We've just learned that MoveOn is about to sink half a million dollars into a huge ad buy in North Carolina linking Elizabeth Dole, who's facing a tough re-election fight, to John McCain and Big Oil.

Here's a first look at MoveOn's spot, which will run statewide starting tomorrow night:

The ad, which highlights GOP support for tax breaks for oil companies, will be released sometime today in honor of McCain's high-profile trip to an oil rig.

It's likely that the spot foreshadows more ads from MoveOn linking GOP Senate incumbents to Big Oil and McCain. Though some polls show public preference for McCain's position on drilling, MoveOn and Dems believe that hammering away at the links between the GOP and the big oil companies can change the conversation in their favor.

You may have heard by now that former MoveOn chief Tom Matzzie has set up a new third-party effort with the somewhat unorthodox goal of targeting big GOP donors who support Swift Boat Vet-style efforts on the right.

The group, called Accountable America, is firing off a letter to hundreds of would-be donors warning them of the downsides of supporting such efforts.

We've got a copy of the letter, which you can read right here.

"Many of the leading donors to 501(c) and 527 organizations have had their business and personal affairs closely scrutinized by the media and well funded watchdog groups," the letter says in a not-so-implicit threat. It continues that the result of such probes could be "fines" and "public disclosure of anonymous donors."

The letter also vows that the group "will publicize the political and business relationships and corrupt activities of donors" to such efforts, and it actually has emblazoned at the top the word "warning."

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MoveOn is starting to put money into ads in the Congressional races for the first time this cycle, pumping a series of radio ads into the districts of six House Republicans.

The spots, which MoveOn just sent over to us, hammer each GOPer for taking money from Big Oil and backing offshore drilling. The ads describe drilling as a "gimmick," adding: "We wouldn't see a drop of oil from offshore drilling for at least ten years. By then, who knows what prices will be."

You can view a list of the targeted GOPers and listen to the ads here.

The GOP appears to be hanging on to an advantage in polls on this issue, so the more we see of efforts like this to persuade people that the drilling "solution" is a sham, the better.

MoveOn sends over a new ad that's meant as a sequel to their earlier "Alex" spot, which featured a mother asking John McCain if her baby would be bound for Iraq under his "100 years" policy.

The new spot is about gas prices, and features a worried middle-aged man directly addressing McCain and telling him that he'd "let me and my kids down" by pushing the "gimmick" of off-shore drilling as a genuine solution to the gas crisis...

The idea with the spot is to dispel any lingering conception folks might have of McCain as a genuine reformer. MoveOn will be spending at least $150,000 on the spot, and it will likely run on national cable and in key states, though where exactly hasn't been determined.

MoveOn goes up with a new ad attacking John McCain for opposing a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq:

The spot says that Americans and Iraqis want this thing to end, while McCain would continue to spend "hundreds of billions" to keep our troops in Iraq for "years and years."

MoveOn will spend $100,000 to run the air on national cable, suggesting that the target audience is largely an insider one.

The Obama campaign has thus far refrained from calling on McCain to fire Charlie Black, the top adviser who stirred up a big brouhaha the other day by saying that a terror attack on U.S. soil would help McCain's campaign.

But now Obama ally MoveOn is calling for just that. The group blasted out an email to supporters moments ago that echoes some tough language from Change to Win, the coalition of unions backing Obama...

Our allies at Change to Win have called for McCain to fire Charlie Black, saying "the memory of all those who died on 9-11 demand it." We couldn't agree more.

Surely the Obama team is glad to have MoveOn staking out a left flank and keeping the story alive. Full MoveOn email after the jump.

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MoveOn, the advocacy group supporting Barack Obama, has decided to permanently shutter its 527 operation, partly in response to the Illinois Senator's insistence that such groups should not spend on his behalf during the general election, I've learned from the group's spokesperson.

MoveOn's decision, which will dramatically impact the way it raises money on Obama's behalf, is yet another sign of how rapidly Obama is taking control of the apparatus that's gearing up on his behalf.

By shuttering its 527, MoveOn is effectively killing its ability to raise money in huge chunks from labor unions, foundations, and big donors who would give over $5,000. The decision doesn't mean MoveOn will stop spending on Obama's behalf. Instead it will raise money exclusively with its political action committee, whose average donation is below $50 and will even be raising money with things like bake sales starting this weekend.

To put this in perspective, MoveOn's 527 raised $20 million for the general election in 2004 -- and at least half of that came from donations over $5,000.

"This is an affirmation that we, like Senator Obama, believe that this election can be won by ordinary Americans giving small donations," MoveOn spokesperson Ilyse Hogue told me.

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MoveOn, a major Obama supporter, goes up with this tough new ad attacking McCain's ties to lobbyist Charlie Black...

The ad, which is pretty vivid and arresting, paints Black's client list as a kind of global murderer's row of tinpot dictators and thugs.

The spot is running on national cable, which suggests that it's partly intended for media and political insiders. It's perhaps an effort to gain some free media, to keep reporters in the hunt on the McCain-lobbyists story, and to get pundits to stop reflexively granting McCain reformer credentials.

Adam Green, a spokesperson for MoveOn, a major Obama supporter, has just hit the Illinois Senator hard for his Fox appearance in a piece for The Huffington Post:

It was a mistake for Obama to go on FOX's Sunday show and treat the experience as if it was a real news interview. Democratic politicians need to understand that FOX is a Republican mouthpiece masquerading as a news outlet. When dealing with FOX, you either burn them or they will burn you...

