Green Valley News Editorial – Campaigns Still Fudging

Saturday, September 4th, 2010

See that first letter on the right by Andrew Miller of Green Valley? I promise I didn’t ghost-write it. But I sure could have.

I’m tired of all this, too, but we press on…

The Arizona political world was all atwitter this week over two campaign gaffes. One, it turns out, wasn’t a screw-up at all but still could be costly; the other was ugly, but might not really matter in the longrun.
They’ve been rehashed over and over, so I’ll keep it short.

Jesse Kelly, who’s running against U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords for U.S. House, was the beneficiary after a commercial hit the air paid for by Conservatives for Congress, a Tucson group that is quickly losing credibility with anybody who can think clearly.

The ad states that the group put out the commercial on its own and is not affiliated with any candidate. Technically, that’s true. Realistically, it’s not. If you’re a Republican, they like you. If you’re not, they don’t.

The ad would have you believe that with young soldiers dying in Iraq and Afghanistan, Giffords was only interested in one thing as she questioned Gen. David Petraeus during a congressional committee hearing: solar-powered street lights.

On the surface, it looks bad. But if you look at Giffords’ full question and Petraeus’ full response, she was right on target because the discussion was about the threat to military supply lines, and, ultimately, how to save the lives of U.S. troops by trucking in less fuel.

Giffords’ camp responded to the ad with a press release backed by a slew of military types who are disgusted. They should be.

On Saturday, I tried to reach several people with Conservatives for Congress and managed to go back and forth with one committee member via email. He didn’t call because he was busy with family. (Somebody should tell him politics isn’t a Monday-Friday gig; newspapering isn’t either.) Their Web site says they are “delighted” by Giffords’ reaction to the ad because it allows them an opportunity to explain it.

“The point of our ad is that Giffords’ dogmatic obsession with peripheral items such as solar street lights is but one example of the myopic and leftist views she holds …”

Great explanation, except that Giffords’ exchange with the general overseeing the Iraq/Afghan war isn’t about dogma, it’s about saving lives.

Kelly had nothing to do with the ad but will benefit from it, I told his communications guy. So will he ask them to pull it?

“He really has no statemtent on a third-party ad like that,” John Ellinwood told me. “What he’d like to do is have a serious discusion about issues like Social Security, and he’s sorry to see Gabrielle Giffords demagoguing that ad.”

While Kelly didn’t pay for the ad, he does bear some responsibility because the group is acting on his behalf, whether or not they’ll admit it. But Kelly is sitting on the sidelines twiddling his thumbs. Why? Because the ad — accurate or not — could help his cause. Unless, of course, it continues to backfire like it has.

One last oddity in this. One member of the Conservatives for Congress committee is Rick Stertz, who is heavily involved in the Tucson Business Fellowship, a group of Christian business leaders. One of their tenets is “To teach, encourage and exhort Christians to employ biblical principles in their businesses.”

I think he fell short here.

Apparently the WWJD on Stertz’s bracelet stands for “What Would Jesse Do?”