Politics: A new beginning - Page 79

sgtclub · 11-04-2003, 06:59 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Wrong. If conservatives simply decided to engage in silent protest by changing the channel or spending quality time with their kids when the miniseries aired, I for one would have no problem with that. But such consequences are not why CBS pulled the show.

Right, they pulled the show because the advertisers (or the ones footing the bill) learned that their customers (the ultimate payors of that bill) would not watch. I don't see why this has you up in arms. It is the consequence of a free society. If it was the government telling CBS not to air, that's one thing, but if it's CBS' customers, that's quite another.

sgtclub · 11-04-2003, 07:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
I don't know . . . I read a report that one of the controversial scene edited had Nany urging Ronnie to increase research funding, etc. to help find a cure for AIDS, and Reagan responds "let those who live in sin die in sin." When the network asked about it, the producers acknowledged that they had no source for the statement, but had made it up for the scene. That seemed pretty low to me, to make stuff up that would make RR seem positively shitty by today's lights.

[Although, as I recall, the Regan admin. did dick for AIDS.]

QUOTE]Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
You are willfully missing the point. I am not complaining about CBS, or its advertisers, or the government. I am complaining that the conservatives who are threatening a boycott of this programming because they disagree with it are acting in a way that we all ought to condemn. They are trying to exercise a heckler's veto.

Ar they threatening to boycott the programming? Or the advertisers and the network? If the latter, I agree with you. If the former, I agree with Club.

Anyway, I am constantly puzzled and annoyed by the cult of Reagan, but it is ceratainly no worse than what the DEMS did with JFK , and Reagan had many more accomplishments and a more lasting legacy.

S_A_M [/QUOTE]

If SAM is kind of/maybe agreeing with me, I may have to rethink my position.

Did you just call me Coltrane? · 11-04-2003, 07:20 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
economic veto

My only problem was how this economic veto coincided with the Republican party's outrage. The veto, based on economics, should have been made a LONG time ago.* It's not like CBS is some fledgling company that didn't know any better until the Republicans came along and told them.

*Unless CBS JUST RECENTLY viewed the miniseries in its complete form - then it's fine.

Shape Shifter · 11-04-2003, 07:26 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
[CBS boycott]

Wouldn't this be a tree falling in the woods with no one to hear it sort of thing?

Did you just call me Coltrane? · 11-04-2003, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Wouldn't this be a tree falling in the woods with no one to hear it sort of thing?

Great point. Although it's gotten to the point where I can't tell any of the broadcast networks apart...

Connect_the_Dots · 11-04-2003, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
Ar they threatening to boycott the programming? Or the advertisers and the network? If the latter, I agree with you. If the former, I agree with Club.

Anyway, I am constantly puzzled and annoyed by the cult of Reagan, but it is ceratainly no worse than what the DEMS did with JFK , and Reagan had many more accomplishments and a more lasting legacy.

S_A_M

If SAM is kind of/maybe agreeing with me, I may have to rethink my position. [/QUOTE]

I don't think it's unheard of for people to boycott advertisers if the programs they advertise on do something that someone considers tasteless. (In)Accuracy aside, does no one find it tasteless that Streisand's husband and her like-thinking clones decide to put together a mud-slinging portrayal as Reagan is dying of Alzheimers? The disease is probably in it's late stages (he hasn't been seen publicly for a few years now) and while I don't know if he is on his death bed, he is at the very least defenseless.

I put this show on par with the also-cancelled show about the six bachelors competing for the date with the woman who turns out to be a pre-op transsexual. Neither of them passes the smell test and whoever approved it should be fired for making their employer spend millions on something that no-one will ever watch.

Tyrone Slothrop · 11-04-2003, 07:42 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
Right, they pulled the show because the advertisers (or the ones footing the bill) learned that their customers (the ultimate payors of that bill) would not watch. I don't see why this has you up in arms. It is the consequence of a free society. If it was the government telling CBS not to air, that's one thing, but if it's CBS' customers, that's quite another.

I'm responding to Hello's suggestion that this is an example of market forces in action. Maybe so, but not in a good way. A bunch of people have aimed to keep CBS from speaking because, ideologically, they don't like what CBS is going to say. They are legally free to do this, but as consumers in the marketplace of ideas, the rest of us should not like this. It threatens to chill the sorts of programming available to us. If think it's nifty that the threat of a boycott worked this time, it is surely because you sympathize with their Reagan hagiography, in which case, God bless, but you are taking the short and narrow view. This is not a good way for the marketplace to function. A good way is for CBS to run the show, and for people to watch other things because who the hell wants to watch it anyway. A bad way for a market to operate is for producers to decide not to offer products that many consumers would want because a small subset of consumers gets bent out of shape and wants to restrict the options available to others. The marketplace of ideas is now going to have fewer options available, and that's even before you get to the chilling effect. What part of this do you not understand?

Tyrone Slothrop · 11-04-2003, 07:46 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by S_A_M
Are they threatening to boycott the programming? Or the advertisers and the network? If the latter, I agree with you. If the former, I agree with Club.

The latter. Follow the link:

Join the battle by signing up for our email alert that will tell you which companies advertise on the CBS series. Shortly after the anti-Reagan smear on conservatives airs, we will send you an email alert with the names and contact information for the companies that funded this Left-wing attack. The email will tell you everything you need to know to send emails, faxes, or place phone calls to these companies to inform them you will not purchase their products for 30 days to protest their complicity in smearing patriotic Americans.

