Advertisers will run adds wherever their customers are and the money is. The lesson for any company is don’t play in politics unless your business is politics. And if you are determined to then prepared for the consequences because politics will take precedence over what’s best for the company and its bottom line.
Thanks for the dose of common sense. As Michael C. says, we're talking business, let's talk business. These people made the decision that they'd be better off from a business standpoint by pulling their ads. They tried to curry favor with a particular business demographic (liberals) and thought that would offset any losses from any other group. That seems to be playing out kind of poorly so far, but we'll see. Rush as to fill in the vacancies with new advertisers and from what I've heard he is doing that. I seriously doubt if any real moral outrage was in play here. Any statements along those lines from Carbonite, Sleep Train, or whoever, was just dross. What do they care that a spoiled thirty-something perpetual student has to pay $3000 for birth control pills? That has no impact in their business either way. But feigning outrage to curry favor and sympathy for an "oppressed victim" was thought to buy them into a demographic group that they thought might improve their bottom line. That's all it is with these people.