Democratic candidate Alexi Giannoulias has a new ad in the hard-fought Illinois Senate race, and it pulls no punches in presenting Republican candidate Mark Kirk as an out-of-touch Washington politician who lied about his military service.
“Mark Kirk lied about going to war, opposed middle-class tax cuts,and said unemployment’s not that big an issue,” the announcer says. “What do you say?”
Clips of various folks, depicted as average people on the street, are shown talking to the camera and saying such things as: “I don’t think he has a clue about unemployment,” “He’s been in Washington too long,” and “His whole political career is probably a lie,” and more.
That last line about Kirk’s whole political career being a lie is easily proven false, actually. For example, it can be easily proven in independent sources that Kirk is in fact a member of the House of Representatives, and that he was first elected in 2000. His other claims about having served in Iraq, though…
The TPM Poll Average gives Kirk 43.8%, Giannoulias 43.7%, and Green Party candidate LeAlan Jones 4.1%.
Eric Kleefeld
Eric Kleefeld joined TPM as an intern for the final months of the 2006 midterm elections, and then kept showing up for work. His other interests include guitars, old comic books and the politics of various English-speaking countries.
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