Free Republic

All those obnoxious pharmaceutical commercials that get laced into just about every television and cable “news” program that airs in the United States these days might seem like they are simply about selling more drugs and getting people hooked, but Big Pharma’s true agenda is actually much more sinister than that. Former pharmaceutical industry insider Calley Means spoke to Tucker Carlson recently about what he described as an “open secret” within the pharmaceutical industry. In essence, Means says that Big Pharma is buying the media with all those ads, which allows the drug industry to control what gets broadcasted on...

A green nonprofit that is indirectly funded by a foreign billionaire is pressuring broadcasters to drop advertisements that criticize the Biden administration’s massive electric vehicle (EV) agenda. Climate Power wrote to numerous broadcasters this week demanding that they stop airing American Fuel and Petrochemicals Manufacturers (AFPM)-funded advertisements in swing state markets that rail against President Joe Biden’s plans to impose widespread EV adoption in the coming years. The charitable organization affiliated with Hansjorg Wyss, a Swiss health care mogul and billionaire philanthropist, donates millions of dollars to the Fund for a Better Future, which was the fiscal sponsor for Climate...

Peet's Coffee is running six TV commercials, and two of them are racist. Both of those racist ads contrast cool non-whites with whites behaving badly. In the first ad ("Birthday Cake", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VINuGmrcibw) a white couple dressed like preppies are in the jungle somewhere looking for coffee beans that taste like birthday cake. The Noble Hispanic Coffee Grower can't believe it. When he ignores their request and walks away, the broad caricatures even ask to speak to a manager (a reference to the racist "Karen" trope). In the second ad ("Mango Breeze", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=700iqog80Jo) a white woman orders complicated coffee drinks. Her...

The 2024 presidential campaign is already in full swing, and appropriately enough Joe Biden has come out with a commercial that’s a real… swing and a miss. The ad features a parade of Democratic heavyweights like Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker explaining that they’re all-in on supporting the President. As if that was ever in question. Jimmy and Americans’ Comedian Kurt Metzger discuss how this commercial should be a huge hit with people who are already 100 percent committed to voting for Joe Biden.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis (R.) is taking out a Spanish-language radio ad to warn voters about a George Soros-backed company's purchase of Hispanic radio stations in Miami in order to "infiltrate" the state with leftist ideology. "Warning, voters! The Left is taking control of our local media," reads an English translation of the DeSantis campaign's ad, which will run on stations set to be acquired by a conglomerate financed by the left-wing billionaire. "George Soros, known for financing extreme leftist causes, is now financing the purchase of Hispanic radio stations right here in Miami." The Latino Media Network, backed by...

A new bill in the U.S. Senate could cause the internet as we know it to cease to exist by holding major tech companies like Facebook or YouTube liable for anything posted on their platforms. On Wednesday, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) introduced controversial legislation that would amend Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA). Known as the Ending Support for Internet Censorship Act, it has caused bipartisan backlash on how it would affect tech companies, content creators, and everyday users. Tech companies like Twitter or YouTube currently have protection under Section 230 against being held liable for what users...

LONDON (AP) — Hapless husbands and housework-burdened moms were being banished from British advertising, as a crackdown on “harmful” gender stereotypes came into force Friday. Under new rules, advertisements must not include “gender stereotypes which are likely to cause harm or serious or widespread offense.” Examples include depictions of a man failing to change a diaper or a woman to park a car, or ads that suggest women are solely responsible for cooking and cleaning. Complaints will be assessed by industry watchdog the Advertising Standards Authority. It doesn’t have the power to impose fines, but British broadcasters are bound...

Luci Gosling, sales and research manager at Mary Evans Picture Library, said: 'I think these adverts show that Christmas has been a commercial opportunity for longer than we might think. 'But they also suggest that gift-giving was often more low-key. A pair of stockings for instance, would have been gratefully received in the 1920s, though a 'luckier' woman might receive a Hotpoint vacuum cleaner instead to alleviate her household chores. 'Gender and age stereotyping is fairly common, such as the young woman gifting a bottle of sherry to an old gent. The Great War era saw retailers and manufacturers really...

WASHINGTON — The chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee said Wednesday that they would welcome Facebook’s making public the 3,000 advertisements turned over to the panel that the company has found were tied to a Russian influence campaign. The committee itself, they said, would not release the ads. “We don’t release documents provided to our committee, period,” said Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., the chair of the committee. “Clearly if any of the social media companies would like to do that, we’re fine with them doing it.

Super Bowl LI on Sunday night was as close to a politics-free experience as a football fan could have hoped for, with even halftime performer Lady Gaga eschewing political talk in favor of high-energy showmanship — but several big-name brands couldn’t help but include overt political messaging in their Big Game advertising.

Carly Fiorina has taken a hard line against Planned Parenthood as a Republican presidential candidate, but in 2005 she invested in a health care website similar to WebMD that touted abortion benefits and directed users to Planned Parenthood. The Revolution Health Group website assured users abortion is safe and directed them to pro-choice groups including Planned Parenthood for more information, but did not link to any pro-life groups or offer a pro-choice perspective. Fiorina joined RHG as an investor and board member when it was founded in 2005. Her campaign did not respond to requests for comment regarding her knowledge...

Tonight for some strange reason ads began popping up in the upper right corner of the main index page. Anyone else experiencing this?

Mad Men fans know women took a lot of sexist hits in the past when it came to advertising. Here’s a look at some of those cringe-worthy classics from the automobile world, along with some others that might make you question whether the good old days were always so good.

It’s hard to watch any sporting event without seeing a commercial featuring a star athlete such as Peyton Manning or LeBron James. Now, a study published on Oct. 7 in Pediatrics shows that a lot of the foods they are promoting are unhealthy, concerning pediatricians because adolescents are among their primary viewers. “Professional athletes wouldn’t endorse tobacco today because it would be a liability for them,” lead study author Marie Bragg, a doctoral candidate in psychology at Yale University, told the Globe and Mail. “We’re hoping one day that the same would be true for unhealthy foods.” …

The Trip, 1940's Chevrolet car commercial vivid Technicolor http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBenak9wtkE 

Have R&R ramped up their attack?

How much would you pay to watch a replay of a great play, or skip a bunch of television commercials? And should you have to? Those are a couple of the questions raised by a newly surfaced Microsoft patent application. It’s called “Control-based Content Pricing,” and the basic idea is dynamic pricing of video content, based on the preferences of the user at any given moment — essentially setting different prices for different functions of the TV remote. Here’s an excerpt from the filing. For example, if a user initiates a navigation control input to advance past (e.g., skip over)...

Photography related ads from 1880 into the 1990s.

(scroll down, toward the bottom) One way to put a stop to the left-stream news media's blatant and obvious bias is to file lawsuits changing their status from "the press" to a political contribution group of some sort or another. Federal law currently specifies many of their actions be severely curtailed during the 60 days prior to the November elections, forcing them to shut down. Larry Pierson