Posted on 10/15/2004 1:30:46 PM PDT by Cableguy
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry's campaign Friday morning formally requested equal time to respond to Sinclair stations' planned airings of "Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal," a documentary critical of Sen. Kerry's Vietnam-era antiwar activities, before the Nov. 2 election.
Industry sources said Sinclair has directed all of its 62 TV stations in 39 markets to pre-empt regular programming to air the documentary over several days beginning Oct. 21. Despite intense protest by Democrats, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell told reporters Thursday that the agency doesn't have the authority to block the broadcasts.
But in an Oct. 15 letter to Sinclair President and CEO David Smith, Sen. Kerry's campaign charged that the FCC's equal time obligations require Sinclair to give Kerry campaign supporters air time to respond to the documentary.
"Please consider this a request that each Sinclair station that airs the documentary provide supporters of the Kerry-Edwards campaign with a similar amount of time on that station before the election at a time where an audience of similar size can be expected to be viewing the station," said Marc Elias, general counsel for the Kerry-Edwards campaign, in the letter.
Bona fide news shows are generally exempt from FCC equal time obligations. But the Kerry campaign argued that the documentary does not meet the requirements for an exemption.
"The content of the program will not be controlled by Sinclair or an independent journalistic organization," the campaign said. "The program instead is intended to be an attack on Senator Kerry and thus is not the result of decisions made on the basis of newsworthiness."
In a statement on the company's Web site, Sinclair characterized the presentation as a "special news event" and said it has already offered Sen. Kerry equal time to respond.
Also on Friday, Equity Broadcasting announced that its independent station WPXS-TV in St. Louis will carry the ABC programming that Sinclair pre-empts for the documentary. Sinclair owns ABC affiliate KDNL-TV in St. Louis. Equity officials said Sinclair plans to air the Kerry documentary on KDNL between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. Oct. 22.
So...it's just going to be someone from the Kerry camp responding? Or will Kerry have the balls to do it himself?? yeah right
Now he wants to play. Sinclair should just tell him, you snooze, you lose.
Sure. Let him sit down with the Swiftvets and answer their questions.
BTTT!
HAHAHAHAHAHA! He he he he hehheh! Oh Ho HO HOHOHO!
We'll think about it AFTER the MSM gives GWB equal time for every smear piece they've done on him during this election season.
But, but, but.....the stuff THEY broadcast is "real news" and couldn't possibly be the least bit biassed, don't y'know. (/sarcasm).
Oh, and if there are one or fewer "guys" in this ping list, please accept my sexist apology.
Ouch. O'Neal will crush him. The 100 pages that kerry is having the Navy hold is political acid to Kerry campaign.
Equal time? I thought the equal time laws were history.
He can have equal time right after CBS gives W equal time for Dan Blather’s BS.
Since this is going to be an hour devoted to Kerry, I'd think that Bush has a greater claim to getting equal time.
Sinclair may very well take Kerry up on this; but they will only allow him time to respond to the Stolen Honor film, not to run a one-hour free advertisement bashing President Bush or talking about jobs or Iraq. That's fine with me. I have no problem with them giving Kerry an hour to BS about his Vietnam service. But we might be careful what we wish for. Kerry could use this as a platform to make a dramatic apology to all the Vets, and the MSM would swoon until Election Day.
No, but I think we should meet. How do you do, bahblahbah?
We want to see the documentary, but don't know if or when it will be on one of our area stations.
So, I checked the website:
http://www.stolenhonor.com
Looks to me like you can pay $4.95 and view it online. That's what we'll probably do.
"Kerry Requests Response Time to Sinclair Film"
Great headline (NOT!)...as I heard night a Sinclair official say that Kerry had been
offered response time...and had promptly clucked and declined.
Does anybody have a listing of the stations that will be showing this documentary?
John Kerry was in Vietnam ???
Let him respond.....on November 3rd.
Exactly! He's going to demand equal time, then totally ignore the content of 'Stolen Honor,' because he can't come up with a cogent rebuttal. The DNC will just use it to spin lies about the Bush administration, make unsupported charges, etc. Then they'll say 'Well, they're doing it.'
Kerry can have the response time he PAYS FOR. He's Out Of Money, people. That $70 million had to last an extra month beyond Bush's $70 million because his convention was sooner and it is no CRUNCH TIME.
All the bizarre things you hear and all the offers of interviews are for him to get TV time because he can't pay for it now and he knows it.
HE IS OUT OF MONEY. The $70 million is expired. The calendar is not.
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