Romney makes giant Pa ad buy

The Mitt Romney campaign is making a multi-million broadcast TV ad buy Pennsylvania in an attempt to snuff out Rick Santorum's presidential challenge for good, reports PoliticsPA. The spots start Monday everywhere but Pittsburgh, then come into Santorum's former home town in the week leading up to the April 24 primary.

His SuperPAC is already on cable (ie, Fox News). The campaign's more-expensive broadcast TV buy includes almost 6,000 gross ratings points in the Erie market, nearly 5,000 around Johnstown and more than 3,000 around Philadelphia.

From PP's Keegan Gibson:

Chris Nicholas is a GOP campaign veteran who has bought statewide TV time in multiple states over the past decade, including Pennsylvania. He said the buy is enormous.

“This is an incredible amount of points in two weeks,” he said. “I’ve never bought more than 1,500 a week.”

Industry shorthand suggests that for every 100 GRP, the average viewer sees an ad once. That means the average Erie resident will see a Romney ad 59 times in the next two weeks.