Showing a pro-Kerry movie after the anti-Kerry movie does nothing. The Wingnuts won't watch it and go "wow, the first movie was a lie". They'll just tune out and go to WWF.
I vote to tell them to Go Cheney Themselves and keep the pressure on.

Maybe the high road might be not to show Going Upriver or F9/11, but taking "the high road" hasn't gotten us very far. Look at Lieberman and Daschle. I say make them show one of those two. Some people will watch 9/11 and skip the anti Kerry propaganda. Our stuff is probably better. Any chance to show F9/11 is great for us. (Haven't seen Up the River>)

If true, this is a great opportunity. Too great ... it's probably positioning.

However, if true Kerry should accept on the following conditions:

1) Kerrys gets 90 mins on the next night at the same time

2) Sinclair promotes the two events equally in every advertisement.

3) The two nights must be weeknights between Tu and Th (Fr-Sa-Su are lower viewership nights, and Mo is MNF).

What would Kerry's team do with a free 90 minutes?

I say take 'em down. Their stock is falling below $7/share and some advertisers have already left. Keep up the pressure! There's no doubt several individual, or a class action stockholder's lawsuit is coming. These arrogant assholes have totally jumped the shark and this is our chance to ruin the whole Smith family fortune. WE HAVE to attack these reprehensible media conglomerates and drive their nasty little faces into the ground. Michael Powell is a disgusting weasel and will bring no pressure.

No mercy, no compromise and no relief!

It's a tough decision. For one, countering the attack with our own film could be a positive, on the ther hand, put F911 on there and you'll have people who would have skipped the whole thing altogether now tuning in because of the extra publicity F911 would give. Plus, can you trust SBG not to edit any film the Kerry camp sends in. Though I can't figure out why, F911 was rated R which would give SBG free reign to hack it apart o make it "safe for TV"

I say take 'em down.
No mercy, no compromise and no relief!

I agree but we could use the time to show F9/11 and go after them as well.

In additon to the placement issues per Observer, there are running times to consider: Sinclair is planning a commericial free hour, with a 42-minute film followed by ~15 minutes "discussion."

F911 is 122 minutes long, Going Upriver is 90 minutes long. Neither would work.

And, here's the bigger point: It makes no sense to be talking about Vietnam in this way. Kerry needs to stay focused on attacking Bush.

Sinclair is simply trying to appear "fair and balanced." Hyman was on Lehrer the other day and he kept on protesting that they "hadn't even decided how they would format the hour." He even claimed that they would be willing to give Kerry 50 minutes of the hour and then just show clips from the movie. Yeah right. There's no negotiating with these bastards. Make them pay.

But let's not get sidetracked.

How could anyone turn down 90 minutes of free air time? If Sinclair were to offer it, I think Kerry would have to take it and use it effectively.

Question. Would Kerry be limited to talking about Viet Nam? If not, 90 minutes of free air time to go after George W. Bush would be enough to kill the Bush/Cheney campaign.

If Kerry is limited to Viet Nam, that rules out using Farenheit 9/11 and, at this point in the campaign, I don't think F 9/11 is what we need Americans to see.

I feel similarly about Going Upriver, though I think that is an excellent movie and wish everyone would not only go, but take any "undecided" friends with them.

What Kerry could most use is 90 minutes to completely shred the Swiftees. That is enough time to tell the following stories:

- Who is John O'Neill and how he got where he is.

- How the SBV's got together to get their stories straight.

- How the corporate press/media ignored the men who were not affiliated with the Kerry campaign, at least one of whom is not supporting Kerry, who completely destroyed the SBV lies.

- How the SBV's were funded and what are the long term goals and records of the people who funded them.

- Last but not least, Kerry could and should give a short, less than ten minute talk about his experiences in Viet Nam, and why he came home and became a vocal critic of the war. This part, more than anything else, would completely convince people that John Kerry is a great man, and one whose mind, heart and soul will serve us well in the White House.

Remember this: Each and every time that John Kerry has appeared on television without the Republican or corporate press/media filter, he goes up in the polls.

Of course, we are dreaming. There is no way that Sinclair will let John Kerry, or anyone other than right-wingers, have 90 minutes of air time.

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=38218

Kerry's camp sent a letter to Sinclair asking for equal time.

I like what DeminNewJ and coblin are saying. I think these people have hijacked the republic by broadcasting propaganda/lies and censoring critical public interest information. Mary Chaney is a bigger story than using federal retirement funds to hide the national debt ceiling increase until after the election. There is minimal coverage of Ken Lay’s criminal activity, James Baker $ 2 billion Iraq debt conflict of interest and ramped republican efforts to block voting and registration efforts around the country. Fox should be next. We should not tolerate the lies, deceit, deception, censorship and outright attack on the republic of the United States. There general public is too ignorant, apathetic, xenophobic, gullible and greedy to understand what these people are doing to them and their families. Listening to these people on CSPAN and reading some posts on this site make me wonder how all these people can be so brain dead.

If the campaign agrees to the equal time proposal, the campaign should run an hour of Kerry-Edward and DNC videos (I would prefer MoveOn ads) coupled with real citizen interviews describing the truth about the disaster these people have created and how it will only get worst.

I like the idea of Kerry saying show Going Up River or even telling Sinclair to rerun the Nightline segment.

Just run a hour of the best from John Stewarts Daily Show, that would put the story of this adminstration in proper perspective.
"Bizzaro World"

i think you guys are missing something about the sinclair talking points: they keep saying they will offer "john kerry" - personally - a chance to rebut the claims. they have consistently said they want john kerry to come on and debate the charges with them. i don't think its accurate to say that they have even suggested they are willing to let the kerry campaign choose how to rebut the charges - at best they have been trying to trap kerry into coming onto their show to be ambushed.

Keep the heat on. Sinclair's offer of equal time, if it ever is made, is a chimera, a fake. They will never cede editorial control. They will consign any Kerry reply to the late, late night between paid programming for muscle machines and get-rich-quick-buying-real-estate frauds. They will not fairly promote it, and afterwards will trash anything he says.

Sinclair Broadcasting is owned and operated by the spiritual heirs of Joseph Goebbels.

I say go Cheney yourselves. It is so hillarious watching the sweat come out of the left because they know there is so much truth in the film. Remember, you are the folks who hate censorship!

Oh we're sweating 4Bush, but that's because we're doing Calisthenics...

You guys wanna know the truth? This whole Sinclair-Stolen Honor thang is a big fucking trap. It is a quagmire with a capital QUAAAG. While Sinclair goes ahead and runs their little movie, the Kerrion will be strung along with negotiations for equal time and all that. Every bit of it goes into the newspaper and does two other things: makes Kerry look small and keeps Viet Nam and the Swifties on people's minds.

Did you read the Kerry campaign's lawyer's letter to Sinclair tonight? This is the very face of dumbassery. Trust me.

OK Toby, we'll trust you....

Michael Moore was on Jay Leno tonight. He announced that Pay-per-view cancelled his contract to show the 9/11 movie the night before the election. This was done on the same day Sinclair was approved by the FCC to show their anti-Kerry movie. On Leno, Moore has offered to give Sinclair his movie for free as long as it was shown after their movie.

anon:

i think you guys are missing something about the sinclair talking points: they keep saying they will offer "john kerry" - personally - a chance to rebut the claims.

Yep. Ostensible fairness.

they have consistently said they want john kerry to come on and debate the charges with them.

You got it. But let me tell you: the bait is bigger than the fish. Kerry's got to know this. Right?

i don't think its accurate to say that they have even suggested they are willing to let the kerry campaign choose how to rebut the charges - at best they have been trying to trap kerry into coming onto their show to be ambushed.

Listen to anon, ladies. Anon knows what time it is. Energy spent on this is wasted. True, it's hard to ignore a broadcast that reaches a quarter of America's households (including some in a few battleground states), but that's really what Kerry ought to do. Instead, if his people spend a lot of time openly trying to figure out what to do with their equal time ---which is never going to come on terms favorable to them--- they're just gonna get rolled.

It's like my favorite Paul Anka-Lisa Simpson jingle from one of those great Halloween specials: "Just don't look, just don't look."

Let's get something straight here.

Sinclair's stations are in markets that comprise about 25% of the population. That doesn't mean that 25% of the population watches whatever shows are on Sinclairs stations.

On the other hand, I am sure FOX, CNN and MSNBC have already planned on running six days of 24-hour "coverage" of the Sinclair broadcasting "controversy" and they will be only too happy to show about 50% of the "Kerry is a Traitor" movie in order to make sure that almost all of the country has a chance to see it.

The Sinclair issue is a diversion. This is cover for bush re-election propaganda networks (Fox, MSNBC, CNN, etc.) to censor reports like this one about Iraq. This sounds like Viet Nam part two to me. The next step may be non commission soldiers killing officers. These side issues divert attention from articles that cover how the republicans are looting the treasury (exploiting the public). In other words, the distractions are like “the fire on another street” to distract from a bank robbery. Don't fall for it. We have to stay focused how the Bush Administration has trashed the U.S. and we can't afford another four years of lawlessness, looting and incompetent failures. No more “the dog ate my homework” 9/11 excuses. They have trashed the U.S. on purpose and will lead the U.S. into another “Great Depression” if we allow them to.

Powell:

Sinclair's stations are in markets that comprise about 25% of the population. That doesn't mean that 25% of the population watches whatever shows are on Sinclairs stations.

I don't think that what I said is inconsistent with your [clarification], although I should have said "could reach."

On the other hand, I am sure FOX, CNN and MSNBC have already planned on running six days of 24-hour "coverage" of the Sinclair broadcasting "controversy" and they will be only too happy to show about 50% of the "Kerry is a Traitor" movie in order to make sure that almost all of the country has a chance to see it.

Which would make the Kerry campaign's increasing involvement in this an ever bigger loser since whatever "equal time" they might hope for would only come through some rather marginal stations, shall we say.

And let me just say again, in response to an earlier argument from Steve, that the distinction between the public's "airwaves" and various cable and satellite systems' channels is not worth much. The public's "ownership" of those frequencies is just a populist conceit. And to think that the FCC ---Michael Powell's FCC!--- is going to come to your candidate's rescue is just foolishness.

Yeah, Smooth. I'd love to see what Kerry does with that platoon disobeying orders. If he gets too close to siding with them, Bush will say that Kerry is openly encouraging you-know-what.

The local paper in the city I find myself in today has an interesting page. Juxtaposed on the same page are these two headlines:

Kerry Campaign is asking for equal time from Sinclair stations

and...

Cable not running Moore's 9/11 film

This is the look of the future of free speech in America as long as media consolidation is allowed to persist: one voice, one viewpoint.

So much for an informed electorate. So much for democracy.

Another approach to Sinclair's dictatorial editorial policy? Buy one share in the company; at the next annual general meeting of the company, appoint Michael Moore as your proxy, send your appointment to the company with a copy to Moore. Imagine if Moore appeared at the AGM and asked a few questions regarding the Sinclair management mission and how it helps Sinclair shareholders ... The flies on the wall would fall down laughing ..