Political Attack Ads

[MarcB]

I think the FCC needs to step in and not allow political attack ads. Furthermore they should limit the number of times an hour a station can air political ads and only allow them to air for 2 weeks before an election or primary. At least here in CT two clowns running for congress have been running their attack ads since August and the closer we get to election day the more times they're airing.

P.S. Can stations refuse to air political ads?

 

[KeithE4]

I think the FCC needs to step in and not allow political attack ads. Furthermore they should limit the number of times an hour a station can air political ads and only allow them to air for 2 weeks before an election or primary. At least here in CT two clowns running for congress have been running their attack ads since August and the closer we get to election day the more times they're airing.

That's a First Amendment issue that the Supreme Court already addressed in the Citizen's United ruling. But some of them are so bad that I'm surprised a candidate who is at the wrong end of one hasn't sued for slander (there are a couple of ads in Arizona that would qualify).

P.S. Can stations refuse to air political ads?

Why would they want to? That's revenue.

 

[BigDave]

First amendment issue. Parties shouldbe able to buy as many Political commercials as they can afford!

 

[recto101]

I think the FCC needs to step in and not allow political attack ads. Furthermore they should limit the number of times an hour a station can air political ads and only allow them to air for 2 weeks before an election or primary. At least here in CT two clowns running for congress have been running their attack ads since August and the closer we get to election day the more times they're airing.

P.S. Can stations refuse to air political ads?

You Can't make Political Attack ads Illegal. That's Revenue and also we let Pundits on CNN, Fox News, MSNBC attack the opposing party all the time.

 

[ajc_trw]

I think the FCC needs to step in and not allow political attack ads. Furthermore they should limit the number of times an hour a station can air political ads and only allow them to air for 2 weeks before an election or primary. At least here in CT two clowns running for congress have been running their attack ads since August and the closer we get to election day the more times they're airing.

P.S. Can stations refuse to air political ads?

You Can't make Political Attack ads Illegal. That's Revenue and also we let Pundits on CNN, Fox News, MSNBC attack the opposing party all the time.

There would be nothing on MSNBC but Lockup & Caught on Camera repeats.

 

[crainbebo]

I think one commercial break I saw on a local station, every ad except ONE was political-related. "He'll help" this and "He'll ruin" that. Overkill!

-crainbebo

 

[PTBoardOp94]

P.S. Can stations refuse to air political ads?

Stations may not refuse advertising from candidates and their official committees. They can refuse ads from political parties and political action committees.

 

[BlueWanderer]

There would be nothing on MSNBC but Lockup & Caught on Camera repeats.

That actually would be an overall improvement for MSNBC at this point.

 

[Robnoxious]

I wouldn't know, I'm in a state where our delegates are all ready predetermined.

Obama only comes here to California to ring the register for campaign cash funding and nothing more than that. A point which isn't lost on me as a voter but since the Electoral College decides the Presidency it's just a fact I have to live with. I feel for the swing states like Florida and Ohio, it's probably a cesspool of ad garbage mudslinging from both sides.

The silver lining is it will be over soon, for at least 2 years on the Presidential front.

 

[MarcB]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

 

[dhett]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

And so they protest the childish ads by childishly refusing to vote? That'll show the candidates who's boss.

 

[sack]

There would be nothing on MSNBC but Lockup & Caught on Camera repeats.

That actually would be an overall improvement for MSNBC at this point.

And to be fair, if they weren't shilling for Romney, Fox would have dead air.

 

[recto101]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

And so they protest the childish ads by childishly refusing to vote? That'll show the candidates who's boss.

This is knee jerking at its best. If you don't want to see attack ads don't listen to commercial talk radio, watch Fox News, CNN, MSNBC. Then the attack ads will be reduced. Fox News, CNN, MSNBC and syndicated talk radio all have attacking pundits everyday even though the election is over the pundits will still yell garbage at each other so they can sell an agenda.

 

[FreddyE1977]

The standard for slander that a candidate would have to meet, being a public figure, is so incredibly
high I think it has only been done successfully once or twice.

