Onwards with the Senate ads: Novick releases new spot highlighting his politics 'unusual'

Over the last two weeks, candidates for the U.S. Senate seat flooded the airwaves with ads, most of them negative.

Novick highlighted issue differences with his ‘opponents’ (Social Security taxes), Smith hit Merkley and Novick (accusing them of fundraising hypocrisy and celebrating taxes, respectively), Merkley hit Smith back (“Smith is just another special interest Senator”), and also took a swing at Novick (playing a few blog quotes attempting to demonstrate that Novick divides Democrats), and Smith came back at Merkley (fundraising again.)

Phew.

And today, Novick jumped back into the fray, releasing a new ad which aims to dispel “negative politics as usual” (in other words, Merkley’s “Believe” ad, which receives a couple of seconds of cameo.)

The spot features former Governor John Kitzhaber, who touts Novick’s unconventional politics; “Steve is standing up for principle and that's why Oregon Democrats are standing up for Steve.”

Novick focused on the meaning of “the new politics of hope and change” today at a press conference.

"If you look at what he has on television right now, it's apparent that for Jeff Merkley 'the new politics of hope and change' consists of a desperate effort to convince Oregonians that Steve Novick is a very bad man," said Novick.

"We've decided not to respond in kind. Our campaign from the beginning has been based on faith in the voters. Faith in the voters that they'll appreciate a little laughter with their politics. Faith that the voters want a candidate who would offer details about the challenges this country faces and what we need to do meet those challenges. And we have faith that the voters will embrace the candidate that ends the campaign on a positive note," the candidate continued.

Matt Canter, Merkley’s spokesman, responded to the ad—and Novick’s words—by noting that “Novick has run a negative campaign since Day One.”

“With regard to these statements [cited in Merkley’s ad] Novick has never said they were taken out of context and when asked at the Portland City Club debate he defended them,” Canter said, also referring to a number of articles written over the past couple of months as evidence that Novick went negative early on.

Indeed Novick at the Portland City Club debate, Novick maintained that he criticizes other Democrats when they depart from their progressive principles, but he also acknowledged that some of the comments were over the top.

After the debate, he told The Oregonian that “I'm going to be more careful about what I say about people in public life," he said, "because they're real people and they have feelings, too."

He has, however, noted that the quotes pulled by the Merkley camp are out of out of context; on May 8, Novick responded to Merkley’s ad saying: "Jeff Merkley is accusing me of dividing Democrats, but his campaign is the only one circulating these out-of-context statements – to the media, at positive Democratic gatherings around the state and now in advertising. He is doing a disservice to the Democratic cause in this election.”

Canter also stressed that Merkley is the real “positive leader” in the field. When asked about the recent—and decidedly—negative ads the campaign has recently run, Canter responded that Smith has been running the truly negative ads lately.