POLITICAL ADS GONE WILD

Michael J. Fox's pitch for stem cell research included, this year's
elections have sparked several unusual attempts to woo voters. In
North Carolina, Democratic challenger Heath Shuler spent $10,000 to
have his name on the race car driven by Brad Keselowski in the Dollar
General 300 race held Oct. 14 in Charlotte. Shuler, who is trying to
unseat Republican Rep. Charles Taylor, has a narrow lead in the polls
and, if it holds up, Nascar would finally have a winner. In 2004 and
2005 two other candidates tried the same tactic but neither got the
checkered flag.

The campaign around a Colorado ballot initiative on the minimum wage
has reached new lows. A "Stop 42" ad opens with a close-up of a toilet
paper roll and an announcer saying an increase to the minimum wage
sounds like a "feel good idea." The next shot is of a cheese grater
wrapped around the toilet paper roll. The announcer adds "the
feel-good idea will quickly turn painful" and "grate" the state's
economy. "Vote no on Amendment 42 and wipe out a very painful future."
Perhaps feeling they hadn't alienated enough people, Stop 42 also has
a spot in which God and Moses (with the tablets of the 10 Commandments
in hand) denounce the amendment.

Yet, the most honest ad belongs to Loretta Nall, the Libertarian
candidate for governor of Alabama. Nall's Web site features a cartoon
picture of the candidate; when people donate money to the campaign it
is pushed into her decolletage. The more you donate, the more you get
to see. For enough money, she removes her blouse to reveal a tank top
with a picture of her opponents on it and the words: "The biggest
boobs in Alabama politics." Nall e-mailed: "I think the ads and the
T-shirts have been so effective because it bares [sic] all the
markings of mocking the authorities. It brings humor to an otherwise
dull, boring, same old, same old political season . . . People love an
underdog." And boobs.