The latest trio of attack ads – a Splat Trick? – from the 2012 presidential campaign (all via Politico’s Morning Score):

Obama Campaign Brings the Bain

The hardworking staff at first thought this was a 2:03 web video – but it’s actually a two-minute TV spot from the Obama campaign running in the usual swingspects: Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Colorado, and Virginia.

Description:

Kansas City’s GST Steel had been making steel rods for 105 years when Romney and his partners took control in 1993. They cut corners and extracted profit from the business at every turn, placing it deeply in debt. When the company eventually declared bankruptcy, workers not only lost their jobs but were denied their full pensions and health insurance, and the government was forced to step in and provide a bailout.

The spot:

Killer quote: “It was like watching an old friend bleed to death.”

GOP Group Yokes Obama to Wall Street

Republican independent expenditure group American Future Fund “is launching a $3.4 million, five-day, eight-state counter-assault . . . that ties President Obama to Wall Street.”

The spot, which begins with Obama saying “I did not run for office to be helpin’ out a bunch of, y’know, fat cat bankers on Wall Street”:

Killer quote:

“Guess who gave $42 million to Obama’s last campaign for president? Wall Street bankers and financial insiders, more than any other candidate in history.”

Disregard the fact that Wall Street regrets backing Obama more than any other candidate  in history.

MoveOn.org’s Mitt Romney Drive-By

“A 30-second spot from MoveOn.org’s political action wing, timed to Obama’s speech at Barnard today, suggests Romney moved to the right on women’s issues to secure the Republican nomination and features various women saying they won’t let him pivot back toward the middle. The script, read by various females looking into the camera:”

Congratulations, Mitt Romney! You’re the presumed GOP nominee
and all you had to do was
threaten to let our employers take away our contraception coverage
threaten to let our insurance companies charge us more, just because we’re women
and threaten to get rid of Planned Parenthood, a life-saving source of healthcare for million of women
So this November, we’re gonna remember
how you threw women under the bus, just to get the nomination.

The spot:

Of course, none of those women would have voted for Romney at gunpoint under any circumstances, so the ad is a sort of empty exercise.

Which pretty much describes this entire enterprise.