Ian
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
> [mailto:owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com]On Behalf Of Martin Schiller
> Sent: Saturday, January 15, 2000 8:50 PM
> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
> Subject: McCaffrey's Angels
>
>
> I apologize if this is inappropriate or has already been noted...
>
> Networks Let White House Drug Office Check Scripts
> If slant deemed right, broadcasters benefit
> Marc Lacey with Bill Carter, New York Times
> Friday, January 14, 2000
> ©2000 San Francisco Chronicle
>
> URL:
> http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/
> 2000/01/1
> 4/MN78399.DTL
>
> Over the past two years, the White House has reviewed some scripts and
> advance footage of such television shows as ``ER'' and ``Beverly Hills
> 90210'' under a little-known financial agreement with the networks that
> encourages them to include anti-drug messages in the plots of programs.
>
> As part of the arrangement, White House drug policy officials scrutinized
> in advance more than 100 episodes on all the major networks. If the
> government signs off on a particular show, the networks receive credit
> that reduces the number of costly public service announcements they are
> forced by law to air.
>
> The government officials, in the White House Office of National Drug
> Control Policy, said they made some programming suggestions to the
> networks. But television executives, who are participating in the effort
> voluntarily with an eye on the bottom line, insist that they never gave
> control of the content of their shows to the government.
>
> ``NBC has never ceded creative control of any of our programs'' to the
> drug policy office or any other department of government, said Rosalyn
> Weinman, executive vice president of content policy for NBC. The other
> networks issued similar statements.
>
> But various networks and television studio executives said they did look
> for episodes that might satisfy the interests of the drug office.
>
> The practice surfaced yesterday in a critical report on the Internet
> magazine Salon that labeled it ``prime-time propaganda.'' Although not
> widely known, the programming effort had been outlined by Barry
> McCaffrey, director of the drug policy office, during a congressional
> hearing last fall.
>
> Andrew Jay Schwartzman, president of the Media Access Project, a public
> interest law firm, told Salon, ``This is the most craven thing I've ever
> heard of yet. To turn over content control to the federal government for
> a modest price is an outrageous abandonment of the First Amendment.''
>
> Under the program, government officials get an advance look at whatever
> shows the networks want to submit and an opportunity to make the case
> that anti-drug messages be inserted. Occasionally, the drug policy office
> might suggest that a scene be changed or a line rewritten to show
> characters turning down marijuana or ruining their lives through cocaine,
> said Alan Levitt, an official in the drug policy office who helped create
> the program. In the vast majority of cases, he said, no suggestions are
> made at all.
>
> Officials with the drug policy office defended the arrangement as an
> effective way of spreading anti-drug messages to young people without
> infringing on the creative process. Drug use among youths has dropped by
> 15 percent in the last year, said drug policy office leaders, crediting
> both a government advertising blitz and anti-drug programming.
>
> ``I guess we plead guilty to using every lawful means of saving America's
> children,'' said Bob Weiner, a spokesman for the drug office. ``But we
> don't interfere in the creative process. We don't say they can't run
> anything. We don't tell them what to say or not to say.''
>
> LAWMAKER SUPPORTS POLICY
>
> Rep. Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz., whose appropriations subcommittee funds the drug
> policy office, said he approves. ``I'm not going to be wringing my hands
> over the fact that we're getting some positive messages out.''
>
> Levitt said all the major networks have participated in the arrangement,
> saving in excess of $20 million in advertising costs. Although Levitt
> listed numerous shows that had been reviewed by his office -- from ``ER''
> to ``Touched by an Angel'' to the ``Cosby Show'' -- he declined to
> provide the complete list.
>
> HALF-PRICE GOVERNMENT ADS
>
> Congress in 1997 financed a huge anti-drug advertising campaign that
> required that media outlets match any advertising time purchased by the
> federal government with an equal amount of public service time. That
> mandate essentially gives the drug office and other government agencies
> the ability to purchase ads at half price.
>
> Under the programming deal worked out by the drug office, networks can
> reduce the amount of ad time they are required to provide to the
> government by airing anti-drug shows. The networks can then sell air time
> that would have gone to the government for half price to regular
> advertisers for full price.
>
> Every network issued statements saying they have never ceded any control
> over their content to any governmental office.
>
> Every network but one agreed that they had sent either final drafts of
> scripts or tapes of completed shows to the advertising agency
> representing the drug office, seeking credit from the government.
>
> The one exception was the new and smaller network, WB, which conceded
> that it had submitted scripts in progress from ``Smart Guy'' and ``The
> Wayans Bros.'' Both shows were doing episodes on the theme of drug use,
> and both altered their scripts as a result of suggestions by government
> experts.
>
> Jamie Kellner, chief executive of WB, said the network's motivation was
> to ``try to find expertise'' that would help make the episodes accurate.
>
> ``They're not editing the scripts. They may say something like, `This
> will only work in the story if the person is truly inebriated.' ''
>
> PRODUCERS UNINFORMED OF POLICY
>
> Like several other producers whose shows were used to help generate
> network credits, John Tinker, who produced the medical drama ``Chicago
> Hope,'' never knew his show was being sent to the government. ``I would
> certainly have liked to know about it,'' he said.
>
> Aides said McCaffrey was traveling and not available for comment
> yesterday. At a hearing in October before a House appropriations
> subcommittee, McCaffrey outlined the complicated system of credits.
>
> McCaffrey discussed the complexities of getting the right message across.
> ``We realize that you cannot `shoehorn' a drug message in a script where
> it does not belong,'' he testified. ``It must appear organically.'' He
> added: ``Sometimes only a one-second frown or wave of the hand when
> someone is offered marijuana is all that is needed.''
>
> Rich Hamilton, an advertising executive who helped create the
> arrangement, said the program does not force networks to offer anti-drug
> shows.
>
> ``We'd say to a television network: `You're already doing this, and it's
> great you're doing this,' '' said Hamilton, chief executive for the North
> America operations of Zenith Media Services in New York. ``And if you're
> planning, once our paid campaign begins, to continue this, send us the
> script, and we will not rule out giving you credits for it.''
>
> Until a year ago, Zenith was responsible for media planning and buying
> for the drug control policy office's paid advertising initiative. Zenith
> lost the account in January 1999 to Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide in New
> York, a unit of the WPP Group.
>
>
> DRUG SCREENING
>
> Some of the network TV shows reviewed in advance by White House
> drug policy officials:
>
> -- ``ER'' (NBC)
>
> --``Beverly Hills 90210'' (Fox)
>
> --``Chicago Hope'' (CBS)
>
> --``The Drew Carey Show'' (ABC)
>
> --``7th Heaven'' (WB)
>
> --``The Practice'' (ABC)
>
> --``Home Improvement'' (ABC)
>
> --``Sports Night'' (ABC)
>
> --``The Wayans Bros.'' (WB)
>
> --``Cosby'' (CBS)
>
> --``Providence'' (NBC)
>
> --``General Hospital'' (ABC)
>
> Source: Salon
>
> ©2000 San Francisco Chronicle Page A1
>