Skelly on TV

Get ready to see Michael Skelly and his family on TV.

Democratic congressional challenger Michael Skelly brought an unusually early and extensive start Tuesday night to the next season of political TV advertising in the Houston area.

Skelly, who has raised significantly more campaign money than his Republican opponent, Rep. John Culberson, said he will run campaign ads on TV until the Nov. 4 election.

Few candidates for the U.S. House have had the luxury of running TV ads non-stop for 3.5 months. Skelly, an executive of a wind power company, called it a necessity.

"I'm new to the political world. I come from the business world. So I need to work extra hard," he said. "It's as simple as that."

Here's the ad:

Nice, positive spot, and the kids come across well, which is a tricky thing to do. What do you think?

This is the best part of the story:

Culberson noted that he was heavily outspent by an opponent in his first Republican primary for Congress "and I have run against millionaires before, but never against one who raised so much money from outside of Texas."

Skelly has raised less than 25 percent of his money from outside the state, however, while 31 percent of Culberson's donations came from Washington-based political action committees.

Culberson also wrote that he is "completely focused on doing my job representing District 7, and I am confident that as long as I continue to do the right things for the right reasons, the politics will follow."

In an electronic text message to a network of people, however, Culberson said on Sunday, "Big day tomorrow; must keep raising $$ since my multimillionaire opponent has infinite $$$."

Oops. Hold still, Congressman, I think you've got something in your eye. Nice to see the Chron following Culberson on Twitter, by the way. It really is a useful resource, isn't it?

Posted by Charles Kuffner on July 16, 2008 to Election 2008