The conservative-leaning Sinclair Broadcast Group, whose television outlets reach nearly a quarter of the nation's homes with TV, is ordering its stations to preempt regular programming just days before the Nov. 2 election to air a film that attacks Sen. John F. Kerry's activism against the Vietnam War, network and station executives familiar with the plan said Friday.

Sinclair's programming plan, communicated to executives in recent days and coming in the thick of a close and intense presidential race, is highly unusual even in a political season that has been marked by media controversies.

Sinclair has told its stations — many of them in political swing states such as Ohio and Florida — to air "Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal," sources said. The film, funded by Pennsylvania veterans and produced by a veteran and former Washington Times reporter, features former POWs accusing Kerry — a decorated Navy veteran turned war protester — of worsening their ordeal by prolonging the war. Sinclair will preempt regular prime-time programming from the networks to show the film, which may be classified as news programming, according to TV executives familiar with the plan.

Executives at Sinclair did not return calls seeking comment, but the Kerry campaign accused the company of pressuring its stations to influence the political process.

"It's not the American way for powerful corporations to strong-arm local broadcasters to air lies promoting a political agenda," said David Wade, a spokesman for the Democratic nominee's campaign. "It's beyond yellow journalism; it's a smear bankrolled by Republican money, and I don't think Americans will stand for it."

Sinclair stations are spread throughout the country, in major markets that include Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Las Vegas; its only California station is in Sacramento. Fourteen of the 62 stations the company either owns or programs are in the key political swing states of Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where the presidential election is being closely fought.

Station and network sources said they have been told the Sinclair stations — which include affiliates of Fox, ABC, CBS, NBC, as well as WB and UPN — will be preempting regular programming for one hour between Oct. 21 and Oct. 24, depending on the city. The airing of "Stolen Honor" will be followed by a panel discussion, which Kerry will be asked to join, thus potentially satisfying fairness regulations, the sources said.

Kerry campaign officials said they had been unaware of Sinclair's plans to air the film, and said Kerry had not received an invitation to appear.

Broadcasting official charged in sex stakeout
Sinclair president, woman arrested in company car

Published on: August 15, 1996
Edition: FINAL
Section: NEWS
Page: 2B
Byline: SUN STAFFPeter Hermann

372

The president of Baltimore-based Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc., which owns the local Fox television affiliate, was arrested Tuesday night and charged with committing a perverted sex act in a company-owned Mercedes, city police said.

David Deniston Smith, 45, of the 800 block of Hillstead Drive in Timonium, who also is Sinclair's chief executive, was arrested in an undercover sting at Read and St. Paul streets, a downtown corner frequented by prostitutes, Baltimore police said yesterday.

Smith and Mary DiPaulo, 31, were charged with committing unnatural and perverted sex act. Smith was held overnight at the Central Booking and Intake Center and released on personal recognizance at 2 p.m. yesterday. DiPaulo's bail status was not available.

Officials at WBFF-TV (Fox 45) and Sinclair, one of the fastest-growing broadcasting companies in the nation with 28 television and 34 radio stations, would not comment yesterday. The company had $126 million in sales in the first half of this year.

President Bush himself would have qualified as a "small business owner" under the Republican definition, based on his 2001 federal income tax returns. He reported $84 of business income from his part ownership of a timber-growing enterprise. However, 99.99% of Bush's total income came from other sources that year. (Bush also qualified as a "small business owner" in 2000 based on $314 of "business income," but not in 2002 and 2003 when he reported his timber income as "royalties" on a different tax schedule.)

In New Attacks, Bush Pushes Limit on the Facts

...the scathing indictment that Mr. Bush offered of Mr. Kerry over the past two days - on the eve of the second presidential debate and with polls showing the race tightening - took these attacks to a blistering new level. In the process, several analysts say, Mr. Bush pushed the limits of subjective interpretation and offered exaggerated or what some Democrats said were distorted accounts of Mr. Kerry's positions on health care, tax cuts, the Iraq war and foreign policy.

