The Washington Post

pa2012.com is proud to partner with The Washington Post in bringing our originally reported insider political news to a wide audience of decision makers and opinion leaders across the country.

Close it

send to a friend | print | comment

Stations pulling chamber ad, as Sestak & Toomey clash over Pelosi allegiance

At least as far as two Pittsburgh TV stations are concerned, 100 percent means 100 percent, and the health care law wasn’t really a government takeover.

Both WPGH and WPMY are pulling an ad from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, The Post-Gazette reports. The spot hit Congressman Joe Sestak (D-7), the Democratic Senate nominee, for voting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi 100 percent of the time during the current Congress, and for supporting the “government takeover” of health care.

The stations are pulling the ad in response to complaints of inaccuracy from Sestak’s campaign, which noted at least one vote against Pelosi’s position and disputed the “government takeover” language. In a letter from the parent company that owns the two stations to the Chamber of Commerce, reported by the newspaper, a sales executive wrote: “At this time, our two stations, WPGH and WPMY, will discontinue airing the Chamber of Commerce commercial. It appears that the ad is false because it is not true that Sestak voted with Pelosi 100 percent of the time.”

Sestak’s campaign has lodged the same complaint with other stations running the ad.

“The advertisement, launched by the ultra-conservative Chamber of Commerce, is full of false, misleading, and deceptive statements,” Sestak campaign spokesman Jonathon Dworkin told The Post-Gazette. “We are pleased to learn that at least two television stations in Pennsylvania have decided to stop airing this false attack ad and we hope our opponent will call on others to do the same.”

The kerfuffle ignited the latest war of words between Sestak and Republican Pat Toomey’s campaign, which said Sestak is trying to “hide his liberal record.” The campaign e-mailed reporters a breakdown of Sestak’s voting record Thursday morning, noting that he voted with Pelosi 96 percent of the time in from 2007-2008, 100 percent of the time in 2009 and 94 percent of the time in 2010. The campaign was also planning an afternoon conference call with reporters to discuss “Sestak’s attempt to hide his liberal record.”

“Whether Congressman Sestak has voted with Nancy Pelosi 100 percent of the time, as he did in 2009, or 96 percent of the time another year, the fact remains that he is way too liberal for Pennsylvania,” Toomey spokeswoman Nachama Soloveichik said. “Either way, his votes for never ending bailouts, government-run health care, ballooning deficits, a cap-and-trade energy tax, and trillions of dollars in tax increases make him far outside the mainstream. It is telling that Congressman Sestak is going to such lengths to hide his liberal record from Pennsylvania voters.”

share001btn Stations pulling chamber ad, as Sestak & Toomey clash over Pelosi allegiance

July 15, 2010 at 11:07 am

--pa2010.com Staff

Tags: ,

comments

comments [7] | post a comment

  1. sick of it all

    Jul 15th, 2010

    Keep attacking the republicans for their lies, it is about time!

  2. 1994 Again

    Jul 15th, 2010

    Normal voters could care less about any of this.

  3. Tony Soprano

    Jul 15th, 2010

    I’m sure voters across America will be relieved to hear that Joe Sestak voted independently of Nancy Pelosi at least once!

  4. Adam S.

    Jul 15th, 2010

    Wasn’t Pat Toomey serving in the Congressional Majority when the budget surpluses of the 90′s turned into deficits in the first place?

  5. TheMortonMagician

    Jul 15th, 2010

    In response to Mr. Toomey’s flack, Ms. Solveichik,

    “Either way, his votes for never ending bailouts, government-run health care, ballooning deficits, a cap-and-trade energy tax, and trillions of dollars in tax increases make him far outside the mainstream. It is telling that Congressman Sestak is going to such lengths to hide his liberal record from Pennsylvania voters.”

    OK, enough with the lying, Mr Toomey. “Never ending bailouts” – The bailouts were demanded by the faux-conservative administration of one George W. Bush. Anyone remember him? They were necessitated by the reckless fiscal policies of faux-conservative legislators, most particularly former Republican Senator Phil Gramm of Texas, who engineered the dismantling of critical Great Depression-era firewalls in our financial system in the 1996 financial services deregulation law. enthusiasically supported by the very same Wall Street cabal that made Mr. Toomey a very wealthy man. Many of which were thankfully restored today with the passage of the 2010 financial reform legislation.

    Furthermore, the “never ending” Bush Adminstration bailouts were ended in 2009, as soon as the Obama Administration could safely do so without risking the wholesale collapse of the world economy. Everyone take a look around. We are in a very frustrating economic situation, but NOT IN A 2ND GREAT DEPRESSION. And the BAILOUTS WERE ENDED in the early months of the OBAMA ADMINISTRATION. Pretty damn good fiscal management if you are willing to be intellectually honest. But of course Mr. Toomey is not capable of that, because the majority of career has been spent on an out of control Wall Street that believes it can have its cake, eat it too, and let the taxpayers clean up. If Mr. Toomey can spend a career lying to himself, he certainly can rationalize lying to you. The question for the voters is whether they prefer to be lied to day in and day out or not.

    On the “ballooning deficits” – look back to the end of the Clinton Administration – we were running surpluses and paying down the national debt. Fast forward to 2009. President Obama inherits massive, out-of-control deficits and has pressed congress for spending cuts since. Not as easy as it sounds with constituencies across the nation protecting their turf. What happened in the intervening 10 years? Oh yeah, that George W. Bush guy again. Yes, we had wars to fight. So were two massive tax cuts heavily favoring the wealthy, during a relatively strong economy, mind you, a good idea? No. Because it squanders the leverage government needs to manage a real crisis like the last 2 years. That’s what Barack Obama inherited, not created. Again the fact that we are not in a 2ND GREAT DEPRESSION today will vindicate his actions in hindsight. But you can’t prove what didn’t happen, so this means nothing to the Glenn Becks of the world or their followers.

    Anticipating the cries of “stop bringing up George W. Bush” – I understand why so many conservatives wish he could be swept away and forgotten, but the devastating economic consequences endure. When the Republicans in congress agree to correct those wrongheaded policies, perhaps we can move on, but today’s mostly partly-line vote on financial regulation shows there is more than a little nostalgia for old Dubya, and if that holds sway to the benefit of the likes of Mr. Toomey in November, one thing is for sure. We should all have out checkbooks ready for more ballooning deficits and bailouts for Mr. Toomey’s friends.

    Mario Cimino
    D – Morton Borough Council

  6. Bob Guzzardi

    Jul 16th, 2010

    Are Government bailouts of private profit making companies a good idea or not?

    Are the record debt and deficits of Bush-Obama a good idea?

    Do these bailouts, debts and deficits grow jobs and raise our standard of living?

  7. Bob Guzzardi

    Jul 16th, 2010

    Do you think Pat Toomey is a Bush Big Government Republican?

Leave a Reply


- will not be published


pa2012.com blogs