Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center is dropping some serious coin to promote its anti-media message at the Republican National Convention. From an Aug. 27 CNSNews.com article by Pete Winn:
From now until Sept. 2, the media watchdog group, which is the parent organization of CNSNews.com, has rented three 14 ft- by-48 ft. billboards along Route 60 -- the primary road running from the Tampa airport to the convention site, the Tampa Bay Times Forum.
In addition to the billboards, a plane will fly a 40 ft.-by-80 ft. aerial banner around the city, weather-permitting, and a mobile billboard truck with the same slogan will drive around the Tampa area displaying the slogan.
High-powered projectors will also shine night-time projections with the message onto buildings surrounding the downtown convention site. And "Don't Believe the Liberal Media" buttons, bumper stickers and signs will all be handed out around the outside of the convention hall, according to MRC Marketing Director Ed Molchany.The $300,000 Tampa campaign is part of an overall $5 million “Tell the Truth 2012” campaign that MRC President L. Brent Bozell III announced in January, during the New Hampshire primary.
Does the fact that the Media Research Center has to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get its message out to a highly targeted audience that should theoretically already be receptive to it indicate the weakness of that message? If the MRC thinks so, it certainly won't say so in public.
Winn's boss, Brent Bozell, is quoted as making this curiously worded statement:
“Our goal is not--and I underscore this--our goal is not to do what they do, which is to attempt to elect or defeat a candidate," said Bozell. "We want a level playing field. We want the rules to apply to both sides. If you are going to have hard-hitting investigative reporting on one side, perfect. Then have hard-hitting investigative reporting on the other.”
Bozell has to say that the MRC's efforts are not intended "to attempt to elect or defeat a candidate" -- the MRC would be violating its 501(c)3 nonprofit status if Bozell wasn't tossing out that disclaimer and keeping up the pretense that it's not an arm of the Republican Party and the Romney campaign.
However, Bozell is simply lying when he says that "we want the rules to apply to both sides." The MRC has never applied the same rules to, say, Fox News that it applies to the "liberal media." And the MRC's "Tell the Truth!" campaign is hostile to media outlets that tell the truth about conservatives.
