Facing midterm elections on November 7 and with control of the US Senate and House up for grabs, political candidates and their "fan clubs" as well as key state issue-based organizations are running thousands of radio spots in major markets this week, according to the latest weekly analysis from Media Monitors. Radio commercials are especially heavy and competitive in the swing states of Tennessee, Missouri, Virginia, Florida and Maryland. Here are the results of some of the hottest political campaigns in terms of their use of radio to reach voters. Numbers used in parenthesis refer to that candidate's or issue's rank on or below this week's Media Monitors "Spot Ten Politics '06" chart which ranks the most-aired political commercials on radio this week.
TENNESSEE POLITICS: US Senate candidate Bob Corker (#10) (R-TN) is running for US Senator from Tennessee against Democrat Harold Ford, Jr., son of former US Representative Harold Ford, Sr. In Nashville, Memphis and Knoxville, Corker ran almost 600 spots this week on Tennessee radio, three times more radio than Ford. Ford aired just over 260 spots with ads sponsored by both the Tennessee Democratic Party and by Ford for Tennessee. Meanwhile, there are more Fords campaigning in Tennessee: Jake Ford, Harold's younger brother, is up for a state congressional seat, and he purchased over 220 spots last week to promote his candidacy. Then there's also another family member, the Aunt of both Fords, Ophelia Ford, running for State Senate in Tennessee but airing a much smaller radio campaign than her two nephews.
Meanwhile, though, Bob Corker's commercials are garnering additional play in cities far from the Volunteer State. His spots were the controversial "Harold, call me" TV spots you may have seen the all-news cable TV channels analyze recently. Those spots were pulled last week and replaced with newly-controversial spots currently airing on radio and TV.
MISSOURI SENATE RACE: Democrat Claire McCaskill (#2) ran 1,525 spots in the combined markets of St. Louis and Kansas City this week, more than any other single candidate in the USA. Her opponent, Republican Jim Talent, ran far fewer with just over 860 spots in the same two markets.
FLORIDA GOVERNOR'S RACE: Incumbent Governor Jeb Bush is term-limited, so he cannot run for re-election, leaving the competition there between Republican Charlie Crist (#3) who aired close to 1,380 radio spots and Democrat Jim Davis (#59) who only ran just under 250 radio spots. To assist in Republican causes, the Republican Party of Florida aired an additional 730 spots during the same 7 day period in the combined Florida markets of Miami/Ft. Lauderdale, Tampa/St. Pete, West Palm Beach, Orlando, Jacksonville, and Ft. Myers/Naples.
LEARN HOW TO VOTE ALL OVER AGAIN: In Ohio, the scene of problematic vote-counting issues back in 2004, the Ohio Secretary of State's Office (#7) ran over 700 radio spots last week promoting their new machines. Their spots provide listeners a web site with simple and short videos showing how the new system is "as easy as 1, 2, 3" where voters select any of the state's 86 counties and view the demo of that county's machine.
THAT'S PEDERSON, NOT PETERSON: Former Chairman of the Arizona Democratic Party Jim Pederson (#8) is running for US Senate in Arizona and aired over just under 700 spots in Phoenix and Tucson this week for his candidacy. But don't confuse Jim Pederson with Jim Peterson, fellow Democrat and current US Senator from South Dakota.
TEXAS: The current Governor of Texas, Republican Rick Perry (#4), is campaigning for re-election and purchased over 1,100 spots on Texas radio in the past week. Democratic opponent Chris Bell didn't even appear on the radio radar in the past week.
MARYLAND: In the Gubenatorial battle between the Democratic Mayor of Baltimore Martin O'Malley (#11) and the current Governor, Republican Bob Ehrlich, O'Malley's leads in radio spots aired on Baltimore and Washington DC radio stations, with just under 600 spots this week.
CALIFORNIA: However, the political spot which aired more than any other political candidate or issue in the past week was "Vote No on Proposition 87" (#1) from a group called Californians Against Higher Taxes. They ran nearly 2,275 spots in the combined markets of Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Sacramento and Fresno. Their "issue" spots also ran repeatedly on Honolulu radio.
