Politics

Swing State Diary: Colorado?Home Stretch

By Nancy Watzman

Denver, Colorado…With five days to go before Election Day, outside spending on Colorado’s Senate race is now over $30 million, still top in the country. By far the biggest non-party outside spender here is American Crossroads, the newly formed “super PAC” that gets fundraising and advice from GOP political operative Karl Rove, which has reported spending a staggering $5.6 million. That’s one-and-a-half times as much as would-be senator Ken Buck has collected for his campaign fund.

So it’s no surprise that today’s harvest of political advertisements, this time from viewing a half hour of morning news on channel 9 (NBC), includes an offering from American Crossroads, as it has most days. Today I saw eight advertisements; five were bought by candidates’ campaigns, one by American Crossroads, and two by the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC).

Here’s what I saw:

8:26 a.m. From the Betsy Markey campaign, an ad calling out her opponent Cory Gardner’s attacks as a “disgrace” and pointing out that some of his ads were pulled from the air. (Gardner revised an ad against Markey after her campaign complained that it referenced her votes incorrectly, confusing her with Rep. Ed Markey, D., Mass.) Sunlight CAM links on Markey here.

8:29 a.m. The NRSC presents Ken Buck as a husband and father with “deep Colorado roots,” who has said no to reckless spending and is a strong advocate for business. See Sunlight CAM link here.

8:34 a.m. From Cory Gardner campaign, ad says Betsy Markey has voted with Nancy Pelosi 94 percent of the time. Have seen this one lots.

8:36 a.m. Another shot from the NRSC, this ad saying, ?Bennet is pushing for Obama?s over-reaching agenda.? The Denver Post referred to him with the phrase ?not enough spine.? This one has been airing a lot.

8:41 a.m. The John Salazar campaign says his opponent, Scott Tipton supports radical budget, is no match for Salazar, who has looked out for his district and is a “good match.” Sunlight CAM link here.

8:48 a.m. American Crossroads comes on with its ad proclaiming the Bennet is too close to Obama, that he was the deciding vote for “Obama-care,” and ends with the tagline “Their senator, not ours.”

8:49 a.m. Markey with her ad decrying Gardner’s “negative acts,” saying she has “zero tolerance for Wall Street bailouts.”

8:58 a.m. Bennet is a businessman who has saved jobs, while Ken Buck is ok with jobs going overseas. This one is from the Bennet campaign.

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Full post as published by Sunlight Foundation on October 28, 2010 (boomark / email).