Attack ads heat up Senate race

By Bill Barrow, The Times-Picayune

October 2, 2008

BATON ROUGE -- The televised war of words in the U.S. Senate race between Democrat Mary Landrieu and Republican John Kennedy escalated this week with the release of two tough new ads seeking to tie each candidate to corruption and mismanagement.

The first, by the National Republican Senatorial Committee, seeks to capitalize on a recent report by a non-partisan watchdog group, Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington, that labeled Landrieu one of the most corrupt members of Congress based on her efforts to secure a congressional earmark for a company that later contributed to her campaign.

"We have seen it all -- gambling interests funneling money, favors for contributors, allegations of bribery. Until Landrieu is gone, ethics reform in Louisiana just isn't done," the narrator says.

Landrieu's campaign fired back with an ad tying Kennedy to the state's troubled insurer of last resort, the Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corp., which struggled to pay claims after Hurricane Katrina and was fingered in a state audit for wasting money on golf outings and other trips.

"John Kennedy sits on the board of the company that wasted a million dollars on golfing and trips but didn't have enough to pay hurricane clips," the Landrieu ad says.

Both campaigns responded with detailed news releases seeking to rebut the claims. Kennedy called the ad "patently false" and said in a statement that it "intentionally misleads voters into thinking that I went on a junket somewhere."

While Kennedy does sit on Citizens' board, he was not a recipient of the largess cited in the audit.

The Landrieu campaign called the GOP ad "false, negative" and issued a news release citing her senatorial votes in favor of tougher ethics laws and awards she has received from good-government groups.