By signing up on our list, you also allow us to report to advertisers, IN ADVANCE of the show, how many fed-up Americans will punish them at the check-out counter for supporting this trash TV.

Shape Shifter · 11-04-2003, 07:52 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
A good way is for CBS to run the show, and for people to watch other things because who the hell wants to watch it anyway. A bad way for a market to operate is for producers to decide not to offer products that many consumers would want because a small subset of consumers gets bent out of shape and wants to restrict the options available to others. The marketplace of ideas is now going to have fewer options available, and that's even before you get to the chilling effect. What part of this do you not understand?

I think the producers just didn't want their products associated with the miniseries. I have no problem with that, just as I would have no problem with a producer who didn't advertise on Limbaugh's show. I support the right not to speak in this instance. And if the miniseries fail to attract advertisers, I have no problem with CBS yanking it. And speaking of yanking it, I can't wait for the Clinton miniseries. On Cinemax.

Aloha Mr. Learned Hand · 11-04-2003, 07:56 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
A bunch of people have aimed to keep CBS from speaking because, ideologically, they don't like what CBS is going to say.

Au contraire, Ty. CBS has decided for themselves, through Les Moonves (the guy in charge of programming), not to "say" anything because the "message" that the program was going to convey was biased and not what they intended or paid for.

They are not running a charity or a public forum. They are a private, for-profit network. I'm no programming guru, but last I checked the idea was to (1) get a lot of people to watch (2) to put on programming they want to see and (3) get advertisers who want to pay exorbitant amounts of money to be associated with the network, its programming, and to gain exposure to the viewers... Anything that cuts against any of those three costs them money and is not in their interest. Capitalism, it's a wonderful thing.

Tyrone Slothrop · 11-04-2003, 08:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Aloha Mr. Learned Hand
Au contraire, Ty. CBS has decided for themselves, through Les Moonves (the guy in charge of programming), not to "say" anything because the "message" that the program was going to convey was biased and not what they intended or paid for.

They are not running a charity or a public forum. They are a private, for-profit network. I'm no programming guru, but last I checked the idea was to (1) get a lot of people to watch (2) to put on programming they want to see and (3) get advertisers who want to pay exorbitant amounts of money to be associated with the network, its programming, and to gain exposure to the viewers... Anything that cuts against any of those three costs them money and is not in their interest. Capitalism, it's a wonderful thing.

Every word you say here is correct, and yet you are missing my point entirely. God bless CBS, too. Presented with the threat of a boycott of their advertisers, I have no reason to question the way they acted upon their fiduciary duty to their shareholders.

Them's that I'm condemning are those behind the boycott. And those of us who want to have more choices about what we watch should agree.

Dave · 11-04-2003, 08:13 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
I don't remember a specific boycott, but my general rule has been to avoid Domino's pizza, both for the obvious gustatory reasons but also out of a desire not to subsidize the Detroit Tigers (although lately they need all the help they can get).

Brief timmy moment -- the Tigers used to be owned by Tom "Domino's" Mognahan, but they're now owned by Mike "Little Caesar's" Illitch. So avoid "Pizza Pizza" at all costs.

Carry on.

Dave, from accounting.

Say_hello_for_me · 11-04-2003, 08:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Them's that I'm condemning are those behind the boycott. And those of us who want to have more choices about what we watch should agree.

Why? If someone here disparages the New York Times, isn't that like saying dont' read it? The National Review? The Wall Street Journal editorial page? Cinemax?

What exactly is the problem with encouraging others, even as blatantly as this, to avoid a particular form of private media and its supporters?

I'm not sure you addressed the point I made earlier, but I'm also not sure my stomach allowed me to make it clearly. How is organizing a boycott any different from things that literally happen millions of times a day otherwise? On the FB, they are constantly badmouthing shows. If that is encouragement for others not to watch, then what exactly is different? Aside, of course, from the fact that this is being done before (I think) the reviewer has actually had a chance to watch the show.

Hello

Sexual Harassment Panda · 11-04-2003, 08:37 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Nancy Reagan's outrage? Try the outrage of millions of us, and CBS's advertisers. Which part of that part of the story are you missing?

I'm missing the part where you said you and millions of others had called CBS to voice your concern. Otherwise how would they have known?

Quote:

I'm a little ill today, so I have medicine head. Can you explain how this economic veto would refute the studies that conclude the media is liberal? I mean, it was based on a representative sample that admitted to being liberal in large numbers. Does this strongly refute such evidence? If so, how?

I won't because it's not pertinent to my point. My point is that I don't think the cancellation was due to millions of Reagan fans calling CBS to bitch. I don't think that happened.

Quote:

Ahh well, I went home and slept. This is 3 minutes that I'd rather have spent sleeping some more.

I do think that it's pretty subhuman to do this as he lies dying of Alzheimer's, though.

notcasesensitive · 11-04-2003, 08:51 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Sexual Harassment Panda
I do think that it's pretty subhuman to do this as he lies dying of Alzheimer's, though.

You mean he's still lying even while he's on his deathbed?! That bastard!

[as an aside, I still believe that some other healthier former president will die before Reagan. Not sure if it will be Carter or Ford.]