New McCaine Web ad compares Obama to Heston's Moses

Washington, August 2 : A new Web advertisement released by U.S. presidential candidate John McCain's campaign compares his competitor Barack Obama to Charlton Heston's movie character Moses. The ad seeks to portray what it says is Obama's smugness and false regal perception with a new comparison - to Charlton Heston's famous Hollywood version of the biblical character.

It begins with narrator's voice referring to Obama as "The One", the nickname McCain aides are using for their opponent and the aura around him.

The ad even contains sound bites from Obama.

The Obama campaign has criticised the ad, and accused McCain of "juvenile antics".

McCain, however, insists that he was running a "respectful" campaign, and brushed off complaints from critics and even some supporters that his tone had taken a sharply negative turn of late.

Since the new ad was not set for broadcast on any TV stations, the campaign was counting on it to attract viewers by circulating broadly on the Web.

In the advertisement, when the Red Sea parts under Heston's outstretched hand, there emerges the Obama campaign's version of the presidential seal, which it abandoned after a brief appearance on the campaign trail.

"It's downright sad that on a day when we learned that 51,000 Americans lost their jobs, a candidate for the presidency is spending all of his time and the powerful platform he has on these sorts of juvenile antics," foxnews.com quoted Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan as saying.

Defending the ads, McCain said: "I don't think our campaign isn't negative in the slightest. We think it's got a lot of humor in it, we're having fun and enjoying it. ... We'll continue to fight and scrap all the way to November 4."

ANI