Wolves In Sheep's Clothing

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"Some of the United States' best-heeled corporations and capitalists, seeking to elect a Republican Congress in November, have turned to a gambit pioneered nearly 70 years ago by rulers of the Soviet Union," Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist Joel Connelly writes. "The underlying reason: Sheep's clothing is often needed for wolves to stalk their prey." With elections drawing near, industry-sponsored front groups are flooding the air waves with their anonymous messages. The drug company sponsored United Seniors Association spent more than $1 million to boost embattled Rep. George Gekas (R-Penn.) in his re-election race. "Before his death Friday in a plane crash, Democratic Sen. Paul Wellstone was targeted with a $1 million hostile TV media buy for the last two weeks of Minnesota's Senate campaign," Connelly writes. "The ad time was bought by a group called Americans for Job Security. It also has bought up to $1 million worth of late-campaign media in New Hampshire, $480,000 in Missouri, and $625,000 in Colorado." Americans for Job Security does not give out its contributor list, but Connelly reports that it was founded in 1997 with $1 million in seed money from the American Insurance Association and $1 million from the American Forest and Paper Association.