Bush Administration Hands Out Payola.

So the Bush Administration paid Armstrong Williams $240,000 to promote the No Child Left Behind Act.

The campaign, part of an effort to promote No Child Left Behind (NCLB), required commentator Armstrong Williams "to regularly comment on NCLB during the course of his broadcasts," and to interview Education Secretary Rod Paige for TV and radio spots that aired during the show in 2004.

Williams said Thursday he understands that critics could find the arrangement unethical, but "I wanted to do it because it's something I believe in."

Excuse me, but that's pure crap. If a liberal had been caught doing this, we'd be hearing wails of scandal and payola and demands for an investigation.

This will rightly also attract more serious attention to the Administration's other pet projects and to Williams' connection to the White House. It doesn't matter if he "believes in" NCLB or not.

The contract may be illegal "because Congress has prohibited propaganda," or any sort of lobbying for programs funded by the government, said Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "And it's propaganda."

Propaganda is not, in fact, illegal. Propaganda that is hidden or covert in some way is. And this was certainly hidden.

Who ever authorized the payments should at least lose their job. And Williams should be made to return the payments and deal with whatever the ramifications of his actions are.

Let's see how the Administration handles this. It will go a long way to telling us how the next four years are likely to pan out.

Comments

[Bachbone]

If memory serves me correctly, chicanery was involved in this administration's hype for the Prescription Drug 'Benefit' Plan, too. There is much to be sad about where Mr. Bush is involved, no matter one's political persuasion. Supporting the lesser of evils gets tawdry quickly.

[Daniel]

I believe that you're correct. I have had similar misgivings about some of the promotion of the Faith-based Initiative and the manner in which government support gets meted out.

This administration has a problem with thinking that as long as their intentions are what they consider good, the means are merely detail. This is much how the radical left has operated in the past and one of the reasons why I left the left.

If Bush doesn't watch himself, he could bery well succomb to the "second-term jinx." And if he does, he'll have no one to blame but himself.

[Scooter Blue]

Yeah, I agree w/you on this one! I also posted about it. The Fairness Doctrine needs to be reinstated.