Tim Grieve, the author of Salon magazine’s War Room politics blog, is taking the spokesman for Mitt Romney to task for his recent comments in the The New York Times about the Salvation Army’s bell ringers.

Kevin Madden, the spokesman for the candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, said voters were likely to get annoyed by the amount of political messages they will receive during the forthcoming holiday season. To illustrate his point, he compared the candidates with holiday fund raisers for the Salvation Army.

“No longer will the guy with the Salvation Army bell outside the door be the most annoying person,” Mr. Madden told the Times. “It will be the candidate asking for your vote.”

Mr. Madden wrote Salon later to say that the statement was made tongue in cheek.

“Nevertheless, it was a thoughtless remark and I should have been more careful,” he wrote. “For that, I apologize.”

Mr. Grieve, meanwhile, wrote that the statement will probably not play well with Republican voters.

“We’ve certainly got issues with the Salvation Army, but the Christian conservatives Romney is trying to win over don’t,” Mr. Grieve wrote. “Moreover, the group does claim that its ‘red kettle’ campaign raised $117-million for Americans ‘in need’ last year.”

What do you think? Was Mr. Madden disparaging the Salvation Army, or are the comments being taken too seriously? Click on the comments link below this post to share your thoughts.