March 17, 2010 02:16 AM UTC

Bennet Starts TV Advertising Campaign Day After Caucuses

•  
• by: RedGreen

( – promoted by Colorado Pols)

The Michael Bennet campaign announced this afternoon it will start running a television ad on Wednesday to introduce the candidate and his campaign to voters.

The message is a sharp stick in the eye of Washington, which Bennet calls “broken,” building on reform measures he introduced earlier this month. It’s the first TV commercial Bennet has ever run, his campaign emphasizes, making the point he’s not a career politician.

Shot in front of Lookout Mountain, the ad also unveils a new Bennet slogan: “I’m Michael Bennet and I approve this message,” he says, “because I’m listening to Colorado.”

The ad will run for two weeks in Denver and Colorado Springs on broadcast and cable at a reported cost in the neighborhood of $300,000.

Watch the ad and read a transcript after the jump.

Here’s a transcript:

Michael Bennet: I’ve been in Washington for only a year.

But it didn’t take that long to see the whole place is broken.

It’s time to give them a wake up call.

That’s why I’m for freezing Congressional pay until we get our economy back on track.

I think senators and congress should lose their health insurance, until they can stop insurance company abuses.

And I’d ban members of congress from ever becoming lobbyists.

I’m Michael Bennet and I approve this message because I’m listening to Colorado.

Lynn Bartels reports on The Spot blog that GOP Chairman Dick Wadhams had a snappy retort to the ad:

Trust Dick Wadhams, chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, to weigh in and not in a good way for Bennet. Said Wadhams: “Bennet says something about only being in Washington for a year.  Interesting comment from someone who was raised in the salons of Washington, D.C. and went to school at the exclusive St. Alban’s School.”