On the Campaign Trail with Ed Tibbetts

Iowa Democrats are responding to the television ad that presumptive Republican presidential candidate John McCain began airing in the state last week.

The McCain ad is called “Accountable,” and the Arizona senator stresses fairer taxes, cleaner energy and more affordable health care.

Democrats today issued a “reality check” on the ad.

They say his health care ideas will leave 273,000 Iowans without coverage and, says Brooke Borkenhagen, the party’s spokesperson, his ”big ideas include hurting Iowa’s farmers by ending federal investment in American ethanol and increasing incentives for Brazilian farmers to import their ethanol to the United States.”

McCain’s made no secret of his disdain for ethanol incentives. Now, the Democrats plan to bludgeon him with it. Expect this to continue right up to November.

Ordinarily, this might be a losing hand for McCain in Iowa. But in a day food prices are high and there are food shortages overseas – and ethanol is getting, fairly or unfairly, some of the blame — his position might win more friends here than it would otherwise. It’s a stretch to see his position as a net plus, but the timing might be better than it ever will be.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 at 3:33 pm and is filed under On The Campaign Trail. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.