A veterans group is undertaking a $2.2 million California advertising blitz to assail Democrat Barack Obama and urge members of Congress to pass a resolution recognizing the surge in Iraq "as a strategic victory in the central front in the war on terror."
The expensive, 10-day media campaign by Vets for Freedom -- a group supporting current U.S. military policy in Iraq -- is being undertaken in a state where voters have overwhelmingly opposed the Bush administration's handling of the conflict.
But with former Marine and Gov. Pete Wilson as its California spokesman, the group today formally launched its state "Tell the Truth About the Surge" campaign.
Officially, the effort urges members of Congress to pass a Senate resolution -- S.R. 636 -- to recognize the troop increase as a success.
The meaure by Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., and Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, warns against any action "that jeopardizes those gains or dishonors the service and sacrifice of the men and women of the United States Armed Forces who made those gains possible."
In an interview, Wilson said the media effort is well worth the money in blue state California, where "we've got this huge congressional delegation and half of them are opposed to the surge."
Pointing out that California has the nation's largest population of military veterans, Wilson said: "They need to hear from constitutents, particularly veterans who have been in combat, that the turnaround in Iraq has been nothing short of remarkable."
The campaign today began running televisions commercials in major California media markets - with the exception of San Francisco. They attack Obama for voting against troop funding and making 45 campaign trips to Iowa but only two visits to Iraq.
In a debate with Republican candidate John McCain last Friday, Obama said he voted for troop funding in a bill that included a timetable to withdraw U.S. forces while McCain voted against the bill. Their votes were reversed on a funding measure that included no timetable.
While saying the surge exceeded his expectations, Obama assails McCain and Bush for errors in judgment in going to war based on faulty intelligence and wrongful expectations of being greeted as liberators.
Vets for Freedom Chairman and Iraq veteran Pete Hegseth said the group recently spent $2.6 million for similar pro-surge and anti-Obama media campaigns in critical swing states of Ohio, Virginia, Michigan and Colorado.
The campaign spending in California, where Obama held a 16 point lead over McCain in a recent Field Poll, may find a less receptive audience. In a July state poll, 87 percent of California Democrats and 78 percent of independent voters said they opposed the Bush administration's handling of the war in Iraq.
But the message could resonate with the state Republican base -- of whom 59 percent approve of the job Bush is doing in Iraq.
Watch the ad here.
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