$200 million in TV adverts

ABOUT $200 million (€129m) “has been spent on television advertising during this presidential election year so far, with the overwhelming amount of recent spending coming from the race for the Democratic nomination,” the Wisconsin Advertising Project and TNS Media Intelligence/CMAG has reported.

Democrat Barack Obama has spent $78m (€50m) on ads, they say, which is more than the entire GOP field, who have so far spent $57m.

Democrat Hillary Clinton has spent $49m.

The numbers cover ad spending through the May 20 primaries in Kentucky and Oregon, so some more recent ad buys aren’t included.

In the months studied, Obama’s commercials appeared on the air more than 139,000 times. Clinton paid for 80,500 airings. Both those figures top the total number of ad broadcasts by all Republican candidates — 80,261. Republican John McCain has put ads on TV 16,413 times. He’s well below the figure set by former GOP contender Mitt Romney — 36,841 broadcasts.

Although he may not wear a flag pin on his lapel, nearly 30% of Sen Obama’s campaign ads feature the American Flag. John McCain’s ads contain the flag 60% of the time.