Presidential Palm Pilot 10-8
(from Air America Radio, Morning Sedition, 10/8/04)

4 a.m. Debate Day. Wake Up in St. Louis in a cold sweat. NOTE: Must score coke, must score coke, must score coke. Call Ramon.

4:30 a.m. Call Ramon again NOTE: Where the hell is he? How are people supposed to score coke in the Midwest? How long would it take Air Force One to go to Miami?

6 a.m. Dangle Kerry debate dummy off balcony. Need confidence builder.

7 a.m. Wake economic advisor. See if it’s too late to buy every voter a car.

8 a.m. Ramon finally comes. Thank you, Jesus.

9 a.m. Party!!!!. NOTE: What do I am I have to worry about? I’m the greatest president of all time!!! Everyone loves me. Thank you Ramon!!! Who-hoooo!!!!! Hail to the Chief!!!!

11 a.m. Curl up in a corner. Weep. NOTE: I can’t do this, I got nothing, there’s no WMD’s, the polls are down, I screwed up the last one, Kerry is a much better debater than I am, Cheney won’t take my calls, everyone knows about the earpiece, I’m SCREWED, SCREWED, SCREWED, SCREWED!!!!!

12-7 p.m. Stare out the hotel window at nothing. NOTE: What does it all mean? No one knows the real me. I just wanted to run a baseball team. I never wanted this. Dad wanted this. It’s always about making Dad happy. Let Jeb do it…

7:30 p.m. Meeting with Cheney. HIS ADVICE: Pull yourself together you stupid hick!!! We didn’t waste billions on you so you could bail out now. Remember, we could take you out anytime, and I don’t mean the race!!! So get dressed, you stupid blow monkey!

9 p.m. Debate. Be prepared to go to “Aide-hands-me-a-piece-of-paper-and-I have-to-go-now scenario. National security. Can’t talk about it. Gotta run. Gotta go do something presidential.”

11 p.m. Bedtime. NOTE: Well, I’ve still got one friend left. Hello, Ramon?

After undergoing his annual medical check-up in August 2001, 2002 and 2003, US President George W. Bush (news - web sites) has put the procedure off this year until after the November 2 election, his spokesman said.

Bush, locked in a neck-and-neck race for the White House with Democratic Senator John Kerry (news - web sites), is in "great health" and got the green light for the decision from his doctors, spokesman Scott McClellan told AFP.

"This has been a busier travel period for the president than the previous three years," the spokesman said.

Bush, 58, is known as an avid physical fitness buff who switched from running to mountain biking earlier this year after hurting his knee.

"The president, like other Americans, talked with his doctors about when to have his physical. They felt it was perfectly fine to do it later this year," said McClellan. "The president is an active person who is physically fit and in great health."

Stress can do a lot to someone's face and posture and W's got it bigtime. Here's what I imagine is running through his mind: "If I'm wrong about WMD, then I could be wrong about invading. If I was wrong about invading, I could be wrong about what the 'War on Terror'. If I'm wrong about that then I could be wrong about my faith. If I'm wrong in my faith, I need a drink. If I need a drink, then I need more faith. We got to find that WMD. AAAARRRGGGG"

WASHINGTON - The Education Department has advised school leaders nationwide to watch for people spying on their buildings or buses to help detect any possibility of terrorism like the deadly school siege in Russia.

The warning follows an analysis by the FBI (news - web sites) and the Homeland Security Department of the siege that killed nearly 340 people, many of them students, in the city of Beslan last month.

"The horror of this attack may have created significant anxiety in our own country among parents, students, faculty staff and other community members," Deputy Education Secretary Eugene Hickok said in a letter to schools and education groups.

The safety advice is based on lessons learned from the Russia incident. But there is "no specific information indicating that there is a terrorist threat to any schools or universities in the United States," Hickok said.

Federal law enforcement officials also have encouraged local police to stay in contact with school officials and have encouraged reporting of suspicious activities, the letter says.

In particular, schools were told to watch for activities that may be legitimate on their own — but may suggest a heightened terrorist threat if many of them occur.

The strategy is aimed at stoking public fears about terrorism, raising new concerns about Kerry's ability to protect Americans and reinforcing Bush's image as the steady anti-terrorism candidate, aides said.

