An ad produced by the Democratic House Campaign Committee is causing quite a stir amongst Republicans, who are furious that it includes a video showing flag-draped coffins containing American soldiers killed in Iraq. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi heads the committee that produced the ad and is standing by it.

But Republicans, who believe this is an opportunity to fire up their conservative base for the upcoming election, are outraged. They are demanding that Democrats yank the ad from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committees website. The ad started running on July 2nd. Nancy Pelosi, who heads the committee is not backing down and claims the Republicans are "in denial of the consequences of their actions in Iraq." Pelosi was one of the few Democrats who voted against the resolution authorizing the president to use force against Saddam Hussein, claiming it would be a grotesque mistake.

The Republican strategy for this election year is to show Americans how much better equipped they are to defend the country than Democrats. While, the Democratic strategy is to show the American public how the Republicans have totally dropped the ball on defending the US. Republicans attacked the use of the casket image in the ad.

"This new DCCC fundraising video that attempts to exploit U.S. military casualties in the global war on terror, I think, is outrageous," said House Majority Leader John Boehner of Ohio.

Taking advantage of deaths in the war on terror, who would do such a thing? How about the Republicans? In a 2004 election commercial for Bush used an image of a flag-draped coffin of a terrorist victim. Some families of 9/11 victims were upset with the ad, but Republicans defended the ad. Other ads were equalling exploitative.

Since Republicans began criticizing the ad, traffic and donations to the Democratic Committees website has greatly increased. Before Thursday only 1% of website visitors watched the ad. Now tens of thousands of people are clicking on the ad and following up by donating to the Democratic campaign.

zarth

Seattle, WA

December 2004

JUL 14, 2006 08:10 PM

I'll be curious to read bones_708's take on this.

Chainlink

Key West, FL

August 2005

JUL 14, 2006 08:34 PM

I think they should show each and every man and woman that falls being unloaded back home. When they come back in a box with a flag it should be pre-emted on every television, hell , it should pop up on your cellular phone and we should have a moment of silence for every single one of them.

I bet if every time a soldier was killed they interupted American Idol with unloading flag draped coffins this war would get over real damn fast.

DanTheGreater

Anacortes, WA

November 2004

JUL 14, 2006 08:59 PM

I don't care about the ad at all. It means nothing to me. However I find it interesting that all the Dems who jumped on Bush for the 2004 ad, are all for this one. I guess two wrongs make a right for these people.

cherrylove

USA

November 2005

JUL 14, 2006 09:13 PM

It's typical that the dems would use something like that to try and drum up support for themselves. They decry the war and everything about it, and are the first in line to profit from it...