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Campaign Ad Spend Starting To Flow

  • CBS News, Friday, September 21, 2007 11 AM

The day after Sen. Hillary Clinton unveiled her health-care plan, a new campaign ad with her surrounded by children and holding a baby hit the airwaves in the early-primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire. The spot, which claims she "changed our way of thinking when she introduced universal health care to America," is the latest volley in an ad war launched months before the first voters go to the polls.

Only three of the presidential contenders have spent much on ads so far. Two top Republican candidates -- former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and actor and former senator Fred Thompson -- have limited themselves largely to Internet attacks on Democrats, while former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has blown some $6 million on TV. That total is followed by New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democrat who has dropped just under $2 million.

In Iowa, says Evan Tracey, chief operating officer of the Campaign Media Analysis Group, candidates have "blown past the historic totals of the last election" much earlier. Running down the other Democrats, Tracey says Sen. Barack Obama has spent $1.3 million and Sen. Christopher Dodd is at $863,000. Clinton has shelled out $475,000 thus far, while former senator John Edwards spent $385,000.

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