"The country doesn't know it yet, but it has created a monster, a monster in the form of millions of men who have been taught to deal and to trade in violence, and who are given the chance to die for the biggest nothing in history; men who have returned with a sense of anger and a sense of betrayal which no one has yet grasped."

"They wanted everything to do with the war, particularly with this foreign presence of the United States of America, to leave them alone in peace, and they practiced the art of survival by siding with whichever military force was present at a particular time, be it Viet Cong, North Vietnamese or American."

"We rationalized destroying villages in order to save them. We saw America lose her sense of morality as she accepted very coolly a My Lai, and refused to give up the image of American soldiers who hand out chocolate bars and chewing gum."

"Each day, to facilitate the process by which the United States washes her hands of Vietnam, someone has to give up his life so that the United States doesn't have to admit something that the entire world already knows, so that we can't say that we have made a mistake."

French officials were prepared to provide as many as 15,000 troops for an invasion of Iraq before relations soured between the Bush administration and the French government over the timing of an attack, according to a new book published in France this week.

The book, "Chirac Contre Bush: L'Autre Guerre" ("Chirac vs. Bush: The Other War"), reports that a French general, Jean Patrick Gaviard, visited the Pentagon to meet with Central Command staff on Dec. 16, 2002 -- three months before the war began -- to discuss a French contribution of 10,000 to 15,000 troops and to negotiate landing and docking rights for French jets and ships.

French military officials were especially interested in joining in an attack, because they felt that not participating with the United States in a major war would leave French forces unprepared for future conflicts, according to Thomas Cantaloube, one of the authors. But the negotiations did not progress far before French President Jacques Chirac decided that the Americans were pushing too fast to short-circuit inspections by U.N. weapons inspectors.

Ralph Nader Accepts Campaign Contributions from Funders of "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth"

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ALERT

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Funders of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a right wing PAC, have made thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to Ralph Nader, United Progressives for Victory (UP for Victory) announced today. In addition to accepting contributions from donors of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Nader has also taken money from conservative PAC donors who have given to the Club for Growth, along with legal representation and ballot help from Republican consultants, lawyers, major donors, and state parties.

According to Federal Election Committee records, five major donors who have given $13,500 to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth to air its attack ads on John Kerry’s military service have also given Nader $7,500.

Specifically, Travis Anderson (NJ), Brian Pilcher (CA) and Donald Burns (FL), are three of Nader’s largest donors and each has given him $2,000 (the maximum allowable contribution), while also contributing to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Charles Eckert (CA) and Oliver Grace (NY) have also given to both Nader’s PAC and the swift boat PAC.

Nader has condemned the ads run by this PAC, saying, “It's pretty deplorable that Bush through his proxies is doing this smear,” Nader said. (8/27/2004, A.P., in speech at Tulane University)

Robert Brandon, a former Nader associate, public interest attorney and co-founder of UP for Victory said, “Now we learn that Bush, through his proxies, is funding Nader’s campaign. If Nader wishes to have any credibility left with progressives, he must give back all right wing money and finally acknowledge that his campaign is being used by the Bush/Cheney re-election team.”

Altogether, UP for Victory research has documented over $100,000 in cash and known in-kind contributions to Nader by GOP donors and consultants. This does not count the unreported in-kind contributions made by the GOP in circulating his ballot petitions in many states.

"Undercutting the Bush's administration's rationale for invading Iraq, the final report of the chief U.S. arms inspector concludes that Saddam Hussein did not vigorously pursue a program to develop weapons of mass destruction when international inspectors left Baghdad in 1998, an administration official said Wednesday."

"Charles Duelfer concluded that Saddam's Iraq had no stockpiles of the banned weapons but said he found signs of idle programs that Saddam could have revived once international attention waned."

"'It appears that he did not vigorously pursue those programs after the inspectors left,' the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in advance of the report's release."

"White House spokesman Scott McClellan continued to maintain that Duelfer's report will support the White House's view on Iraq's prewar threat."

