Sen. Ted Stevens and Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich are trading ad blows this week in a pair radio spots in the race for U.S. Senate.

First, the Stevens campaign accused Begich of talking out of both sides of his mouth. Stevens' commercial says Begich promised Alaskans he'd battle to open ANWR, then told a popular left-leaning blog he'd be "cautious" about drilling and would wait until "the environment is right."

Begich responded Monday with a commercial of his own, talking directly to Stevens, who is in court this week fighting federal corruption charges. In the clip, Begich says he strongly supports opening ANWR.

"Senator, with all due respect, doubletalk isn't something you should be accusing anyone of right now," Begich says in the clip.

The fight comes in the middle of a bizarre election season, with Stevens stuck a good part of the time in trial in Washington, D.C., and Gov. Sarah Palin soaking up much of the political spotlight in her bid for the vice presidency.

The ads mark the first time Stevens and Begich have directly attacked each other. Until now, the candidates left the barbs to their respective state political parties.

The flare-up also comes at time when a D.C.-based group that works to get Democrats elected is flooding Alaska airwaves with commercials hammering Stevens.

In August, the Huffington Post blog posted a story about Begich's Senate bid.

On the subject of ANWR, the Web site reported that Begich "respectfully bucks the party line on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge."

It then quoted Begich saying: "On exploration and drilling [I'm] supportive, but carefully cautious about it, if that makes sense ... I'm not just going to do it really willy-nilly. But we'll do it when the environment is right."

The Stevens campaign leapt on the statement in a radio ad last week. "It's no wonder the global hot air crowd is pumping big bucks into the Begich pipeline," the commercial says.

The Begich campaign said Stevens was trying to distort Begich's record and swung back with an ad of its own. "With all that's going wrong in our country, we deserve better than desperate attacks," Begich says in the clip.

So what did Begich mean about being cautious on ANWR?

"What he meant was that just the right balance of drilling and protecting the incredible resources that we have in Alaska," said spokeswoman Julie Hasquet. "But he certainly doesn't mean that he's hesitant to open ANWR."

"Probably wasn't the best choice of words that day on the Huffington Post," she said.