Attack Ads!

This year marks the fifth time that I've run for Congress. I have never had ads run against me ten months before the election - until now. These right-wingers must have money to burn. The GOP Strategy in 2014

The front group running this ad is called Concerned Veterans for America. What they seem most concerned about is that I might be reelected to Congress.

Let me go through their brainwashing agitprop with you. Their disinformation ad features a father and daughter who are veterans. They claim that they are very unhappy with VA medical care. ("Government-run healthcare means disaster," says the ad.) According to them, VA medical care is the same as Obamacare. ("If you really want to know what Obamacare is going to be like, look at the VA system," says the ad.) Then the ad throws my face up on the screen. The implication is that I support Obamacare, and therefore, Grayson Must Go.

Regarding VA medical care, no system is perfect, and there's certainly room for improvement.
But it should be noted that according to the University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index, the Veterans Administration enjoys a 94% customer satisfaction rating.

That happens to be the highest customer satisfaction rating that the University of Michigan has ever recorded. Coca Cola, Google, McDonalds and Apple would kill to get a rating like that. If those father and daughter vets are part of the 6% who aren't happy, then we'll do our best to help them. In fact, our constituent service staff helps vets like them every single day. My goodness, I'll help them even though they were suckered into recording a bogus ad against me. I'm that kind of guy.

And as for VA medical care being the same as Obamacare - I wish. The VA medical system essentially is a single-payer system. The government employs VA doctors and nurses, and runs VA hospitals. In contrast, Obamacare attempts to salvage something from the wreckage of the profit-obsessed, dehumanizing, selfish, savage, brutal and lethal private health insurance system that traps roughly half of all Americans, while taking a stab at helping the 50 million Americans who have no health coverage at all, and can't see a doctor when they're sick. If the VA medical system is like Obamacare, then a fish is like a bicycle.

And yes, I do support Obamacare, because it saves lives and it saves money. So shoot me. Which is exactly what this ad is trying to do to my political future.

(Irony alert: the ad asks, "If you're sick or hurt, why should you have to wait to get attention?" Good question. The answer is that Obamacare makes it less likely that you'll have to wait, and far less likely that you'll die waiting.)

Anyway, 2014 has barely started, and they're already running these vicious, fraudulent attack ads against me. Every ad they run against me is trying to win the Academy Award in the categories of Most Hogwash, Twaddle, Rubbish, Hooey, Drivel, Horsefeathers, Poppycock and Bunk. If this is what they're doing in February, then what are they going to be doing in October and November?

We need reach our voters, to dispel the lies. And whether we do it through TV ads, radio ads, internet ads, mail or even yard signs, it all costs money.

Look, I need your help, and I'm going to need it all of the time between now and Election Day. Not once - all the time. If you haven't contributed to our campaign yet, then you need to start now. If you have contributed, then you need to do it again. If you aren't already contributing monthly, then you need to do that - because these rotten attack ads against me are going to run monthly, weekly, daily and hourly. And if you already contribute monthly, God bless you for that, but please consider upping the ante.

This is serious. I need you to pitch in. Every dollar counts, because I count, and you count.

Courage,

Rep. Alan Grayson

Paid for and Authorized by the Committee to Elect Alan Grayson