Republican National Committee threatens TV stations

[solarbird]

This is strangely blatant. I guess they're reminding TV stations of who controls their licenses to broadcast...

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/03/06/moveon.ads/index.html

RNC tells TV stations not to run anti-Bush ads
GOP committee says MoveOn.org's spots are illegally financed

Saturday, March 6, 2004 Posted: 8:53 PM EST (0153 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Republican National Committee is warning television stations across the country not to run ads from the MoveOn.org Voter Fund that criticize President Bush, charging that the left-leaning political group is paying for them with money raised in violation of the new campaign-finance law.

"As a broadcaster licensed by the Federal Communications Commission, you have a responsibility to the viewing public, and to your licensing agency, to refrain from complicity in any illegal activity," said the RNC's chief counsel, Jill Holtzman Vogel, in a letter sent to about 250 stations Friday.

"Now that you have been apprised of the law, to prevent further violations of federal law, we urge you to remove these advertisements from your station's broadcast rotation."

But MoveOn.org's lawyer, Joseph Sandler, said in a statement that the ads were funded legally, calling the RNC's letter "a complete misrepresentation of the law."

Comments

[banner.livejournal.com]

Drudge has a better acurracy record than all of the newspapers and news networks combined. So there aren't any better sources out there to find.

And the IRS does pay a bounty for people who turn in tax cheats, but don't worry, after being audited several times during the clinton years (I publically protested clinton policies several times, but of course it's probably just a co-incidence that the IRS came after me), I hired a professional to do my taxes and make sure that everything is 100 percent legal.

Oh just FYI, I was opposed to the McCain Fiengold law, I feel it's unconstitutional in it's attack on my 1st amendment rights.

[solarbird]

Drudge isn't too bad; most of the time he just links to other sources, tho' he does obviously release things on his own, too. But he has also said that sometimes he just makes shit up, so you really have to be careful with anything for which he's primary source.

[avram]

Who exactly is compiling this record of Drudge’s? And is there someplace I can see it, so I don’t have to take your word for it?

The one time I looked at a Drudge story in any detail, it was something that was clear and obvious bullshit. (The bare facts he reported were true, but the way he reported them implied things that weren’t.) So I’m not about to trust him.

Looking at MoveOn’s actual site, I see that there are three actual entities: MoveOn.org, a 501(c)(4) organization focused on education and advocacy; I assume this is the one that used to take foreign money. There’s also MoveOn.org PAC, a federal political action committee which helps members elect candidates. And there’s the MoveOn.org Voter Fund, a 527 organization, which runs anti-Bush ads. If they keep their accounts separate, I don’t see how the foreign donations to the advocacy org affect the ad-running org. If the RNC (or Matt Drudge, or you) is claiming that they don’t keep the accounts separate, then I expect to see some evidence.