| By Jen Caltrider - Apr 10th, 2008 at 4:41 pm EDT |
So, at this point we've all seen the U.S. Term Limits "Thanks Bob" video, right?
And hopefully, you've all seen our fun spoof too, "Thanks Big Oil Bob".
The Rocky Mountain News even gave us some lovin' in Wednesday's paper.
But the story doesn't end there. Seems the good old gang at U.S. Term Limits doesn't really understand this whole "YouTube" thing so well. So, they hired a firm to make their video and put it on the great wide interwebs for them. Except, the firm they hired, well, they didn't understand that this wasn't a "Bob Schaffer for Senate" video, but really just a Thanks, Bob video for being such a great guy.
But the wonderful folks at CREW picked up on that and, tada, a complaint was file and boom, the video was pulled off YouTube.
A national group behind a political ad showing schoolchildren repeatedly thanking U.S. Senate candidate Bob Schaffer for his commitment to charter schools has run afoul of federal election laws.
U.S. Term Limits, a Virginia- based group, paid for the ad, which includes a written disclaimer: "U.S. Term Limits does not endorse candidates for public office."
But when the ad was posted to YouTube.com, it was labeled "Bob Schaffer for Senate video." That's considered election advocacy, according to a national ethics watchdog group. Anyone who pays for an ad advocating the election or defeat of a candidate must file a report with the Federal Election Commission within 48 hours after the ad appears. No report was filed. "We find this embarrassing,"
Philip Blumel, president of U.S. Term Limits, said Wednesday. He said the media company that produced the ad was supposed to label it "Thanks, Bob."
johne over at SquareState has a great post on the whole thing, complete with screen grabs, before they pulled everything down.
When I posted our spoof video, I linked it as a response to the orginal U.S. Term Limits video. You can see in this screen grab that they labeled it a "Bob Schaffer for Senate video."
Oops, turns out that's a BIG no-no.
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