Crossroads Gps

My column Wednesday lists some of the year's best and worst political advertisements so far. But don't take my word for it; go see them yourself. Here are three I'd recommend because they'll give you a distilled version of the presidential campaign so far: " Wake Up ," from Crossroads GPS, Karl Rove's independent group. It's a concise version of the core Republican argument: President Obama got our hopes up in 2008, but he let us down -- and it's time for a change. " Come and Go ," from the Obama campaign.

WASHINGTON -- Forget any summer lull before the conventions. Voters in battleground states will be swamped with campaign television ads in coming weeks, as was evident Friday when conservative advocacy group Crossroads GPS announced it would spend $25 million in the next month on spots hitting President Obama on the economy. The commercials - technically “issue ads,” because they do not explicitly call for Obama's defeat - will air Monday through early August in Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Nevada, Ohio and Virginia.

WASHINGTON - Critics of President Obama's healthcare overhaul are seizing on the Supreme Court's ruling that the individual mandate can be upheld as a tax penalty, saying that formulation offers them a fresh way to attack the measure. “If they're going to uphold it, frankly this is the most helpful way to uphold it,” said Tim Phillips, president of the conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity, which on Friday launched a new $9-million ad campaign calling the measure “one of the largest tax increases in American history.” “Shouldn't Obama's priorities have been creating jobs and ending reckless spending?

WASHINGTON - During their long campaign to loosen rules on campaign money, conservatives argued that there was a simpler way to prevent corruption: transparency. Get rid of limits on contributions and spending, they said, but make sure voters know where the money is coming from. Today, with those fundraising restrictions largely removed, many conservatives have changed their tune. They now say disclosure could be an enemy of free speech. High-profile donors could face bullying and harassment from liberals out to "muzzle" their opponents, Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Virginia's heavyweight Senate match between two former governors could be one of the clearest tests of a Republican campaign strategy of tying Democratic candidates to President Obama this fall. In the race for Virginia's open Democratic Senate seat, Tim Kaine, a close Obama ally and the president's first Democratic national chairman, is facing Republican George Allen, who lost the seat in 2006 after a campaign gaffe that captured the rise of YouTube as a political weapon. Allen secured the Republican nomination this week against light primary opposition.

WASHINGTON -- A new ad unveiled Tuesday by conservative group Crossroads GPS blasts President Obama on increasing the national debt, the latest attack on the administration funded by well-financed outside groups. Crossroads GPS, the nonprofit arm of the Republican mega-group founded in part by Karl Rove, put $7 million into the television buy, which launched its two-week run Tuesday in 10 key presidential swing states including Colorado, Florida and Ohio. The ad shows a ticking stopwatch , depicting rapidly accumulating national debt that, according to the commercial, is hampering the country's economic growth.

A presidential campaign is never just two people slugging it out on the national stage. It is always a battle of narratives, and the struggle, when all is said and done, is over which candidate can craft the most persuasive story. For Mitt Romney, the story is about a businessman with sterling credentials and a profound knowledge of how jobs are created, facing off against a nice guy who is in over his head, has no idea how to fix the economy and is spending the country into oblivion.

WASHINGTON -- The 2012 campaign air battle grew more intense Wednesday with the news that Crossroads GPS, the cash-flush conservative advocacy group, is pouring another $25 million into television ads castigating President Obama for “broken” promises. The massive ad buy matches the $25 million that Obama's reelection campaign announced last week it would be spending on a month of TV airtime. The first new spot from Crossroads GPS begins airing Thursday in 10 presidential battleground states.

WASHINGTON -- Advocacy groups spending millions of dollars in the 2012 campaign are now faced with the prospect of having to reveal the donors who have been secretly financing their efforts after a federal appellate court panel refused to block a lower court order requiring the move. In a 2 to 1 decision issued Monday evening, a U.S. Court of Appeals panel in Washington declined to stay a ruling by a federal judge requiring organizations that run election-related television ads to disclose their donors.

Washington -- Priorities USA Action, the "super PAC" supporting Obama's reelection, raised $2.5 million in March, ending the month with just over $5 million in the bank. Its biggest benefactor was Amy P. Goldman, a New York-based writer and philanthropist who gave the group $1 million. Comedian Chelsea Handler gave the group $100,000. The pro-Obama group, which has struggled to raise money, nevertheless got more in March than American Crossroads, the heavyweight GOP super PAC that was founded in part by Karl Rove.