Dear Mr. President:

As professors of economics and business, we are concerned that U.S. economic policy has taken a dangerous turn under your stewardship. Nearly every major economic indicator has deteriorated since you took office in January 2001. Real GDP growth during your term is the lowest of any presidential term in recent memory. Total non-farm employment has contracted and the unemployment rate has increased. Bankruptcies are up sharply, as is our dependence on foreign capital to finance an exploding current account deficit. All three major stock indexes are lower now than at the time of your inauguration. The percentage of Americans in poverty has increased, real median income has declined, and income inequality has grown.

The data make clear that your policy of slashing taxes – primarily for those at the upper reaches of the income distribution – has not worked. The fiscal reversal that has taken place under your leadership is so extreme that it would have been unimaginable just a few years ago. The federal budget surplus of over $200 billion that we enjoyed in the year 2000 has disappeared, and we are now facing a massive annual deficit of over $400 billion. In fact, if transfers from the Social Security trust fund are excluded, the federal deficit is even worse – well in excess of a half a trillion dollars this year alone. Although some members of your administration have suggested that the mountain of new debt accumulated on your watch is mainly the consequence of 9-11 and the war on terror, budget experts know that this is simply false. Your economic policies have played a significant role in driving this fiscal collapse. And the economic proposals you have suggested for a potential second term – from diverting Social Security contributions into private accounts to making the recent tax cuts permanent – only promise to exacerbate the crisis by further narrowing the federal revenue base.

These sorts of deficits crowd out private investment and are politically addictive. They also place a heavy burden on monetary policy – and create additional pressure for higher interest rates – by stoking inflationary expectations. If your economic advisers are telling you that these deficits can be defeated through further reductions in tax rates, then you need new advisers. More robust economic growth could certainly help, but nearly every one of your administration’s economic forecasts – both before and after 9-11 – has proved overly optimistic. Expenditure cuts could be part of the answer, but your record so far has been one of increasing expenditures, not reducing them.

What is called for, we believe, is a dramatic reorientation of fiscal policy, including substantial reversals of your tax policy. Running a budget deficit in response to a short bout of recession is one thing. But running large structural deficits over a long period is something else entirely. We therefore urge you to consider the fiscal realities we now face and the substantial burden they are placing on our economy.

JOHN EDWARDS IS WRONG: There aren't "two Americas." There are three.

There's sane, rational, informed and normal America, which overwhelmingly supports John Kerry.

There's crazed, nutty, off their rocker wingnut America, which overwhelmingly supports George W. Bush and/or Ralph Nader.

Then there's ignorant dumbass America, which, sadly, supports Bush by a majority at the moment.

These are the folks who think Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11.

These are the folks Jay Leno embarrasses on national television when they can't name their own state's Governor.

The biggest problem John Kerry and the Democrats face is that George W. Bush is practically the patron saint of Dumbass America.

There are nearly 108,000 registered Republicans in the 5th Congressional District, plus 62,000 registered Democrats, 214,000 undeclared voters, and 1,400 registered independents.

There are no registered idiots.

Someone forgot to mention this to Rep. Scott Garrett, whose excuse for not committing to debate Democrat Anne Wolfe in Bergen County or Passaic County - which account for only a measly 69 percent of the district's population - would be accepted only by an idiot. Chief among Garrett's excuses is that, darn it, he just hasn't been able to find the time.

He has, however, found time for partisan visits. But debate the issues? No.

Garrett is the freshman Republican from Wantage who is after his second term in the House. It would be a mark of delectable political candor if he simply were to imitate the outlaw in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" and say through a sneer: "Debate? With those registration numbers? I don't need no stinkin' debate."

But he doesn't say that.

Instead, in seeming to chicken out of a scheduled Oct. 21 meet-

ing at Ramapo College in Mahwah, Garrett had his campaign manager, Matthew Barnes, tell The Record: "Given Congressman Garrett's congressional responsibilities and often-changing congressional schedule, we cannot commit to the debate at this time."

It sounds high-minded. But when you read it again, you find it's not Garrett's fault that he probably won't meet Wolfe or the minor party candidates to discuss such piddling matters as war and peace, homeland security, terrorism, gay marriage, the environment, abortion, health care, Social Security or education.

