Senate Dems target McConnell, but without their leader

WASHINGTON - Four years after the GOP successfully sunk the Democratic leader in the U.S. Senate, Democrats are giving Republicans the reverse treatment by going after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

For the last three weeks, national Democrats have barraged Kentucky media markets with television advertisements slamming McConnell (R-Louisville). The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee's newest TV ad, out this week, shows McConnell as a delivery truck driver while a narrator says the Republican "backed George Bush's crazy spending and delivered a $10 trillion debt."

In a press conference today, DSCC Chairman Chuck Schumer was repeatedly pressed on whether the decision to target the opposing party's leader was proper. He responded that after Republicans succeeded in targeting then-party leader Tom Daschle in 2004, Democrats had a free hand to go after McConnell.

"[Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid and I discussed it and the rules of etiquette were broken with Tom Daschle, and maybe they'll be restored after this election, whatever the outcome is in Kentucky," Schumer said.

Publicly, Reid has been far from clear in his view on Schumer's DSCC's going after McConnell.

In an October 2007 joint appearance with McConnell at the University of Louisville's McConnell Center, Reid praised the Republican leader for his understanding of the traditions and functioning of the Senate and contrasted McConnell with prior Republican leader Bill Frist, who actively campaigned against Daschle in the 2004 race.

Frist "really didn't understand the Senate," Reid said then. "Mitch McConnell understands the Senate."

Reid spokesman Jim Manley declined to comment on Schumer's comments today, only saying that Reid had followed through with his vow not to campaign against McConnell.

"Senator Reid decided a long time ago that unlike Senator Frist, who went to South Dakota to campaign against Senator Daschle, he would not go to Kentucky to campaign against Senator McConnell. Senator Reid felt very strongly that what Senator Frist did was counterproductive and did not help the Senate as an institution," said Manley.

Manley did not answer when asked if Reid agreed with the DSCC's decision to target McConnell in TV ads.

At the press conference today, Schumer suggested the decision to go after McConnell had nothing to do with his position as minority leader.

"Let me say this: We did not go after Kentucky's seat any more or less because Mitch McConnell was the party leader," Schumer said. "We went after it like any other seat. We tried to be strategic here and figure out which seats we had the best chance at and focus on them. And from the beginning we thought we had a good chance at Kentucky and that has proved to be true. Whether we win or lose we had a good chance" at the seat.

Public polling shows McConnell in slightly ahead in a dogfight against Democratic businessman Bruce Lunsford. A late October Herald-Leader/WKYT/Research 2000 survey found McConnell leading just 47 percent to 43 percent.