Friday, January 07, 2005

NAB Twists the Facts on Sinclair

In a self-serving twist of logic, the industry lobbyists at the National Association of Broadcasters now see the Sinclair flap as making the case for deregulation. The NAB has turned complaints over Sinclair Broadcasting's and Pappas Telecasting's partisan abuse of public airwaves into arguments against new public interest obligations for broadcasters. The NAB said, the fact that Sinclair only aired portions of an anti-Kerry documentary, after pressure from advertisers and others, and the FCC's decision to require Pappas to give equal time to opposing candidates, showed that marketplace forces and current FCC regs were sufficient. Expect no less from the shills at the NAB.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

FOR YEARS THE COMMUNIST,LEFT WING MEDIA IN THIS COUNTRY HAS HAD ITS WAY BY BEING PARTISAN. NOW THE AMERICANS ARE FIGHTING BACK AND THEY CANT STAND IT. RICH

Anonymous said...

FOR YEARS THE COMMUNIST,LEFT WING MEDIA IN THIS COUNTRY HAS HAD ITS WAY BY BEING PARTISAN. NOW THE AMERICANS ARE FIGHTING BACK AND THEY CANT STAND IT. RICH

Timothy Karr said...
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Timothy Karr said...

Actually, Sinclair's Mark Hyman is on record as saying that their initial plan was to air "Stolen Honor" in its entirety.

This was also the initial communication to the news directors at their 62 stations. I checked the online TV schedules of most all of the stations at the time, and, sure enough, most had blocked out time for "Stolen Honor."

The controversy then grew to a fever pitch and Hyman began to backpedal. First, saying that they would have a studio discussion after the airing that would allow the Kerry campaign time to respond to allegations made in the film.

Later, after their stock value had fallen in response to the negative publicity, Sinclair announced that they were going to air a program called "A POW Story: Politics, Pressure and the Media." They asked their local stations to make a last minute change to their schedules and told the press that the resulting program [which was a hastily assembled defense of Sinclair's right to free speech] had been their intention all along, and that pressure from the public, advertisers and investors had nothing to do with it.

Quite simply, Sinclair was lying. Their initial plan was to use our airwaves in a brazen attempt to push their political agenda and influence the outcome of the elections. It was halted by an extensive public campaign to shame and punish Sinclair.