Volkswagen is rolling out a new ad campaign this month tagged simply "Das Auto" ("The Car") as the German automaker tries to leverage its place as a pop-culture icon and reinvigorate sagging U.S. sales. The star of the effort is Max, a talking 1964 black Beetle that converses with celebs like Heidi Klum, David Hasselhoff, Leonard Nimoy and Bobby Knight about "what people want." For Tim Ellis, vice president of marketing at Volkswagen of America, "Max personifies Volkswagen's past, present and vision for the future. Through him, we will reconnect with American consumers and let them know …

Sen. Barack Obama is outspending Sen. Hillary Clinton by a three-to-one ratio coming into the crucial Pennsylvania primary, according to one top ad tracker. Obama is facing a tough battle overcoming Clinton's apparent advantage in the April 22 Keystone State primary. "He has dropped a couple million bucks in his first week on the air there,'' says Evan Tracey, COO for Campaign Media Analysis, a unit of TNS. Obama is now spending about $150,000 a day for TV ads in Pennsylvania, Tracey says, triple Clinton's levels. Since Obama started TV in Pennsylvania on March 21, he has about …

A new move by Congress to overturn the Federal Communication Commission's loosening of the ban on cross-ownership of newspaper and broadcast is underway. The Senate Commerce Committee is scheduling an executive session to consider legislation by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D.-N.D., that would return a former ban on one company owning a newspaper and radio or television station in the same market. Senate Joint Resolution 28 to bar said practice is co-sponsored by 13 other senators, including presidential contenders Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama -- along with 2004 Democratic candidate John Kerry. The resolution is aimed at overturning a …

New Line, a Time Warner-owned movie studio, will pull its $250 million media buying count from Aegis Group's Carat and give the business to WPP Group's MediaCom, insiders say. The shift is set to happen after New Line rolls out its "Sex and the City" film next month and comes a month after Time Warner announced it would fold New Line into its larger Warner Bros. Studios film unit, already a MediaCom client. According to Nielsen Monitor-Plus, Warner Bros. spent more than $600 million on ads last year; combined with New Line, the account would be better than …

SoapNet will pump up its original programming roster with the premiere of "MVP: The Secret Live of Hockey Wives" in June. The show, a scripted look at on and off-ice drama, has been ordered up for 10 installments by the cable channel. It will be put in the 11 p.m. time slot that will be filled in the meantime by "Relative Madness," a six-special run with clips and commentary about the craziness of TV families. "SoapNet will increase its original program offerings this spring and summer," says Brian Frons, president of daytime for Disney-ABC Television Group. "MVP is …

While NBC will kick off next years' NFL coverage with the Super Bowl champion New York Giants, followed by Indianapolis Colts, ESPN will start its Monday Night Football coverage with a doubleheader of intra-division match-ups. The NFL will open the 2008 season with a Thursday night home game for the Super Bowl winners, with a game against the Washington Redskins. But because of the Republican National Convention that night, NBC will start the game at 7 p.m. Eastern -- about 90 minutes before Sen. John McCain is expected to make his acceptance speech. Then, NBC's first Sunday …