A Last-Minute Entry for Fail of the Year

2009 was a year full of scandals and acts of stupidity, and although I have no intention of making a top 10 list of fails of the year, there's still something that happened last week that deserves to be ridiculed as we rid ourselves of some of the baggage from the previous decade. The fail I'm referring to is a recent political advertisement from Andy Martin, a Republican candidate running for the senate seat that Obama once held. Here's the transcript of the radio ad:

ANDY MARTIN: I'm Andy Martin, Republican candidate for United States Senator. I approve this message because Illinois Republicans deserve the truth about their candidates.

I have over 40 years of experience and integrity fighting corruption and fighting for the truth in politics. I helped expose many of Barack Obama's lies in 2008.

Today I am fighting for the facts about Mark Kirk. Illinois Republican leader Jack Roeser says there is a solid rumor that Kirk is a homosexual. Roeser suggests that Kirk is part of a Republican Party homosexual club. Lake County Illinois Republican leader Ray True says Kirk has surrounded himself with homosexuals.

Mark Kirk should tell Republican voters the truth.

I'm Andy Martin, a Republican you can trust, for United States Senator. Please vote for Andy Martin.

ANNOUNCER: Paid for by Illinois Republicans for Andy Martin.

This is not the first time that Martin has made unusual accusations, as evidenced by his credit for starting the rumor that Obama was a Muslim, and as with the Obama accusations, this isn't the first time that his assertions are based on a single source. Let's face it: Just because someone calls someone else gay does not mean it's necessarily so. It's especially a rumor of questionable veracity when the candidate in question has married a woman before.

But the questionable accuracy of this ad isn't the only reason why it's such a fail. It fails because the Martin's campaign spent enough money to buy a full minute of time to talk to his consituents, and the most convincing reason he could come up with for voters to support him was: "Vote for me because there's a chance that my opponent might be gay."

Overall, this is definitely a ridiculous ad that reaches the ranks of failing political ads from earlier in the decade like the one in which Saxby Chambliss copped a feel of his own granddaughter and Mike Gravel's "Rock" ad.