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Two years ago, Duncan Smith, vice president of Sinclair, gave then Maryland GOP gubernatorial candidate Robert Ehrlich extensive use of a luxury helicopter Smith owned and billed Ehrlich’s campaign-at a discounted rate of $1,000 an hour-only after an inquiry by the Baltimore Sun. Smith’s company, Whirlwind Aviation, Inc., rents out the aircraft for $2,500 an hour. "Ehrlich used the helicopter at least six times during and after the gubernatorial campaign," according to a Nov. 20, 2002 Baltimore Sun story. Smith said at the time that the remaining fee of more than $13,750 would be picked up by Whirlwind and listed by the company as an "in-kind" contribution to Ehrlich’s campaign.
But the conflict went even further and it highlights the problems with relaxing federal rules governing media ownership. While Ehrlich campaigned for governor, a campaign that he eventually won, he also lobbied the Federal Communications Commission on behalf of Sinclair who was embroiled in a licensing dispute with the agency. The FCC chastised Ehrlich for intervening on Sinclair’s behalf without disclosing that the company provided him with use of its helicopter.
In September, Sinclair and Ehrlich once again made headlines as a result of the media company’s cozy relationship with the governor. Sinclair produced a series of tourism ads in which Ehrlich appeared and waived its production fee on the condition that the state of Maryland purchase $60,000 worth of time on a Sinclair-owned station to air them, a deal which Ehrlich agreed to.
A week after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Sinclair Chief Executive David Smith and his three brothers who control the media company handed down an edict to their news and sports reporters, and even a weatherman, at the company’s flagship Baltimore television station, WBFF, requiring the broadcasters to follow up each on-air report with a statement conveying full support for President Bush and the war on terror.
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