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Ad Watch: A Miami Herald look at campaign ads

• Campaign: Florida's 25th Congressional district

• Candidate: Republican U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart

• Opponents: Democrat Joe Garcia

• Available on the web:www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo-GQc9LsfY

• TV markets: Statewide

• Nickname:``Enron-Joe''

In a new television ad, similar to an earlier one, the narrator talks of America's current financial crisis. A large FBI logo flashes on screen with a newspaper headline about current investigations into alleged financial wrongdoing by CEOs. Floating dollar bills appear, followed by an old photo of Garcia intertwined with one of late Ken Lay, Enron's convicted CEO. The words ''Corrupt'' and ''Obscene profits'' from other articles referring to Lay -- not Garcia -- flash on the screen, along with a narration saying that Garcia attempted to ''gain favor'' with Lay.

``With America gripped by financial crisis, the FBI has launched an investigation into fraud, misreporting, the millions going to executives at the heart of it all. So Joe Garcia is the last person we should ever send to Washington. Because Garcia's attempts to gain favor with Enron's convicted CEO will never be forgotten by the millions who lost jobs, retirements, everything. Aren't we hurting enough? Enron-Joe has got to go!

By mixing the old with the new, the Diaz-Balart ad attempts to implicate challenger Garcia in the current financial scandal by linking him to high-spending CEO Ken Lay, who died in 2006. Lay was head of Enron when it collapsed in 2002, sparking an earlier American financial crisis, an FBI probe of Lay (not Garcia) and the negative headlines used in this spot. The ad says Garcia tried to ''gain favor'' with Lay. It's true that Garcia's name appeared in a 2001 memo sent by Lay to the Bush-Cheney Transition team, listing candidates for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. (Garcia had served as chairman of Florida's Public Service Commission.) Garcia acknowledges that Lay called him, but says nothing came of their brief exchanges. ''Eventually, Mr. Lay is the one who blocked me from from being named to the commission because I was a registered independent and not a Republican,'' Garcia said.

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