ALL HIGH AND MIGHTY

Often Risque TV Stations Turn Up Their Collective Noses At Pot Ads

Tune into local morning TV while dressing the kids for school and
you'll be treated to any number of sexual images and innuendos
delivered by a crew of mostly young, gorgeous and ostensibly available
women delivering all the weather, traffic and "news" about Octomom,
Jon & Kate, Michael Jackson and whatever other salacious gossip that
the TMZ.com Web site digs up overnight.

Even though KTLA, Channel 5, is owned by the LA Times, it seems its
news department sometimes wouldn't know what to do without TMZ, which
is perhaps best known for publishing stories online about celebrities
at their very worst — sometimes in death, sometimes in various stages
of trouble, drunkenness, undress or combinations of the three. (If
only Harvey Levin's pit bulls at TMZ would devote as much energy to
shaping up our political systems, but that's another story.)

Much the same situation is true at Channel 11, KTTV (which later in
the evening actually broadcasts the TV version of TMZ), where
reporters and news crews are being let go, but morning viewers still
get to hear hours of banter between two potty-mouthed "reporters"
playing some sort of Freudian good sister-bad sister game with an
aging white on-air father-figure partner who doesn't seem to want to
get in their pants as much as just have them shut up at the
appropriate moments — which they just can't seem to do.

Funny and entertaining? Sometimes. Obnoxious, degrading, exploitive,
demeaning? More often than not.

Yet, it is these very paragons of virtue, these captains of media
morality, who have decided that airing a commercial urging our leaders
to stop being hypocrites, legalize marijuana use, tax its use and in
the process help California close its $23 billion budget gap, is, as
one channel exec said, "sending the wrong message."

What!? Just who are the real hypocrites here?

Although much of the projected $1.3 billion in tax revenue expected
from the legalization of marijuana would surely be generated from
Greater Los Angeles, only one area TV station had the courage to run
the ad extolling the common-sense fiscal benefits of legalizing weed.

Featuring a perfectly average looking, conservatively dressed woman
who says she smokes pot and would happily pay taxes to get it legally
— and help bail the state out of its current fiscal crisis by raising
enough money to continue salaries for teachers, librarians,
firefighters and police officers — the spot started airing on KCBS-TV
last Saturday, according to Bruce Mirken, director of communications
for the Washington DC-based Marijuana Policy Project, whose foundation
sponsored the ad.

But even if KCBS was a little slow in coming to the party, at least
they showed up. In the LA media market, Mirken wrote in an email, "We
had not found even one broadcast outlet willing to air the spot, which
was turned down by KABC, KTTV, KTLA and KCOP. As I write this," Mirken
continued, "KNBC still has not given us a decision." And as of this
writing, still hasn't.

Mirken said that in sharp contrast to the Southland, the commercial
aired widely on broadcast stations in San Francisco and Sacramento,
and on cable across much of the state.

Since taking office in January, President Obama, who supports
decriminalization of pot but not its outright legalization, has called
off federal investigations into use and sale of marijuana for medical
purposes. California is one of 13 states that have legalized marijuana
for medical purposes, and more than 400 dispensaries operate just
within Los Angeles city limits. Anyone with a prescription can get it
at below street prices, and people are now smoking it in public and
eating it for lunch in the form of brownies, cookies and other baked
goods.

Arguing that marijuana represents an untaxed $14 billion-a-year
industry in California, San Francisco Assembly Democrat Tom Ammiano
has proposed the Marijuana Control, Regulation and Education Act,
AB390, which would allow pot use for recreational purposes for anyone
21 and older.

Betty Yee, chair of the state Board of Equalization, earlier this year
told the San Francisco Chronicle that an analysis of the measure found
the state could collect $1.3 billion a year in tax revenues if retail
sales of marijuana were legal.

We thought this was a very straightforward message," Mirken said of
the ad. "We certainly didn't think anything like this would happen."
In fairness, KTLA still tackles tough spot news stories and does a
great job in the field. But, with all the trivialization of important
matters, the absence of standards for on-air behavior, the ongoing
exploitation of women, the ceaseless pandering to questionable
sponsors and the general lack of consistency and fairness, fear of
people thinking a station might support pot use should be the least of
any TV executive's worries about sending the wrong message.