UPDATED: Keeping the record straight

Firing back at David Dewhurst, Dan Patrick debuted a video ad this week that opens with the narrator saying: “The Austin American-Statesman calls Dewhurst’s attack a Pants on Fire lie.” The words “Pants on Fire lie” appear in white at the bottom of the screen.

Patrick’s ad simultaneously shows a clip from Dewhurst’s ad, which came out last week, criticizing Patrick’s personal bankruptcy of the 1980s.

To be clear, we didn’t rate all of Dewhurst’s ad Pants on Fire, though we found incorrect and ridiculous — Pants on Fire — his claim that Patrick changed his name to hide his debts. See that fact check here or to the right.

May 2, 2014, update: We subsequently rated as Half True a similar Patrick reference to PolitiFact. See that fact check to the right or here.

We like citations of our work as much as you might expect. It’s also crucial to present findings as precisely as possible.

Meantime, KERA-TV, Channel 13 in Dallas, said in an online post this afternoon that it had “received numerous queries about whether the station played any role in a commercial released last week by the campaign of Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. Texans have asked whether we gave permission for the campaign to use images of our reporter asking a question during KERA’s Jan. 27 debate. They’ve asked whether our reporter agreed to appear in the Dewhurst ad.”

KERA-TV continued: “The answer to both is an emphatic ‘No.’ The campaign did not ask KERA for permission to use the footage, and when the ad was released on April 16, KERA immediately objected. The Dewhurst campaign responded by saying it would not pull the ad. “

See the full debate question, answer and follow-ups–centered on Patrick’s personal bankruptcy–by going to the station’s post here. See the ad that’s drawn this reaction to the right of this story.

Lt. Gov. Dewhurst and state Sen. Patrick, both of Houston, face a May 27 runoff for the Republican lieutenant governor nomination.

What else?