Americans Against Escalation in Iraq and the Campaign to Defend America have launched a new ad in Kentucky on the support Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who is up for reelection in 2008, has given to the President's Iraq policy. The ad looks like this:

I've argued for some time, both on this site and in private conversation, that it's completely in the interest of the Democratic Party and the progressive movement to keep McConnell's feet to the fire by almost continuously running ads exposing how the positions he has taken and the actions he has undertaken are bad for America and out of touch with Kentucky. Even if McConnell isn't to be beaten this cycle -- and let me state for the record that I believe he is beatable, even though it would clearly be a difficult race for the Democrats to win -- keeping him on the defensive, thinking about his obstructionism may hurt him back home, could make it more difficult for him to keep his caucus together in blocking the Democratic agenda. With this in mind I most certainly endorse this ad buy.

Beyond that, I think this ad is important for another reason. By many accounts, General David Petraeus is an outstanding soldier and military mind. But he has acceded to the President's demand that he play a role in American politics by agreeing to be a part of a report on Iraq this September that will apparently be written by the White House to futher their own agenda. Given that the Bush administration and the Republican Party have been more than willing to politicize Petreaus, it is entirely reasonable that they are held to account for the potential political fallout from his comments, in this case that he believes America needs to stay in Iraq for the next decade, which, as President Bush's war czar has suggested may require a reinstatement of the draft.