Telcos Blitz Washington in Million-Dollar Campaign
May 4th, 2006 by Tim KarrThe cable and phone lobby is bombarding Washington with TV ads telling Congress to support their plans to seize control of the Internet. According to Jeff Chester, the industry is spending nearly $1 million a week on an ad blitz to convince elected officials to side with AT&T and Verizon — and against their constituents.
“Companies such as Qwest, Comcast, Time Warner, and AT&T want to be broadband barons,” Chester writes, “with all other content providers and users reduced to serving as merely consuming digital surfs.”
How much is the PR campaign costing? Chester replies:
Well, intrepid media consultant Gary Arlen of Arlen Communications has done the math. “About 975K is being spent on Washington-area media buying,” he told us. That sum is mostly for local broadcast TV expenditures. According to Mr. Arlen, the U.S. Telecom Association has been spending $250 K/week (and so far has run-up a six-week $1.5 million ad tab). AT&T is forking out $600K per week (for its “Choice” campaign). TV4US, a telco “Astroturf” group, is spending $75k per week for at least a four-week air time buy. The NCTA, meanwhile, has gone through at least $ 1 million nationally in a year, spending 50K a week in the DC market as Congress meets.
We need to match each telco lobbying dollar with the voice of an actual person. Let Congress know that you speak louder than industry propaganda. Contact Congress today. More than 500,000 people have already.
We’re turning the tides against “business as usual” in Washington, as Josh Silver wrote yesterday:
As predicted, the cable and telephone companies have lined up their PR henchmen and “Astroturf” campaigns in an attempt to muscle through legislation that hands them control of the Internet. But they’re now facing a formidable opposition in the form of a public that’s fed up with business as usual in the nation’s capital.
Whereas before, the big telephone companies and their hired guns were confident that Congress would simply roll over, today, no member of Congress can vote with the teleco cartel without feeling public heat.
