The Cavalry Has Arrived For John McCain

From Will Evans of the Center for Investigative Reporting. Will is working on the Secret Money Project with NPR's Peter Overby.

According to the latest numbers, this month independent conservative groups are spending much more on TV ads criticizing Democrat Barack Obama than liberal groups are spending on anti-McCain spots.

It's quite a turnaround from June, when Moveon.org and a government workers union dominated the airwaves with an estimated $500,000 in ads attacking Sen. McCain's Iraq strategy.

Now there's a new ad from Citizens United, which is promoting a film critical of Obama (the group had an anti-Hillary film set to go, but had to rush out the Obama version when he bested Clinton in the primaries). And Let Freedom Ring, a religious conservative advocacy group, has unveiled new ads calling Obama "worse than a flip-flopper."

Those two, combined with Vets for Freedom's ads (this one, for example), which back McCain's approach to the war in Iraq, puts conservative airtime power at about $1.4 million in July, according to estimates by the Campaign Media Analysis Group. An assortment of lefty groups, in contrast, scrambled up a comparatively paltry $243,000 in ad buys for the same period.

That's a change McCain can believe in.

-- Evie Stone

5:25 PM ET | 07-29-2008 | permalink

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