The airwaves are awash with political ads, with more than half a
The airwaves are awash with political ads, with more than half a dozen more spots for statewide candidates and measures being added to the airwaves in the last two days alone.
New sets of ads promoting candidates at the top of the ticket target specific voting blocs — independents, women and Asian-American voters.
GOP Senate candidate Carly Fiorina is airing two news ads blasting Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer. One titled “Buck,” blames Boxer for voting for “reckless spending” in the federal stimulus package. The second ad, “Label,” seeks to court Democrats and decline-to-state voters, casting Boxer as a partisan career politician.
“When bickering ends solutions begin. I’m prepared to oppose my party when it’s wrong. We can change Washington. But first you have to vote to change the people we send there,” Fiorina says in the spot.
Jerry Brown, the Democratic candidate for governor, is getting a boost from his law enforcement backers. A coalition of firefighters and police, funded by the Peace Officers Research Association of California and the California Professional Firefighters, has launched two new ads claiming support from “100,000 police officers and firefighters.” The ads, which you can watch here and here, feature a female police officer and a female firefighter. Versions of the ad show the women highlighting Brown’s leadership experience as well as Republican Meg Whitman’s history of not voting.
Whitman, meanwhile, is running two new ads reaching out to Asian-American voters. The 30-second spots, which the campaign says will run in the Los Angeles and San Francisco media markets, are in Cantonese and Mandarin.
“Meg Whitman understands our community. She knows entrepreneurship, high-tech jobs and education are the keys to our future,” the announcer says, according to a translation provided by the campaign.
Other ads released this week.
• Treasurer Bill Lockyer wins this week’s prize for bluntness in a political spot. The first ad of the longtime Democratic politician’s re-election campaign pledges “Straight talk, no bull#*+!”
• The campaign for Proposition 26, which would raise the vote requirement for approving new fees, has a new spot called “Committee,” featuring mock lawmakers plotting to pass a “new tax” by deciding to “call it a fee.”
• Law enforcement is also going to bat for Republican attorney general candidate Steve Cooley. A new ad paid for by the Peace Officers Research Association of California touts Cooley’s crime-fighting credentials as Los Angeles district attorney and hits Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, San Francisco’s district attorney, for not seeking the death penalty in a 2004 case involving the killing of a police officer.