And the tactic could backfire as coverage of the lawsuit only serves to make even more people
aware of the allegation.

 

[anotherguyTN]

I've joked about wishing I could vote for None of the Above. There have been times on the local level that I didn't vote for a particular position either because I didn't know anything about any candidate or didn't like any of the choices. But in the major positions like President, Governor, etc. I've always voted for someone even if it was voting for who I thought was the lesser of the two evils.

Not voting at all or voting for a third party that doesn't have a chance as a protest doesn't make much sense to me because you're basically letting everyone else who voted Republican or Democrat decide the election, which in a close one could change who wins and you lose either way.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Not voting at all or voting for a third party that doesn't have a chance as a protest doesn't make much sense to me because you're basically letting everyone else who voted Republican or Democrat decide the election, which in a close one could change who wins and you lose either way.

I am fond of referring to our country, our government, our system, our culture as "a 230-old experiment in self-government".

We don't have it perfected yet. We haven't figured out how to keep the political conversation up on the roadway and out of the ditches.

If you never vote for someone who is obviously going to lose, what vehicle are you left with to let those who won the election know that there are citizens who disagree with the platform of the winner? If you never vote for someone who is obviously going to lose, what vehicle are you left with to let those who lost know that there is support for their platform and that they should continue to promote their concepts?

If we are going to post our own personal "wish list ideas" on how to improve the political system in our country, I throw these two ideas into the soup-pot.

1. All political advertising should reveal WHO is paying for it. In the days when our country was founded, and all of these attributes of "free speech" were being put into the recipe of our national soup, politics tended to me much more oriented to the local scene, and it was darned near impossible to do much electioneering and remain anonymous in the long term.

2. Political advertising funding should not cross state lines. Why should a billionaire who is based in Nevada or Kansas be allowed to spend enough money in a Wisconsin congressional district or in the state of Florida to "suck all the oxygen out of the room". What is American about that?

When we get back to the place where "ugly language advertising" is locally funded and I have a chance to run into the person paying for the attack ad in the meat market at the supermarket, then my neighbors and I can handle politics more in line with what took place at town hall meetings in the original colonies that had become states.

If I go to choir practice on Wednesday night at church and I am sitting behind the wife of the guy who is paying for negative attack ads, I can get them stopped!

There are some dark sides to that kind of face-to-face communication, but so far, we haven't grown up enough in this country to the point we can agree on how to keep political discourse out of the road ditches in the 21st Century.

 

[quadraphonic]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

Did yall talk about this while you were watching Maury and Springer, because if you were, I can see a bigger problem there than (temporary) political ads.

 

[Mitchell H]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

Childish perhaps, but nothing new.

http://www.itsabouttv.com/2012/10/the-negative-campaign.html

Many people would suggest that those ads were as bad as what we may see today.

And I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that had television been available to the founders, the same results would have ensued. Perhaps it is worse now, perhaps not - but politics is, always has been, and always will be, adversarial. As long as polls suggest the effectiveness of negative ads, they will continue.

 

[BigDave]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

Childish perhaps, but nothing new.

http://www.itsabouttv.com/2012/10/the-negative-campaign.html

Many people would suggest that those ads were as bad as what we may see today.

And I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that had television been available to the founders, the same results would have ensued. Perhaps it is worse now, perhaps not - but politics is, always has been, and always will be, adversarial. As long as polls suggest the effectiveness of negative ads, they will continue.

Ads aren't childish of they're the truth!

 

[Mitchell H]

All I know is I'm sick of them and a lot of friends around my age (30)and younger are refusing to vote. They said the ads are childish.

Childish perhaps, but nothing new.

http://www.itsabouttv.com/2012/10/the-negative-campaign.html

Many people would suggest that those ads were as bad as what we may see today.

And I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that had television been available to the founders, the same results would have ensued. Perhaps it is worse now, perhaps not - but politics is, always has been, and always will be, adversarial. As long as polls suggest the effectiveness of negative ads, they will continue.

Ads aren't childish of they're the truth!

Spot on, BigDave. Let not the manner of the telling obscure the truth of the mattter.