The debate over health care reform hits the air with a television ad targeting Senator Richard Burr and other Republicans who’ve spoken out against the current Democratic reform proposals.

Two groups, “Health Care For America Now” and the “American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees” have launched an ad campaign that points out Members of Congress receive good health care through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program.

The ad then calls into question Senator Richard Burr’s loyalty to health care reform or the insurance company lobbyists.”People like Senator Burr are not sitting down at the table and being a partner for health reform.  He’s going over platitudes, but not sitting down and negotiating the details of the bills,” said Adam Linker, a health reform advocate with the NC Justice Center.

Linker’s  group has partnered with Health Care For America Now in North Carolina.

Senator Richard Burr drafted his own ideas of reform in the Patient Choice Act.

His campaign staff countered the ad with this statement: “The Union backed ad is misleading and is designed to divert attention away from the public’s outcry against the government first plan beig pushed by liberals i Washigto. Senator Burr’s bill ‘The Patient Choice Act’ undermines this labor union’s effort to institute a government controlled healthcare system. We are not surprised they would resort to distorting his efforts of keeping people in control of their own health care.”

Senator Burr told NBC 17 News on Friday he had concerns with empowering the Health and Human Services Secretary to mandate rules for private industry.

“We allow the Secretary of Health and Human Services to decide what the competition looks like, if you’re allowed to do that, it can go anywhere.  So I can’t make the claim that choice continues to exist in the system.  Choice is youo are willing to except something that might be cost prohibitive or that doesn’t have the benefits you are looking for,” said Burr.

On the other side, Linker said “We need the private market invovled, but we need to set some minimum standards for them to compete so no people asrte dropped from their plan when they get sick.  At it’s core, health care reform is about consumer protection.”

RALEIGH, N.C. – U.S. Senator-elect Kay Hagan has filed motions to drop her lawsuit against Elizabeth Dole.

Elizabeth Dole’s ‘Godless Americans’ ad has clearly blown up in her face, as Kay Hagan has now expanded her lead to seven points.

Check this out — a place to creat your own attack ad.

MOUNT AIRY – Opie and Andy Taylor support Barack Obama. And not everyone in Mayberry is happy about it.
In a three-minute video posted last week at www.funnyordie.com, Ron Howard – who played Opie on “The Andy Griffith Show” and has since become an Academy Award-winning director – said that he was going to extreme measures to show his support for Obama, the Democratic candidate for president.

He did so by dressing up as Opie and taking part in a skit with his TV dad, Andy Griffith.

During the skit they talked about the need for change.

Howard then changed costumes to become Richie Cunningham, his character in the popular ’70s sitcom “Happy Days,” and did another endorsement for Obama, this time with Henry Winkler, who played Fonzie.

So far, the video has gotten more than 2 million hits.

The video has been a topic of conversation around Mount Airy, which has built much of its tourist trade on nostalgia for “The Andy Griffith Show” and the fictional Mayberry. Griffith is a native of Mount Airy and based much of the show on the area. Many scripts refer to nearby cities, including Winston-Salem.

Some fans of the show don’t like to see the actors using their roles to take sides in real-life politics.

“A lot of people are surprised at him (Griffith), and disappointed, too,” Russell Hiatt, who runs Floyd’s City Barber Shop on Main Street. “Everybody’s high on Andy.”

But he said he wasn’t shocked by Howard doing the skit.

“I’m not surprised with Opie at all,” Hiatt said. “He hasn’t ever even come here to Mount Airy.”

Joe Brookshire, a tourist from Cordele, Ga., said that the endorsement video “distresses me.”

He and a group of friends, who are McCain supporters, came to Mount Airy because of their fondness for the classic TV show.

“I don’t know if we’d have come if we’d known” about the video, he said.

At Snappy Lunch, manager Mary Dowell said she has heard some talk about the endorsement from customers and staff. Dowell said she understands why Griffith and Howard would want to perform as their beloved characters for the endorsement, rather than do the endorsement as themselves.

“Everyone relates to Andy and Opie,” she said.

Mayor Jack Loftis, a Democrat, said he didn’t expect the video to make much of a difference in the election.

“There’s an awful lot of respect for Andy and Opie both in this town, but I’m not sure it will impact the way people are going to go vote right now,” Loftis said.

“With all the campaigning that’s been going on over a year now, I think everyone would have their minds made up by now.”

Watch the Video

RALEIGH, N.C. – Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole is back on the airwaves with a new ad that again decries her rival’s ties to an atheist group.

Dole says in the ad airing Friday that the faith of Democratic state Sen. Kay Hagan is not the question. The incumbent says the facts are that Godless Americans held a fundraiser in her honor in Boston.

An adviser for Godless Americans held a fundraiser at his home. The event was not billed as a Godless Americans event, and other hosts included an ambassador and U.S. Sen. John Kerry.

Hagan has already filed suit against Dole, saying an initial ad on the subject was defamatory. Lawyers for Dole’s campaign filed a motion on Friday to dismiss the suit.

The letter, from the law firm Boyce & Isley, PLCC to Hagan’s attorneys at Parker Poe Adams and Bernstein, LLP, was delivered to Hagan’s campaign.

Dole ends her new ad by asking voters, “If Godless Americans threw a party in your honor, would you go?”

U.S. Senate Candidate Kay Hagan filed a lawsuit Thursday against Elizabeth Dole and the Elizabeth Dole Committee, Inc., after Dole declined to remove her new television ad that calls Hagan “godless.”

A new ad from those “Wassup” Budweiser guys in 2000 is out, but this time it’s political.

GREENVILLE, N.C. – A federal judge has refused to block election officials from enforcing disclosure rules on a group running an ad critical of Barack Obama’s record on abortion.

U.S. District Judge Malcolm Howard denied Wednesday a request for an injunction by a North Carolina group called the Committee for Truth in Politics.
 
The group said it ran a television commercial in three states accusing Obama of voting against bills in the Illinois Senate that would have protected infants who survived late-term abortions.

The group hasn’t filed federal election reports because its lawyers said disclosing who gave to the group would violate free speech.

Howard wrote the committee’s arguments don’t stand a great likelihood of success.

A group attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment.