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Stolen Honor: Sinclair Under Fire
worm eater writes "The Sinclair Broadcasting Group, in its latest politically charged move, has announced that it will air a 90-minute anti-Kerry documentary a week before the election. The video, 'Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal,' was funded by a group of Pennsylvania POWs that has merged with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Sinclair, which is the largest TV broadcasting group in the nation, has 62 affiliates, many in swing states. It made news in April by refusing to let any of its affiliates air an edition of Nightline in which Ted Koppel read the names of US soldiers who had died in Iraq, saying the broadcast was politically motivated. Predictably, liberal blogs are fighting back."
But on the other hand, they don't give an affirmative statement that the documentary is not intended to attack Kerry.
Since they're basically slashdotted, this is on their front page:
We welcome your comments regarding the upcoming special news event featuring the topic of Americans held as prisoners of war in Vietnam. The program has not been videotaped and the exact format of this unscripted event has not been finalized. Characterizations regarding the content are premature and are based on ill-informed sources.
Massachusetts Senator John Kerry has been invited to participate. You can urge him to appear by calling his Washington, D.C. campaign headquarters at
(202) 712-3000.
if you would like to make further comments on this matter, you may do so at:
comments@sbgi.net
Yah, get *this* straight:
F/911 was a film produced for cinemas. You know, the kind you have to actively seek out and pay for!
Stolen Honor is an extended ad for the Swift Boat liars that all of the major networks ran away from. So, Sinclair, is using the public airwaves (which they don't own) to broadcast a nakedly partisan *smear* for the Bush campaign.
The two are entirely different. If you can't see that, well, then you are an idiot.
Again, you had to actively seek out and pay for F/911. OTHO, Sinclair is illegally making use of *public* airwaves to broadcast a Bush campaign smear.
They should be sued by their shareholders for such a stupid move.
... and tell them you're not going to be buying their products as long as they support Sinclair. Hurt Sinclair where it really stings - in the wallet.
List of Advertisers
Furthermore, just in case you don't think your phone call will do anything, see a little morale-booster from Kos.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/e1/equaltime.asp
a Federal Communications Commission rule that requires equal air time for all major candidates competing for political office. It was preceded by the fairness doctrine, abolished in 1987, which required radio and television broadcasters to air contrasting views on controversial public issues.
wow. So many open targets...where to begin...
1. Michael Moore doesn't own 62 stations, and he didn't force anyone to show his movie. He made it, and people gladly lined up to see it. It may have been a little too conspiritorial in a few places, but no one has proved it untrue, and it's certainly not showing up masquerading as a news show.
2. Despite what you are determined to believe, while the memos may have proven to be fake, the 'real facts' did in fact get out and guess what, they support what's expressed in the memos. That's what made it possible to verify them. Everyone and their brother agreed that what's in them is true.
3. George Soros also has not forced anyone to broadcast anything. He's written a rational essay, and paid for it to be dispatched like any other advertising. See point #1.
Now if Dan Rather had put Fahrenheit 9/11 on TV and dressed it up as news, then you might have a point, but you seem to be hanging on to your simplistic views a little too tightly.
It's not flaming when someone brings up legitimate points.
Sinclair has every right to show this film on their networks except during election season. There are rules and regulations that must be followed. If they show this film then they must also show anti-Bush propoganda for the exact amount of time (Farenheit 9/11 would be a good fit, but it is by no means the only film available).
Do not forget that they are "pre-empting" (which means, in this case, playing over) regular broadcasting. This will create a huge problem with advertisers who expect their material to be played during regular commercial breaks of certain shows.
Since you brought up Michael Moore's piece, we have all shown you the clear problem with your argument. Farenheit 9/11, while certainly a propoganda piece, was not "pre-empting" regular programming on public airwaves during election season.
So stop whining about the left being so "up in arms" when all they are doing is attempting to bring regulatory entities into this so laws will not be broken.
Here's an explanation of why Sinclair should not be allowed to run this "news segment," in the words of former FCC chairman Reed Hundt (pulled from Talking Points Memo):
Why is it important that Sinclair Broadcasting be urged in all lawful ways that can be imagined to reconsider its decision to broadcast on its television stations the anti-Kerry "documentary"?
Because in a large, pluralistic information society democracy will not work unless electronic media distribute reasonably accurate information and also competing opinions about political candidates to the entire population. Certainly, for the overwhelming number of voters this year, controlling impressions of the candidates for President are obtained from television.
In all countries, candidates for public office governments aspire to have favorable information and a chorus of favorable opinion disseminated through mass media to the citizenry. In a democracy, on the eve of a quadrennial election, the incumbent government plainly has a motive to encourage the media to report positively on its record but also negatively on the rival. But its role instead is to make sure that broadcast television promote democracy by conveying reasonably accurate reflections of where the candidates stand and what they are like.
To that end, since television was invented, Congress and its delegated agency, the Federal Communications Commision, together have passed laws and regulations to ensure that broadcast television stations provide reasonably accurate, balanced, and fair coverage of major Presidential and Congressional candidates. These obligations are reflected in specific provisions relating to rights to buy advertising time, bans against the gift of advertising time, rights to reply to opponents, and various other specific means of accomplishing the goal of balance and fairness. The various rules are part of a tradition well known to broadcasters an honored by almost all of them. This tradition is embodied in the commitment of the broadcasters to show the conventions and the debates.
Part of this tradition is that broadcasters do not show propaganda for any candidate, no matter how much a station owner may personally favor one or dislike the other. Broadcasters understand that they have a special and conditional role in public discourse. They received their licenses from the public -- licenses to use airwaves that, for instance, cellular companies bought in auctions -- for free, and one condition is the obligation to help us hold a fair and free election. The Supreme Court has routinely upheld this "public interest" obligation. Virtually all broadcasters understand and honor it.
Sinclair has a different idea, and a wrong one in my view. If Sinclair wants to disseminate propaganda, it should buy a printing press, or create a web site. These other media have no conditions on their publication of points of view. This is the law, and it should be honored. In fact, if the FCC had any sense of its responsibility as a steward of fair elections its chairman now would express exactly what I am writing to you here.
Maybe partying will help...
Excerpts from "Stolen Honor", from the ever witty Adam Felber.
Look out honey, 'cause I'm using technology; Ain't got time to make no apology
There is an important difference between the "documentary" Sinclair intends to broadcast and F9/11 and the concerts you cite. People actively chose to attend those concerts; they were not broadcast on TV. People paid money to go see F9/11. The concert halls and movie theaters are private property. By contrast, the airwaves are public property, and broadcasters are granted the privelege of using assigned frequencies with the understanding that they will not abuse that privelege. That is why, for example, the FCC levies fines for indecency. It would NOT be OK for a network syndicate to order its stations to broadcast F9/11 uninterrupted before the election, just as Sinclair's plans are not in the public interest.
--- Often in error; never in doubt!
The only thing proven by the memos were that they were fake. The only person they could find that hinted that the view expressed may possibily had some truth was a secretary. His own wife and co-workers denied the memos and almost all claimed that he had only respect for GWB.
/. as you know the moderation here is a joke and that most moderators hold multiple accounts just so they can mod their own posts higher.
I suppose as part of the "BIG LIE" you hope that if you repeat your BS enough it will be believed. I suppose that you post such on
Typical leftist crap, repeat a falsehood enough times that you make people believe it. Works on weak minded people.... of which there are plenty here.
Max Cleland blew himself up with a grenade on the way to get a beer at an air base. While tragic, it is disgusting that he has let people think he was wounded in combat.
There were many more people in the Hanoi Hilton than John McCain, and many of them have repeatedly told stories of how the North Vietnamese played tapes of John Kerry's senate testimony to break their wills.
You named three people. The vets putting this documentary together number over a hundred and many of them were POWs in the Hanoi Hilton.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
bullshit.
they do not own the airways - they have a licence that we the people granted them, and have regulated tighlty.
... hi bingo
Where to begin ?
Lets start by impeaching the credibility of the witness. The secretary is a democrat and a kerry supporter. She wasnt his personel secretary. Last but not least if you watched the interview dan rather did a lovely job of leading her.
If you want further testimony. Col. Killians wife and son both disown the memos, both claim he wouldn't write things like that down. To be fair the son is a republican.
Killians commander disowned the memo's and stated categorically that there was no favoritism for Bush.
Its not that the story has been lost its that there is nothing to it. But to borrow from the man who started 60 minutes "Its a non story even if it is true". What it reveals is the management and staff of 60 minutes and CBS news were willing to whatever it took to damage President Bush. They didn't care if they had to make stuff up because like you they knew it was true so why not it serves the greater good. In case you haven't noticed being willing to do whatever you have to for the greater good is AlQueda's rationale for their actions it was also Timothy McVeighs.
As for Dan Rather this has not been the first case of propaganda he has been party to. It is however the most eggregious.
Well, since we're on the subject of lies, and deception, let's look at the degrees of each of these cases.
While investigating a supposedly thirty-year-old document, a news team discovered that the writer expressed similar reservations verbally. They also discover that the circumstantial facts were all true (missed a physical...outside pressure applied to fudge some paperwork...etc.) News team therefore assumes a document is valid. Sloppy journalism, yes. Personal vendetta by a journalist to sacrifice his career and reputation to smear the President? Doubtful, but some of you will believe anything...
Contrast that to your example. "Everyone and his brother" hasn't expressed similar doubts about Kerry's service. Actually, of all of the servicemen on those 3 patrol boats, ONE EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT has his doubts...the rest of the "everyone" got this information third-hand. They happen to hook up with some Texas political operatives who smeared McCain 5 years ago, they write a book and form a supposed "group" of Swift Boat Vets. Sorry, pretty low on the credibility chart for me.
You, however, seem to have been swept up in the story about the story.
document
While we're on the subject of foregone assumptions,
"everyone and his brother" hasn't expressed doubts about Kerry's service...and while the Swift Boat Vets have Let's see, if we examine what was said
White: Contains facts, no lies.
Grey: Contains facts, half-truths, parts of the story, etc.
Black: Lies. May contain some facts, but definately contains lies.
f9/11 is either white or grey, depending upon whom you talk to. There are no outright lies in it.
The "Swift Boat" stuff is either grey or black, depending upon whom you talk to.
Just because two items are both propaganda does not mean that they are both the same or that they can both be dismissed.
The "Swift Boat" ads are black.
1. No pipleine in afghanistan
a n/david_sar asohn/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1093434977273600.x ml
"However, in 2002 Hamid Karzai and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf agreed to revive (http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?id=674) plans of a trans-Afghan gas pipeline; Alim Razim, Afghanistan's minister for Mines and Industries, described UNOCAL as the "lead company" in the revived plans, although they continue to deny renewed involvement."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fahrenheit_9/11
I'm saving space and not dealing with your other examples. But they are all just as easily debunked.
Now, lies in the "Swift Boat" campaign.
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregoni
"After the ad ran, Elliott told The Boston Globe he'd made "a terrible mistake" in signing the statement accusing Kerry when "I knew it was wrong." The anti-Kerry group later said Elliott was repudiating his repudiation, but he is no longer available to reporter."
Not just lies but cowardice.