Planned Anti-Kerry broadcast sparks debate in WNC

ASHEVILLE - Television station WLOS-TV Channel 13 has received about 2,000 e-mails from both program supporters and protesters commenting on parent company Sinclair Broadcast Group's decision that its affiliates would broadcast "Stolen Honor: Wounds that Never Heal."

The program is expected to be critical of Sen. John Kerry's anti- Vietnam War activities and is set to air locally at 9 p.m. Oct. 22. Although Sinclair says the final format for the program hasn't been set yet, the company's decision has set off a nationwide debate.

The letters, found in the station's public file, were sent from people around the mountains and around the nation. Under Federal Communications Commission guidelines, the station is required to make comments about program content publicly available.

They reveal not only a polarized mountain electorate, but also a split in WLOS's viewing audience. Many argue Sinclair wants to sway voters with misinformation just days before the election, while others commend the company for getting out much-needed news.

Juanita Dixon of Canton identified herself as a patriotic, Christian grandmother in a Tuesday e-mail to the station. She wrote that she would no longer turn to loved anchorwoman Darcel Grimes and longtime weatherman Bob Caldwell for news and information.

"WLOS has always been `our' station in Western North Carolina, but, sadly, I cannot watch it anymore," Dixon wrote. "I do not agree with using the airwaves to promote one's political agenda."

She will now watch WYFF, the area's NBC station, she wrote. That station is based in Greenville, S.C., and while it shares the television market area, WLOS is the only major affiliate with the main office based in WNC.

But Mark Pless, also of Canton, wrote Thursday that he commends the station for not bowing to pressure from the Democratic Party to keep "Stolen Honor" off the air.

"I as a voter would very much like to hear what your station has discovered. I also would like to thank you for trying to provide the public with insight when we are charged with making a choice in leaders," he said. "I as a voter will most assuredly consider all points that you can provide me on both candidates."

Eighteen senators, all Democrats, wrote to the FCC this week and asking the commission to investigate Sinclair's plan to run the program two weeks before the Nov. 2 election.

Michael Powell, chairman of the FCC, said Friday that commissioners would not violate the First Amendment to block the airing of a program.

Sinclair, based outside Baltimore, has asked its 62 television stations - many of them in competitive states in the presidential election - to pre-empt regular programming to run the documentary. It chronicles Kerry's 1971 testimony before Congress and links him to activist and actress Jane Fonda. It includes interviews with Vietnam prisoners of war and their wives who claim Kerry's testimony demeaned them and led their captors to hold them longer.

Sinclair executives call "Stolen Honor" a news event. The Citizen-Times was unable to reach a Sinclair spokesman for comment. WLOS station manager Jack Connors declined comment.

Elise Anschel of Asheville, like many people in e-mails to WLOS, pointed to Sinclair commentator Mark Hyman, who is featured in a segment called "The Point." She characterized it as a "nightly thinly veiled commercial for President Bush."

"Now it seems they have decided to extend their strong- arming to prime time," she said, calling the upcoming feature political propaganda. "They have made a mockery of broadcasting and they have made a mockery of WLOS."

Together with Sinclair's political action committee, top company executives have donated well more than $100,000 to Republican candidates or committees.

The company last garnered nationwide media attention in the spring, when it opted not to run "Nightline" on its ABC affiliates, including WLOS. Sinclair accused anchor Ted Koppel of pushing a political agenda when he read the names of military members who died in Iraq as their pictures appeared on the screen.

From that, WLOS received an estimated 10,000 responses, though about half were form letters e-mailed by Media for Democracy members.

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*** The company last garnered nationwide media attention in the spring, when it opted not to run "Nightline" on its ABC affiliates, including WLOS. Sinclair accused anchor Ted Koppel of pushing a political agenda when he read the names of military members who died in Iraq as their pictures appeared on the screen***

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***....."The political people at Nightline decided it's time to get the definitive truth. What happened with Kerry's medals, specifically his Silver Star? So what did they do? They went to Vietnam and they interviewed former -- ahem -- Viet Cong soldiers and former villagers who were eyewitnesses to the events. They were not interested in talking to the swift boat vets, as you recall." .....Source

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And now a word from the 'dominoes' (disputing Kerry's senate testimony)***DURING THE Vietnam War, John Kerry testified before a Senate Foreign Relations Committee panel that an investigation conducted by Kerry and his group, Vietnam Veterans Against the War, revealed that U.S. soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam. The investigation was called Winter Soldier.

Now that Kerry wants to be president, some of his former military colleagues say they still resent his allegations. They believe that Kerry slandered his colleagues as war criminals merely as a pretext for gaining support for the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. They believe he was pandering to those who said the "domino theory" was not valid, that the Vietnamese communists were nationalists not terrorists.

One way to try to resolve those conflicting views is asking those affected most by the war - the South Vietnamese. Philadelphia has a large Vietnamese community composed mostly of Vietnamese refugees. Some were "boat people" who fled the horror of communist Vietnam on rafts, boats and pieces of driftwood, risking their lives. Others are more recent arrivals. All fled the utopia that Vietnam was supposed to become, according to Kerry and his anti-war colleagues………..***

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