Blunt Forgets To Mention Any Part Of His Washington Record In First TV Ad

As predicted in this space last week, Roy Blunt is hitting the airwaves early in an attempt to avoid an embarrassing result in next month's GOP primary for U.S. Senate. Politico's Dave Catanese reports this morning that Blunt's first television ad makes no mention of his ignominious record in the Washington GOP leadership:

The 30-second spot, which begins running statewide Tuesday, places Blunt on a farm and never mentions his seven terms in Congress or his party.

It's the clearest signal to date that while Blunt managed to escape a highly competitive primary challenge in a restless cycle, he still has work to do with a portion of his base which remains unsettled by his prolific earmarking, prominent role in the bank bailout and deep ties to Washington...

While the ad is directed at Democratic-controlled Washington, Republican insiders in the Show-Me State say the campaign's decision to go on the air this early is an effort to improve his soft GOP primary numbers against the underfunded and first-time statewide candidate Chuck Purgason.

Here's the ad, titled "Education and Hard Work." As you'll see, it's quite different from Blunt's last competitive election, in which he emphasized his many years in the GOP leadership and "links to the [existing] leadership's system of power and favors."

Blunt says he was taught that there "was nothing you couldn't achieve through education and hard work." Does that include his status as one of the "Most Corrupt Members of Congress?" Or was it through education and hard work that nonpartisan watchdog groups declared him "unfit to lead" as GOP Majority Leader because he "surrendered his office to the imperative of moneyed interests...with disturbing zeal and efficiency?"  I bet he did educate himself on the ways of Washington and work hard to build a "political machine...that extends from Missouri deep into Washington's K Street lobbying community" and "rival[ed] 'DeLay Inc.' -- the political fundraising committees, extensive favor-giving and alliances with Republican lobbyists that the majority leader has used to become one of the most influential leaders in memory."  After all, people didn't declare that Blunt "embodies the insidious, half-legal corruption that has permeated the G.O.P. majority since 1995" without a lot of hard work on Blunt's part.

Or maybe Blunt is just talking about how he's going to work hard to re-educate Missouri voters about his actual record in Washington.  It certainly will take a lot of work to convince people that a potential term in the U.S. Senate won't be anything like his time in the U.S. House.