Congressman Chris Murphy (CT-05), my congressman, a Democrat, has released his first ad of the campaign cycle. It's called Neighbors, and I think it sucks.
The new ad is called Neighbors, which sounds innocuous enough. However, not once in the ad does Congressman Murphy identify himself as a Democrat. I'll grant you, that might be wise on his part, given the country's current anti-incumbent, anti-Democrat leanings (though I think a lot of that is overstated), but what makes it worse is that the only party mentioned in the ad is the Republican party. The ad states that the Congressman is "working with Republicans to pass stronger Made in America laws." The only other legislative reference in the 30 second spot? Voting against the federal budget "because of the spending." I don't even know what that means. Was there too much spending? Too little? Spending on the wrong things? Some spending on the right things but lots of spending on the wrong things?
Look, I know that CT-05 isn't the most liberal district in the country, or even the state. I know Congressman Murphy is endangered, in part because he's only served 2 terms, so he doesn't have as much of the power of incumbency as, say, a Barney Franks. I get all that. But that's no reason to run against your own party. Nobody's going to forget that Congressman Murphy is a Democrat (Sam Caligiuri sure as hell won't let them, anyway), so you'd think he'd focus his campaign on what he and the party have managed to do and on what he's hoping to accomplish the next session. Instead it seems he's going to vote with Republicans and vote against spending. The ridiculous thing about that? Murphy's nothing like a Republican in the House.
Maybe it's my fault I think the ad sucks. Call me a traditionalist, but I think Democrats should run as Democrats and Republicans shouldn't be allowed anywhere near anything that needs governing, at least not until they learn to be good little boys and girls and share. Harry Truman once said "Given the choice between a Republican and someone who acts like a Republican, people will vote for the real Republican all the time," so why would someone who usually doesn't act much like a Republican choose to portray himself as one? I think it's a dumb ad, and it frankly makes me disgusted with the Congressman. I'll still vote for him, but I'll be holding my nose. Until now, I thought I was pretty lucky, having a pretty decent Congressman, but running against his own party? To me, that's low. You're a Democrat for a reason, now sell your constituents on those reasons.