No Way Out
ANNCR: “Lois Capps had a choice: support Main Street or Wall Street. And Capps chose them, voting for a $700 billion Wall Street bailout and to allow executives to take huge bonuses while taxpayers were bailing them out. Then, to help pay for it, Capps supported new job-killing taxes on Main Street’s small businesses. Those are her priorities, are they yours? The National Republican Congressional Committee is responsible for the content of this advertising” (Youtube).
MILLER: “I want to hire more people, but we don’t know what our tax rates are going to be, we don’t know what our health care is going to be or our energy costs. When you go into that voting booth, you need to know who you’re voting for.” ANNCR: “Lois Capps has a 14-year record of failure in Washington, voting for higher energy costs, job-killing regulations that hurt small businesses and to cut Medicare by $716 billion. Vote no. The U.S. Chamber is responsible for the content of this advertising” (Youtube).
The contest has become the first CA target for the Congressional Leadership Fund, “which reserved” about $250K in ads on broadcast TV in the Santa Barbara media market. “The reservation — which is also the first offensive” ad reservation in the country for CLF — is “slated for the last two weeks before the election.”
CLF press sec. Brook Hougesen: “We believe this is a key pickup opportunity this November and we have the right independent-minded candidate in (ex-LG) Abel Maldonado (R) to win.”
“The purchases from CLF and the Chamber comes in addition to the $290,341” the NRCC has spent this month, including $91K “spent on media” reported Sept. 21.
Capps spokesperson Jeff Millman: “Mr. Maldonado pretends he’s not a Republican but he has no problem taking their money, and so far, there have been 13 Super PAC and Maldonado false attack ads against Lois” (Meagher, Santa Barbara Independent, 9/28).
Opposites Don’t Exactly Attract…
“The divide was obvious” on Sept. 28 as Capps and Abel Maldonado “squared off” in a League of Women Voters debate “attended by more than 250 people” that focused on “health care, job creation, climate change and seismic studies offshore of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.”“Capps, a former nurse, stood by the Affordable Care Act but acknowledged that it can be better,” while Maldonado “said he favors some aspects of the act, such as allowing youth to stay on their parents’ health policies for longer and extending coverage to seniors with pre-existing conditions, but he said it was a not the right approach.” Maldonado: “We have health care for everyone today. It’s called the emergency room. It’s just too expensive.”
“Both candidates also stood on opposite sides of what should be done to mitigate climate change.” Maldonado: “Do we have legitimate good science on climate change? … I believe that there is climate change. How much, I just don’t know.”
“Maldonado vowed to not raise taxes, saying that it would foster more uncertainty for businesses,” but Capps said that the Americans for Tax Reform no-tax pledge “has resulted in ‘the most dysfunctional Congress (we’ve) ever had’ because it prevented bipartisan solutions” (Cornejo, San Luis Obispo Tribune, 9/28).