Political Attack Ads

[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.

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.

Spot on! quadraphonic! I kept going after the Talk Radio, MSNBC and Fox News example because thats the one where the negative Political talk is at all the time. But I do agree that Maury and Springer were talk shows that were big 20 years ago but they were "Man waves his private parts to every woman he sees" and "Woman is a whore". Today MSNBC, Fox News and Talk Radio kept the Springer and Maury format alive but with this "Paul Ryan/ Mitt Romney/ RNC is a fascist" to "President Obama/DNC is Communist like North Korea" as the topics. Well After the election we will see this if President Obama wins Fox News will say "The DNC Rigged the Election". If Romney wins MSNBC will say "RNC Rigged the election". Negative Attack talk will go on after the election is over.

 

[BMR]

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.



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?

Interesting idea. My guess is the Kansas billionaire would still find someway of channelling the money to a local Republican or Democrat. That doesn't mean it isn't at least worth trying.

Actually one of the things I admire about your system of government is that so much more stuff is devolved down to state or lower level. I think we could do with that here, but, Scotland aside, there doesn't seem to be much appetite for it.

 

[landtuna]

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

They won't refuse those ads though as they are not required to give non-candidates their best ad rates. The stations must be making a fortune on this election.

Given the number of ads running in my state (which is not a swing state) I cannot imagine having the two presidential candidates buying even more ads.

 

[recto101]

Well you have less than 24 hours to see the Political attack ads outside of CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. But after Election day Only MSNBC, Fox News, Political Bloggers and Talk Radio will have Pundits attacking each other on which lobbyists and campaign advisers caused candidate X to lose the presidency.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Interesting idea. My guess is the Kansas billionaire would still find someway of channelling the money to a local Republican or Democrat. That doesn't mean it isn't at least worth trying.

After 230 years or so, we are still developing the rules and guidelines. We have gone through a period when we had rather comprehensive laws in recent years stating that ALL campaign advertising should be identified as to who sponsored it, and placing rules that limited the amount any one person could contribute to the campaign of any one candidate.

Today there is a lot of "push" that somehow all of the restricts one's "Freedom of Speech". I guess I gather with the camp of those who suggest that "The size of one's pocketbook does not entitle one to have a larger mouth than your neighbor". But that is simply a quaint feeling and those who practice law may prevail with some other camp of thinking.

Let the Kansas billionaire give $2,000 or $5,000 (whatever the law decides is appropriate in this day and age,) and then let all the advertising paid for by that billionaire be adorned with his/her name. I would still wrestle with the concept that money flowing across state lines for local elections needs to be studied long and hard. Yes, if I had a well-to-do brother living in another state and he wanted to contributed to my campaign, why not? College fraternity brother from years ago? why not? Get enough "why not" exceptions in there and we are back to where we are today.

Actually one of the things I admire about your system of government is that so much more stuff is devolved down to state or lower level. I think we could do with that here, but, Scotland aside, there doesn't seem to be much appetite for it.

I have not traveled to your part of the world, but if I made such a trip, Scotland would certainly be on my itinerary. Part of our system of government is not in place because it has proven to be the best system for everyone, but because we had to have a system that fit the geography and the times. Scotland is about half the size of say the state of Arkansas. Your population is maybe just a smidge more that the population of the Atlanta metro area. If you tried to devolve your government down to match ours, you might end up with cities that were no more than four square blocks. (Over here a block is typically about one-tenth of a mile by one-tenth of a mile.

You will hear a lot of noise over here about stuff devolved down to the state or lower level. The cry of many is "states rights". But sleep a bit better at night knowing that once it gets down to the state level, we sometimes have a hard time convincing the folks in state capitols that they are supposed to give more freedom on down to county and city level. "We ain't as good at doing that as it may appear to you at your distance."

 

[Rollo-Smokes]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

It is stuff like this that keeps me away from the networks and news channels for election coverage and stick with C-SPAN. Boring as it may be at times, at least they are free from that partisan junk.

 

[dave73]

Luckily, WTTW in Chicago can refuse to air political ads. Their radio station however can not. Their radio station WFMT holds a commercial license, & must accept political ads against their will. When they're forced to accept an ad, they make a disclaimer about it. They otherwise would rather accept donations to keep the station running.

For the first time ever, I'm surprised Indiana politicians are spending money to air their ads on Chicago TV. In the past, NW Indiana residents that only got Chicago station, never saw political ads for Indiana politicians. That seems to be changing.

 

[BigDave]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

It is stuff like this that keeps me away from the networks and news channels for election coverage and stick with C-SPAN. Boring as it may be at times, at least they are free from that partisan junk.

C-Span has a leftist bias also,don't kid yourself

 

[dhett]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

I tend to blame gullible voters. We wouldn't see "all this garbage" if it didn't work so well.

 

[Rollo-Smokes]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

It is stuff like this that keeps me away from the networks and news channels for election coverage and stick with C-SPAN. Boring as it may be at times, at least they are free from that partisan junk.

C-Span has a leftist bias also,don't kid yourself

Care to elaborate?

 

[azumanga]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

It is stuff like this that keeps me away from the networks and news channels for election coverage and stick with C-SPAN. Boring as it may be at times, at least they are free from that partisan junk.

C-Span has a leftist bias also,don't kid yourself

Care to elaborate?

How can they be "leftist"? One of the reasons why I watched C-Span for the debates is so I could watch it free of interference and opinions that I would otherwise get on the networks and news channels.

 

[BigDave]

Blame the think-tanks, PACs and Super-PACs for all this garbage.

It is stuff like this that keeps me away from the networks and news channels for election coverage and stick with C-SPAN. Boring as it may be at times, at least they are free from that partisan junk.

C-Span has a leftist bias also,don't kid yourself

They sound all too Pro Obama

Care to elaborate?

How can they be "leftist"? One of the reasons why I watched C-Span for the debates is so I could watch it free of interference and opinions that I would otherwise get on the networks and news channels.

 

[Rollo-Smokes]

They sound all too Pro Obama

You obviously don't watch enough, or enter it with a biased eye yourself.

C-SPAN plays everything down the middle. Example: over the weekend, they even aired a debate that featured the obscure, third- (and fourth) party Presidential candidates who. Longshots and whack jobs some of them may be, they get ignored by the networks and news channels but not a channel with a public service mandate.

You must be confusing C-SPAN with NPR, which has an obvious liberal slant.

 

[recto101]

They sound all too Pro Obama

You obviously don't watch enough, or enter it with a biased eye yourself.

C-SPAN plays everything down the middle. Example: over the weekend, they even aired a debate that featured the obscure, third- (and fourth) party Presidential candidates who. Longshots and whack jobs some of them may be, they get ignored by the networks and news channels but not a channel with a public service mandate.

You must be confusing C-SPAN with NPR, which has an obvious liberal slant.

What is Liberal Slant? Apparently anybody that does not go along with Fox News is labeled Liberal. and anything that does not go along with MSNBC is labeled Right wing.

 

[Kent T]

Put these attack ads on cart, want to see the Digibeta have dinner and a snack. Love to see political attack ad carts get eaten.

 

[recto101]

Fox News Will have attack pundits on Obama for the next 4 years since he won the electoral vote.

 

[RadioFanBoy]

A few Billion $$$ spent with the hopes of a Republican super-majority (President, House, Senate) has resulted in....Democratic President, Senate with a clear Democratic majority, and Marijuana now legal in two states!

Money well spent ;D

 

[quadraphonic]

Winners or losers, they all spent too many billions.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Like I've said earlier times like this are why I wish there was a choice of None of the Above. :-\

 

[WPPCProductions]

I'm glad these are over with.