The 2006 election is over, and the 2008 election is 718 days away. So why is a pro-choice Republican group launching a controversial advertising campaign in Pennsylvania TV markets this week?

A week that was supposed to be the first in six months fully devoid of political ads?

"Our ad, which is, you know, purposely divisive, could have hurt Republicans in certain races," said Jennifer Stockman, national co-chair of the Republican Majority for Choice, itself an outgrowth of the former national Republican Pro-Choice Coalition.

The political action group, which focuses on abortion rights and other privacy issues, decided to wait until after the election to air the ads, with the hopes of getting an early jump on the 2008 presidential race.

The ad -- which began airing Sunday, only in Pennsylvania -- asks viewers, "What is the Republican Party today? Is it the party of Abe Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan?"

Or is it a vocal minority of extremists?, the advertisement asks, flashing images of evangelists Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Ted Haggard, as well as the ousted U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum.

The answer, the group hopes, is the party of Lincoln. The Pennsylvania ad slots, which cost nearly $500,000, were purchased before the Nov. 7 election, meaning the GOP group was taking a calculated gamble that the results would be a rebuke to the socially conservative wing of the party, and a victory for Democrats and social moderates. In particular, the group was banking on a Santorum loss, hoping a lopsided margin would show Republicans that they need to move toward the electoral center to win future state and national elections.

The controversy comes with the original version of the ad, which included Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter and former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge on its roster of heroic moderates.

Those images drew complaints from both Mr. Specter and Mr. Ridge, neither of whom wanted to be included in the attack on the recently fallen junior senator.

"The tenor, tactics and personal attacks of the ad don't fit with the way Tom Ridge works," Michele Nix, spokeswoman for Mr. Ridge, told The Philadelphia Inquirer. "He campaigned for Rick Santorum and doesn't believe he deserves to be called an 'extremist.' " Mr. Ridge, in fact, appeared in a late-October television spot urging Pennsylvanians to vote for Mr. Santorum.

Likewise, Mr. Specter, in a letter to the Republican Majority for Choice, wrote "I do not want to be associated with any advertisement that criticizes our fellow Republicans."

Ms. Stockman said her group had edited the ads, subtracting Messrs. Specter and Ridge, by Saturday, but in some markets the original ad still ran because the new versions were delivered too late. By now, the only version of the advertisement being aired is the updated one.

Removing the two Pennsylvania statesmen from the ad was a favor, but not a legal requirement, since the images of their faces are in the public domain and can be used in campaign ads by any group, from any party.

With the ad, the group's campaign arm, called Real Republican Majority, hopes to persuade the rank-and-file GOP that the heart and soul of the party lie in tolerance, choice and less obtrusive government, not an "extreme" agenda "that is both intrusive and alienating."

The ad campaign is part of an ongoing attempt to tweak the group's image, making it into a "big tent" organization that can look beyond the abortion issue, wrapping its arms around immigration, national security and excess government spending. Yet just two years ago, the group changed to its current name to reflect the fact that "73 percent of Republicans believe that the right to choose should be a woman's decision, not the government's," the group said at the time.

The group, under its old name, was founded in 1991, hoping to make its mark on the 1992 presidential election. Though they consider themselves Republicans in good standing, some of their members and directors, both out of choice and out of necessity, run in the same circles as do members of the National Abortion Rights Action League and the National Organization for Women and the Planned Parenthood federation, all of which are considered liberal groups. In May 2002, for example, representatives from all of the groups met at Chatham College for a conference on women's reproductive rights. Those alliances, informal though they may be, are enough to prompt open warfare with much of the religious right.

As a result of the intra-party opposition, and despite drawing support and money from the likes of Pittsburgh's Elsie Hillman (she sits on the board of directors), former President Gerald Ford, Barry Goldwater's wife and, yes, Mr. Specter, the group believes its agenda of moderation has been scraped to the margins, especially over the past six years -- and especially at election time.

They hope those days are over.

"I'm not any fan of a Democrat, trust me," Ms. Stockman said. But she noted that one of the reasons state Treasurer Bob Casey defeated Mr. Santorum was because the senator has made a career of proselytizing on issues like religion and abortion.

"Our belief is that the party has gone to the extreme right," she said. "We hope the ad will start what will be a post-election dialogue of why the party failed."

The ad campaign begins in Pennsylvania, but the group hopes to be on the air in Iowa or New Hampshire -- the states with the earliest primaries -- within the next six months.