Golo

Obama threatens tv stations airing Ayers ads

Posted Updated
Image
The Obama campaign is giving a glimpse of the future for conservative free speech. They’re trying to sic the Justice Department on TV stations, many of them Sinclair Broadcasting stations, that are airing the independent ad on Obama and Bill Ayers.
Feel the chill in the air?
Barack Obama is striking back fiercely and swiftly to stamp out an ad that links him to a 1960s radical, eager to demonstrate a far more aggressive response to attacks than John Kerry did when faced with the 2004 “Swift Boat” campaign.
Obama not only aired a response ad to the spot linking him to William Ayers, but he sought to block stations the commercial by warning station managers and asking the Justice Department to intervene. The campaign also planned to compel advertisers to pressure stations that continue to air the anti-Obama commercial.
It’s the type of going-for-the-jugular approach to politics many Democrats complain that Kerry lacked and that Republicans exploit.
Obama’s target is an ad by the conservative American Issues Project, a nonprofit group that questions Obama’s ties to Ayers, a founder of the Weather Underground organization that took credit for a series of bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and U.S. Capitol four decades ago. ..
… Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor said Obama supporters have inundated stations that are airing the ad, many of them owned by Sinclair Communications, with 93,000 e-mails. He called the ad false, despicable and outrageous.
“Other stations that follow Sinclair’s lead should expect a similar response from people who don’t want the political discourse cheapened with these false, negative attacks,” Vietor said.
Bullying You Can Believe In.
by: Michelle Malkin
From American Issues Project:
Obama Campaign Launches Desperate, Misleading Response to Ayers Ad
New Obama ad fails to dispute asingle fact about relationship with domestic terrorist, William Ayers
Washington, DC – August 25, 2008 – The Obama campaign has launched a new ad that fails to dispute a single fact in the American Issues Project’s initialad questioning Barack Obama’s relationship with admitted domestic terrorist, William Ayers. 

 “This response ad is more smoke and mirrors from a candidate desperate to obscure his long standing relationship with admitted domestic terrorist William Ayers,” said Ed Martin, American Issues Project’s president. “Senator Obama is pretending to barely know the man who hosted the launch of his political career and with whom he has worked for years to advance a liberal agenda.”

Sen. Obama has defended his friend Ayers as “respectable”and “mainstream,” despite the fact that Ayers has continued to trumpet his role in the Weather Underground bombings.  On September 11th, 2001, the New York Times reported him saying, “I don't regret setting bombs … I feel we didn't do enough.''

The Obama campaign’s response comes one day before the University of Illinois at Chicago is set to release the records of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a nonprofit organization co-founded by Ayers whose board Obama chaired.  There cords are expected to shine new light on the relationship between Ayers and Obama.

The American Issues Project’s ad began airing Thursday, August 21, and will continue through the Democratic Convention.  An electronic version of the ad and full documentation of all statements made are available at American Issues Project’s website:  www.americanissuesproject.org.
And, finally, here's the ad: