Independent groups "have run some of the most hard-hitting and misleading ads, because they're not on the ballot," said Brown University professor Darrell West. "The candidates have to exercise some restraint. The groups have almost no accountability, so they can say whatever they want."
The liberal Media Fund, which has raised $60 million, is now expanding from three to eight states with an ad that charges "Bush and the Saudis are too close for comfort." Fund spokeswoman Sarah Leonard said a poll of voters in St. Louis, where the commercial first aired, found a nine-percentage-point swing toward Kerry among those who had seen it.
Some ads rely on humor: A Club for Growth spot illustrates Kerry's supposed flip-flopping by showing a groom dumping his bride to passionately embrace her best friend.
Others are targeted toward particular constituencies -- which, in a tight race, could make a difference. "John Kerry's not a hunter -- he just plays one on TV," says NRA chief lobbyist Chris Cox says in a spot showing a rifle-toting Kerry in camouflage -- giving way to a picture of a French poodle in a Kerry sweater.
Planned Parenthood, which has endorsed a presidential candidate for the first time, has featured actress Helen Hunt in one ad. Another ad says: "Bush has even tried to restrict access to contraception and cut family-planning programs."
A group called MOB, or Mothers Opposing Bush, is also using a famous face. "Sopranos" star Edie Falco asks in an ad: "Mothers always put their children first. What about you, Mr. Bush?"
Same-sex marriage is the theme in three commercials by the group Public Interest, airing on MTV, to motivate young people to vote. One of the public service announcements shows close-up piercings of various body parts, asking: "Who decides where a ring should go?"
Some spots air only in certain battleground states. The Media Fund has run a series of ads in Ohio, with ordinary people talking about the state's loss of 230,000 jobs during Bush's term. The New Democrat Network is tailoring commercials to nine states, with such lines as "one in seven Colorado children with no health insurance." The League of Conservation Voters is spending $3 million on spots in Nevada, where the administration has decided to locate a nuclear waste dump, questioning whether Bush was "playing politics" with the Yucca Mountain site.
Political researcher Brian Faler contributed to this report.
