storymark:
Anecdotal... referring to his own posts here. Which are, you know, in writing.

Once again, revealing how ineffectively you utilize vocabulary.

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Originally posted by Storymark:
As for fantasy.... so, you're saying you do get it now? You really suck at basic writing. No wonder you're so bitter.

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So you are saying that Geezer has never been critical of the right?

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Originally posted by kpo:
One of these days Geezer will post a thread criticising Republicans.

It's not personal. It's just war.

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You don't consider all my posts about the courts overturning same-sex marriage bans as criticizing Republicans?

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Originally posted by BIGDAMNNOBODY:
Actually, I believe the thrust of the argument was that Geezer is never critical of the right. So it would only take one "critical of the right" post to debunk that claim, no?

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Originally posted by Niki2:
Looking at Geezer's posts about gay marriage bans being overturned (had to hunt, there's only a few), since before Xmas he has posted a grand total of four times on the matter. His entire remarks on the subject in those four posts consist of "Good" in one, and "And one step closer to SCOTUS. I expect that the only reason states aren't appealing these decisions is that they know that the Supremes will rule against them and end the suspense as to when same-sex marriage is the law of the land. Guess it'll just have to be state-by-state for a while longer" in another, and "Hope they overturn it. Will be more fodder for the SCOTUS sooner or later. Interesting that the Va. Atty. General supported the "marriage as the union of a man and woman" amendment as a state senator, but now won't defend it in court. Politics much?", and "Good. Another step on the road to the Supreme Court, where one hopes they'll end this violation of equal rights forever. Then maybe we can start in on this "marriage is just between two people" nonsense."

This is "critical" of Republicans?

Oh, wait, is he actually still trying to claim he's nonpartisan? I truly thought he had given up on that game. Silly me.

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Originally posted by BIGDAMNNOBODY:
Well done all! Mission accomplished!

Now everyone is discussing Geezer instead of the posted article.

Your work here is done.

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