It's the fault of Congress itself, Barnes complained, noting that the leadership is holding the House in session. He made it sound as though House members would be free to leave Washington sometime in the next ice age.

In fact, the House is scheduled to adjourn on Friday, maybe Saturday.

So does Garrett actually want to debate? "Congressman Garrett is eager to share his record of accomplishment with the voters of the 5th District," Barnes said.

Yes, but does he want to debate? "He can't commit at this time," Barnes said.

On Garrett's Oct. 29 schedule, Barnes said, is a joint radio appearance with Wolfe on Oldies 1510 in Hackettstown in Warren County, four days before the election. Wolfe says she'll be there. But unless you live within a 20-mile radius of Hackettstown, don't bother tuning in. You're not likely to pick up Oldies 1510's signal, which is too weak to reach Ringwood, let alone Allendale or Norwood, said Norman Worth, the general manager.

It should be noted that Warren County, the home base of Oldies 1510, contains a grand total of 15 percent of the 5th District's population, about the same proportion as West Milford, Bergenfield, Mahwah and Paramus alone.

Bearing in mind that it was as long ago as August when Wolfe challenged Garrett to debate, precisely what is it about Garrett's congressional schedule that prevents him from doing what Dick Cheney and John Edwards did last night and what George W. Bush and John Kerry have done once and will do twice more?

Garrett is a member of the House Budget Committee, which has a hearing scheduled for 10 this morning. He's also on the Financial Services Committee, which has no business this week. There could be general House business this week, such as some roll call votes.

Bush, meanwhile, is reported to hate debating. His responsibilities outweigh Garrett's by about a billion to one. Now, he may have thought about it, but at no time did he shove his press secretary, Scott McClellan, out to a bunch of reporters to utter something like: "Given President Bush's presidential responsibilities and often-changing presidential schedule, we cannot commit to the debate at this time."

With an adjournment set for Saturday at the latest, you'd expect Garrett and all other House members standing for reelection to head home to their districts to make their cases to the voters. Even after just one term in office, Garrett should know that there's more to the 5th District than the cow-mooing countryside of Warren County.

On Saturday, even though he was weighed down by the tonnage of his congressional responsibilities and his often-changing congressional schedule, Scott Garrett managed to travel to Ramsey to smile and shake hands with Rudolph Giuliani, who was stumping for Bush in Bergen County.

Tonight Garrett is the scheduled guest speaker at the Glen Rock Republican Club's dinner meeting.

Hey Garrett, it's time to talk to the voters, not just the party.

On the last day voters could sign up for the Nov. 2 presidential election, Leon County's elections chief said he received up to 1,500 photocopied registration forms and asked the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to find out what happened to the originals.

"The overwhelming majority of them were for African-Americans, and also the majority of them were Republicans," Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho said Monday. "That was one of the things that made us want to start contacting the registrants."

Most of the questionable registrations came from Florida A&M University and precincts around FAMU. Sancho said his office is trying to get in touch with all the voters to find out whether they registered on originals and copies were sent in by accident, whether they registered on photocopies - or whether it was fraud.

US is said to intensify probe of senator's fund-raising
FBI claims proof of improper acts
By Larry Margasak, Associated Press | October 6, 2004

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration's Justice Department is trying to secure the cooperation of an indicted businessman as it pursues Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign for possible fund-raising violations, according to interviews and documents.

The government's most definitive account of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs, to be released today, will show that Saddam Hussein posed a diminishing threat at the time the United States invaded and did not possess nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons or have concrete plans to develop them, US officials said yesterday.

The officials said the 1,000-page report by Charles Duelfer, chief US weapons inspector in Iraq, concluded that Hussein had the desire but not the means to produce unconventional weapons that could threaten his neighbors or the West. President Bush has continued to assert in his campaign stump speeches that Iraq had posed ''a gathering threat."

The officials said Duelfer, an experienced former United Nations weapons inspector, found that the state of Hussein's weapons development programs and knowledge base was less in 2003, when the war began, than it was in 1998, when international inspectors left Iraq.