Truth in advertising doesn’t hold true for political ads.
Democracy takes effort and with it brings easy questions but hard answers.
Question: Say I want to run a political television commercial; do I have to
tell the truth?
Let’s say there’s a guy running for Mayor. He’s popular and he has strong
political instincts and the guy knows how to read an audience. So, what can I
say about him to knock him off his game?
Answer: Anything I want!
Question: Really? Come on, I can’t lie can I?
Answer: The Annenberg Public Policy Center said in summarizing the position
of both the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission
in regulating TV ads and the Supreme Court in upholding the First Amendment,
“Candidates have a legal right to lie to voters just about as much as they
want.”
Question: Let’s say I want to say a particular candidate took “illegal
campaign contributions”. The contributions were illegal because the people who
gave them to him violated the campaign spending laws, not because the candidate
did anything wrong. Despite this can I make it sound like the candidate is a
criminal?
Answer: The “say anything rule” is clear. Back in 1972, the FCC made a TV
station in Atlanta, Ga., run a commercial from a white racist running for the
U.S. Senate. His disgusting ad said the “main reason why n—-rs want
integration is because n—–rs want our white women.”
The FCC said if the station takes any ads from candidates in that race, they
have to take all ads and as long as they are not obscene, you can say anything
in a commercial.
Question: Listen, TV commercials are regulated. You can’t say that fried
chicken makes you skinny, so how can I say that this guy is using “loopholes”
to get away from disobeying the law, when it isn’t the truth? Even the head of
the Campaign Spending Commission said this guy was legal and obeying the law.
But you say I can still say he is “politically bankrupt?”
Answer: Fire away! But there’s an exception. If you arte advertising a
business you have to watch out. The FTC (Federal Treachery Commission), in
2004, penalized Kentucky Fried Chicken when it tried to claim that fried
chicken could be a part of an effective diet program. It made them pull the TV
ads and made them submit all advertising for FTC review for the next five
years.
But, and there’s always a but, political ads are wrapped in free speech!
The Supreme Court takes this seriously. Here is what it said in a 1971 libel
case: “it can hardly be doubted that the constitutional guarantee of free
speech has its fullest and most urgent application precisely to the conduct of
campaigns for political office.”
Question: Holy shit, so I can lie in my ads but will it do any good?
Answer: Dishonest political spots work all the time. TV viewers just think
that all ads are the same and if you put it on TV, someone is checking to make
sure it is true.
For most of us, we all think that if an ad appears on TV that there must be
some truth to it and doesn’t this so-called truth in advertising lull us into a
false sense of security? If so, the question then arises if I have to twist and
distort someone’s record to win or blatantly lie to get votes and win, how will
I be able to look at myself in the mirror when it’s over?
That’s a question that can only be answered by the individual.
Unfortunately, in the worst case scenario, that question never entered Obama’s
mind!
Aloha!
Sources:
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