I was intrigued by a Detroit News article that I read tonight about an attack ad running on the radio in Lansing against Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Cox. I wanted to hear the ad, but I couldn’t find it anywhere online… Here, though, before I get to that, is a clip from the Detroit News:
Mike Cox’s gubernatorial campaign charged today that a radio attack ad on the attorney general’s role in investigating an alleged party at the Manoogian Mansion was engineered by Ann Arbor businessman Rick Snyder, his rival in the governor’s race.
Snyder aides renounced the 60-second spot and denied the campaign had anything to do with it.
The commercial on Lansing radio today poses questions about why Cox “didn’t talk to a key witness” in the probe about a party at Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s city residence in 2002 and asked whether the party was “urban legend” as Cox has characterized it or “urban incompetence.”
“The State Police launched an investigation. So did Mike Cox. He talked to the mayor — in private — and he assured him nothing happened,” the ad says in a sneering tone.
The sponsor of the ad is Foundation for a Secure and Prosperous America, a nonprofit organization in the Washington, D.C., area that backed Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential bid and was founded by former McCain strategist Rick Reed. Reed’s media firm helped produce the Swift Boat ads that went after Sen. John Kerry’s war record in the 2004 presidential campaign. The foundation could not be reached for comment…
Snyder, by the way, denies having anything to do with it… Anyway, after reading the article, I began looking for audio of the ad in question and couldn’t seem to find it anywhere. I eventually, however, found a copy on a site called Right Michigan. And here it is:
If Snyder isn’t behind the ad, one wonders who is. It’s probably unlikely, but I wonder if it could be the Republican frontrunner, Peter Hoekstra. As he seems to be running somewhat ahead of them both, I don’t imagine that he’d stoop to such tactics, but it would be kind of brilliant in a way. By funding a campaign like this, he’d not only tie Cox and the toxic Kwame Kilpatrick together, but he’d make Snyder look like your typical unethical politician, thus negating Snyder’s most attractive attribute – his outsiderness. And, best of all, you’d have the two focused on fighting one another, leaving you relatively untouched.
17 Comments
I want to make a serious comment, but I keep picturing Kwame on a boat. The image is filling up my whole damned brain.
Hoekstra, the leaker of state secrets several times over, spoke at a church* in his district a while back to adoptive families promising to do all he could to extend the adoption tax credit, which expired in 2009. The health reform bill includes an adoption tax credit, and he of course voted against it. Anyway, he seems highly deficient in so many ways, and we will be sad sad sad if he were ever to become the governor.
* church/state boundary blurring again
I don’t know if Hoekstra’s that smart, but you’re right. That would be pretty brilliant if he were behind it. Snyder, I think, is probably a bigger threat to him than Cox, and his main attribute is his outsider status, and his promise to come in with new ideas from the business world. Portraying his as a Washington insider with ties to the McCain team hurts his, as does the implication that he’d stoop to old political tricks like swiftboating.
I always considered swiftboating as a smear campaign based on something that was unfair or untrue. I still think Mr. Cox is hiding something or made some kind of deal with ‘the Kwame’. We all know how honest the former mayor is! How common is it for the State Attorney General to directly interview a principal in an investigation … in private … with no formal notes on record … only to decide that the whole thing is a myth?
I agree…it’s not a smear if it’s true. That whole Kwame deal stinks to high heaven, and I think Mr. Coxsucker is helping in the cover up. But that’s just my opinion. I’m sure some disagree…But it’s pretty shady when you look at the whole thing.
If it is Snyder, I don’t see why he’d say it wasn’t. The tone of the ad may be a bit sinister, but it seems as though the facts are right.
I’d like to think that Rick is capable of something like this, but it doesn’t seem like his style. I suspect it’s a supporter of his. A Lansing radio buy these days is a pretty small investment. I doubt the whole thing cost them more that $25k.
Cox made plenty of enemies long before Snyder even gave thought to running for office. There is something mighty creepy about both of them from what I can gather. Sad that Granholm was so terrible she is likely to hand the state back to a Republican candidate.
Sad that Granholm was left with that grievous mess made by Engler and had to govern during a decade-plus-long state recession.
Engler was horrible, and really stuck it to the little guy…but Granholm has no backbone, and doesn’t dig in and try hard enough. It seems like she is always trying to please people with lip service instead of real action. That said…I’d rather have Jenny whispering sweet in my ear, than Johnny jamming it up my rear
Lovely way to put it, American Dream.
Heard on the news last night that Mr. Cox, if elected Governor, would not move in to the official residence in Lansing and instead stay in Livonia. One of the reasons given was that he wanted to keep his children at their present schools. Pretty vanilla. One of the other reasons for not wanting to move his family to Lansing is so his wife can maintain her position as a Wayne County Commissioner. This is more interesting to me in terms of a potential smoking gun related to the Kwame ordeal. Was anything discussed during the private interview related to his wife and her role as a Commissioner? Who knows. That’s why this IS a story. Unfortunately, there aren’t any reporters around any more to dig deep and investigate. Somebody is hiding something; my gut tells me Cox knows things that could bring him down. He needs to be careful.
Tommy, did you see they “accidentally” released the name of a former assistant AG who Tamara Greene’s attorney was trying to depose? MyFoxDetroit.com also accidentally posted a picture of a woman standing with Mike Cox who they later said was not this woman. Fortunately for her, the judge in the Greene civil case rejected the request to depose her. I have a feeling she would have had to go into protection. Thomas Furtaw wasn’t so lucky.
Holy Crap! Did anybody hear Norman Yatooma’s interview on WJR this morning?!?
He dropped a huge bomb live on air that I had never heard anywhere before! Did anybody else catch it?!
I’ll take the silence as a “no.”
I did not hear it, but I’m intrigued. Please tell us, Robert.
Heard it, but I guess I missed the huge bomb.