DSCC takes on Gordon Smith in new ad

U.S. Sen. Gordon SmithThe Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which does not endorse in the primary, has still been hovering in the background of the U.S. Senate race here in Oregon. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), chairman of the DSCC, hand-picked Jeff Merkley and the DSCC donated to his fledgling campaign back in December.

One might have therefore expected that the DSCC's long awaited first ad in Oregon would mention Merkley. The Speaker is, however, absent from the spot, which instead focuses on U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith.

The ad, which is in part a response to the negative ad the Smith campaign released last week attacking both Merkley and his primary opponent Steve Novick, takes on Smith's record in Washington, accusing him of siding with special interests over Oregon families.

Accordingly, the ad chides the incumbent with supporting tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas, tax cuts for the wealthy, and tax giveaways to big oil.

The ad then goes on to question whether Smith really is thinking independently, as he has claimed to.

And indeed, Smith did fall in with the GOP party line on the votes on tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas and tax cuts for the wealthy, and he has received a good chunk of change from the oil and gas industries (over $275,000 over his federal career, at last count,) and he was the co-chair of the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign in Oregon, which all support the DSCC's vote of ‘not independent.' The ad does, however, perhaps inadvertently point to a 2005 vote where Smith voted the same as more than half the Democrats in the Senate at the time (although Smith colleague from Oregon, U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, was not one of them.)