AS AN AVID Philadelphia Eagles fan, I approached the Super Bowl this year with the same despondency with which Cubs and Red Sox fans approached the World Series. Mostly, I tuned in for the commercials, which turned out to be overshadowed by Janet Jackson's malfunctioning wardrobe. There was one commercial, however, that I didn't see -- MoveOn.org's infamous anti-Bush ad, winner of a host of similarly-themed commercials in a contest sponsored by the Web site. CBS refused to air the inane commercial, and rightly so.
MoveOn.org, a leftist online political organization, sponsored a contest entitled "Bush in 30 Seconds," inviting people to create their own anti-Bush commercials. The winner, "Child's Pay," is a montage of shots featuring children working in various down-trodden jobs with gloomy expressions, followed by the line, "Guess who's going to pay off President Bush's $1 trillion deficit?"
CBS declined to run the ad during the Super Bowl, citing their long-standing policy against advocacy advertising. MoveOn.org and a handful of activists are now crying censorship, and bias, and the rest of the usual things liberals cry about.
Accuracy, however, appears not to be one of them. I'm not sure where the creators of the commercial got their idea of a trillion dollar deficit, but the current number being thrown around in the media is $480 billion for 2004, projected to fall to $297 billion in 2009 ("Critics Blister Bush's Budget," FoxNews.com, Feb. 3). The $480 billion figure is still a large number, yes, but $520 billion less than the ad would lead us to believe.
MoveOn.org had previously run into a bit of controversy over two other ad submissions that appeared on their "Bush in 30 Seconds" site, both of which unabashedly compared President Bush to Hitler and provoked the anger of The Simon Weisenthal Center, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Congress, among others. The two ads are apparently not endorsed by MoveOn.org, and according to Wes Boyd, founder of MoveOn.org, somehow "slipped through our screening process" ("Wes Boyd Sets Record Straight", www.prweb.com,Jan. 9). Oops.
It comes as no surprise, then, that CBS simply chose not to deal with the organization. Aside from the fact that CBS consistently refuses to grant airtime to advocacy groups of all sides, a point conveniently ignored by MoveOn.org's supporters, the network is still reeling from the controversy over the rather biased "Reagans" miniseries, originally scheduled to air on CBS and later pulled after harsh backlash. In the wake of that uproar, no one can blame them for trying to avoid the same mistake.
CBS is, after all, a business. While major networks are required to grant equal airtime to political candidates, all other advertisements run at the network's discretion. MoveOn.org's commercial did not endorse a particular candidate; it didn't really endorse much of anything other than a vague "Bush will single-handedly ruin our children's futures" kind of idea. CBS' decision to avoid the inevitable backlash over the ad is one of financial practicality, not censorship.
MoveOn.org advocates support their censorship cry by citing CBS' decision not to air a risqué PETA ad during the Super Bowl as well, supposedly because the network doesn't support PETA's ideals. The ad featured two sexy ladies and an impotent pizza delivery man. I hardly think the decision to pull the commercial had much to do with CBS's feelings about vegetarianism.
The supporters also claim that CBS does indeed air advocacy ads, ones that warn against drunk driving and encourage people to vote. Perhaps this is a good point. When MoveOn.org supporters can find a valid group that supports drunk driving and/or voter apathy, we might have an interesting debate here.
According to CBS, MoveOn.org's ultimate motive behind all their hysteria is simply to garner free publicity for themselves by submitting controversial ads, knowing they will be rejected. Similarly, what MoveOn.org neglects to mention in all of this hoopla is that their commercial has already been running on CNN for days. Perhaps they felt that not enough people had seen it. Perhaps they felt that a clever way to get more publicity would be to submit the ad to a network and time slot that they knew would reject it, and then they could get all upset about it, and we'd all log on to their Website to see it, and voila -- instant fame. But that's just a hypothetical, of course.
MoveOn.org has, of course, the right to create and promote any commercial that its little heart desires -- and if it can get it on the air, that's super. Its ridiculous accusations of censorship, however, are unfounded and used only to garner free publicity. And, before any of you MoveOn.org-lovers send me mean letters, just remember: You just got a whole column's worth of free publicity. I'm just doing you a favor.
(Kristin Brown's column appears Wednesdays in the Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at kbrown@cavalierdaily.com.)
Read More
PARTING SHOT: You only get what you give
By Delores Cyrus | 13 hours agoThe people at this place have taught me that letting others in, while not always easy, is always worth it.
PARTING SHOT: Life lessons
By Miriella Jiffar | 18 hours agoThroughout my time on the Life Desk, I’ve wondered what breathes life into this University.
PARTING SHOT: Staying the course
By Elizabeth Parsons | YesterdayStorytelling is powerful, and writing for The Cavalier Daily has empowered me to share my own stories and the stories of others.