FOX's power lies not in its audience size -- which is puny and consists mostly of unpersuadable voters. Instead, FOX's power comes from tricking politicians and real journalists into treating their "breaking stories" like real news, thereby propelling smears like the Swift Boats and Rev. Wright into the mainstream political dialogue. That's why progressives fought (successfully) last year to deprive FOX of the legitimacy that comes with hosting a Democratic presidential debate. And that's why Democratic politicians should never treat FOX like a real news outlet -- including FOX's Sunday show.

The MoveOn spokesperson also points to the Obama senior adviser's suggestion to this site that Obama was going on to "take Fox on":

Barack Obama's campaign made a promise before this weekend's appearance. They said he would "take Fox on" -- inspiring hope among those who watched Bill Clinton in 2006, Chris Dodd in 2007, and progressive activist Lee Camp in 2008 delegitimize FOX on the air. But Obama didn't do that, and he suffered as a result.

Hard to miss the mention of Bill's now-infamous episode, in which he took on the very same Fox anchor -- Chris Wallace -- that Obama was interviewed by yesterday.

Green just confirmed to me that this is MoveOn's official statement on this matter. The rest here.

Late Update: Markos agrees.

A spokesperson for MoveOn, which is backing Obama, tells me that their petition calling on super-delegates to follow the will of the people and back the leader in pledged dels has pulled in ...

...over 257,000 signatures and counting...since yesterday.

In a sign that the spin wars over the super-delegates are starting to heat up in a big way, MoveOn has just jumped into the fight, sending out a mass email asking supporters to sign a petition urging super-delegates to back whoever wins the popular vote.

"The superdelegates are under lots of pressure right now to come out for one candidate or the other," reads the petition from MoveOn, which has endorsed Obama. "We urgently need to encourage them to let the voters decide between Clinton and Obama -- and then to support the will of the people."

MoveOn says that if they get 200,000 signatures this week, they'll publish the petition as an ad in USA Today.

Late Update: A MoveOn spokesperson says that the criterion the supers should use to determine the will of the people is whoever is ahead in pledged delegates at the end of the day.

MoveOn gives us advance word on how much they've raised for Obama since midday yesterday: $357,000, with contributions still coming in.

"The Obam-a-mentum fundraiser has been our biggest fundraiser yet this year," MoveOn executive director Eli Pariser will say in a statement soon to go out to reporters. “Our members have not finished giving and none of the contributions through our site have been added yet to the Obama campaign fundraising totals. We are thrilled we’ll be able to add to Senator Obama’s big day."

It's kind of a sign of the times that hundreds of thousands in a single day probably won't surprise a lot of people, given the current astronomical sums we're seeing. But it is significant that MoveOn will keep chugging as a financial engine for Obama. And keep in mind that the MoveOn money is in addition to, not part of, the more than $7 million that the Obama camp raised since Super Tuesday.

Separately on the fundraising front, this is kind of amusing: Emily's List is now using, of all things, Chris Matthews' on-air buffoonery as a fundraising tool for Hillary. The Tweety Effect lives!

A spokesperson for MoveOn, which is backing Obama, just confirmed to me that none of the more than $7 million that the Obama campaign has raised since Super Tuesday came from the group's fundraising efforts.

"The numbers announced by the Obama campaign don't include any fundraising MoveOn has done on their behalf," MoveOn communications director Ilyse Hogue says.

This appears to put a crimp in the Hillary campaign's argument -- in terms of this $7 million, at least -- that their lag in fundraising is partly due to the fact that they're not just up against the Obama camp, but MoveOn as well.

MoveOn is in fact in the midst of a fundraising drive for Obama, and the group tells me that they'll be releasing the totals raised for him this afternoon -- which means still more money flowing Obama's way today. So in the broader sense, Camp Hillary is right -- they are up against Obama and MoveOn, but given that these numbers are broken out separately, it's hard to see how this can be used to explain away her lower numbers.

We'll keep you posted on those MoveOn totals when we get them.

This is interesting: A coalition of right-wing bloggers and MoveOn that helped force several networks to allow public use of their political debate footage last spring has just launched a similar campaign against Fox News.

Fox recently sent letters to all the GOP Presidential candidates "cease and desist" from using Fox footage in any way. In response, the right-wing bloggers and MoveOn are demanding that Fox rescind these cease and desist orders and allow public use of its debate footage.

In a press release just blasted out by MoveOn, RedState.com founder Eric Erickson, a prominent right-wing blogger, is quoted saying: "Already FOX is viewed as a partisan network by the Democrats, who will not use that forum for debates...Every other news organization has liberated their debate footage and FOX should either be no different or no longer have the privilege of airing debates."

The primary concern of the right-wing bloggers seems to be that if they can't use Fox debate footage on their sites, it hampers their ability to comment on the GOP primary and on politics in general. MoveOn, for its part, opposes Fox because its refusal to allow use of debate footage could "stifle debate."

One reason this campaign is interesting is that similar version of this alliance has had success before. After it launched a similar campaign last spring and gained considerable attention, CNN, ABC and NBC all agreed to allow use of its debate footage.

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