roundtable: RE: SEN. ROBERT DOLE, SP

roundtable: RE: SEN. ROBERT DOLE, SP

RE: SEN. ROBERT DOLE, SP

Vigdor Schreibman - FINS (fins@access.digex.net)
Wed, 5 Jul 1995 18:47:08 -0400 (EDT) 

Date: Wed, 5 Jul 1995 18:47:08 -0400 (EDT)
From: Vigdor Schreibman - FINS <fins@access.digex.net>
To: roundtable@cni.org
Subject: RE: SEN. ROBERT DOLE, SP
In-Reply-To: <9507020633.AA17675@athena.capital.edu>
Message-Id: <Pine.SUN.3.91.950705121901.8724A-100000@access1.digex.net>



On Wed, 5 Jul 1995, Jeff Briggs wrote:
> 
....
> 
>      I decided Dole was one of the lowest, slimiest, most dangerous
> demogogues I had ever heard. It was this personal experience that 
> colored my invective.
> 
>      Vigdor, I respect both you and your mind (!), but for you to 
> find common cause with this living proof of what's wrong with American
> politics because he happens to hypocritically hit on an obvious truth
> about American media for the wrong reasons and without the proper 
> context, implications, and analysis, is shortsighted.
> 
>      But I will be priveleg4ed to be in the cross-hairs of your 
> dialectic should you maintain your admirable independence of thought on
> this issue...

  Jeff,

  I find it unacceptable to totally write off the statements of a major
political leader on important issues, especially when I try to follow and
connect their rhetoric to their actions.  It seems to me that a preferable
strategy in reporting the news is to apply the golden rule of "truth and
consequences."  Probably you were asleep under a cool shade tree somewhere
while the rest of the world had an opportunity to read my special report
dated June 20, on, "Two Faces of a Presidential Candidate," attached below
for those who (like you) evidently did not get a chance to see it. 

  Vigdor Schreibman - FINS <fins@access.digex.net>


===========================================================================
FINS SPECIAL REPORT                                           June 20, 1995
===========================================================================

SEN. ROBERT DOLE, TWO FACES OF A PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE
String of Hypocracy From Los Angeles to US Senate

  All those "focus groups" that political managers like to use, are not
looking for the rational opinions of the voters but for their soul, the
deeply felt images that define their most vulnerable beliefs about existence.
These are the "hot buttons" that trigger emotional responses to political
discourse.  They operate on automatic pilot, easily fooled by doublespeak and
easy prey for cynical politicians running to "win" at any cost.

  George Bush won his Presidential seat based on the "hot button" of racial
fears, using his Willie Horton advertisements--of a black man who raped a
white woman--as a kind of attack video hit man, falsely depicting Michael
Dukakis as soft on crime in an environment of exploding criminal activity. 
Sen. Robert Dole (R-KS), a presidential contender, knows about such political
machinations.  In a speech given in Los Angeles, last June 1, Dole blasted
the entertainment industry for "debasing US culture with movies, music
and television programs that have produced 'nightmares of depravity'
drenched in violence and sex" [Fins-NC2.11].  The subject of Dole's attack
was a near perfect "hot button"; most Americans are deeply outraged by the
opportunistic practices of television violence programming.

  Dole portrayed himself as a protector of public morality in that speech,
reaching into the yearning of Americans for a champion of cultural integrity.
Dole did not, however, disclose at that time his intention to give a special
financial payoff to the perveyors of television violence by amendments to the
Telecommunications Competition and Deregulation Act of 1995 [S.652].  Just a
week or so after his Los Angeles speech, on June 9, Dole was on the floor of
the Senate promoting his modified amendment [No. 1255], deregulating cable
rates, and making a special deal for radio and television broadcasters, to
free them from limitations on national ownership of stations.

  That amendment, approved by a vote of 77 yeas to 8 nays, broke the
historical commitment of the United States to community centered
broadcasting.  It was described by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), as "nothing
short of a power grab on the part of the national networks." Days later, on
June 15th, Dole introduced another amendment [No. 1341], to strike program
access provisions of the bill, originally designed to rescue small cable
operators from the stranglehold of cable operators such as Time Warner.  They
are one of the most notorious perveyors of television violence rightly
condemned by Dole in his Los Angeles speech.  The Dole amendment was tailored
in a quid pro quo between Time Warner and Sen. Larry Pressler (R-SD) (who
carried the ball for Dole on the Senate floor), as described in a letter
written by their chief lobbyist Timothy Boggs (June 13), later repudiated.

  Senator Byrd, denounced that Dole amendment, as an "outrageous illustration
of the kind of influence peddling and pushing that surrounds this
legislation."  Nevertheless, it was approved by a vote of 59 yeas to 39 nays.
About $1.3 million in campaing contributions was given to members by Time
Warner during the past ten years, out of the $39.5 million was contibuted by
Telecom PACS.  Bob Dole received $135,950 of that corrupt payment.

  So here's the stoy board.  Morality Bob criticizes the television
programming produced by cable and broadcast giants and acts like he's being
tough on them.  Days later he marches on to the floor of the Senate with a
bill that will deregulate cable rates, expedite the entry of cable into local
telephone service, liberate national broadcasters to grab control of the
media, and in a final gesture to Timne Warner, strips the pending bill of
protections for small cable operators being strangled by the cable giants. 

  So what are we to make of Dole in Los Angeles?  It appears he was just
providing a cover story using the "hot button" of television violence, to
mask the "outrageous ... influence peddling" on behalf of the same depraved
corporations that followed Los Angeles to the floor of the US Senate.  Andrew
Jay Schwartzman, executive director of the Media Access Project, has observed
that the legislation produced by the Dole amendments "does a lot of 'awful
things'"; perhaps, even worse than television violence. 

     Dole's acts could greatly enlarge the powers of the wrongdoer and
encourage television violence and other yet unknown outragous conduct that
would surely follow, should the pending bill be passed by Congress and signed
by the President.  Nevertheless, the people have not had their final say in
this affair, and the mask is now torn clean from the awful two faces of that
candidate, who is seeking the office of the President of the United States!

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