Dial It In

Kos has created a great database of Sinclair affiliate information so that you can conveniently call and write your local station and its advertisers. It's best is you are actually a local to make an impact on local businesses. Kos also has a convenient list of natinal advertisers for all of us to contact.

I would suggest calling instead of writing, although a snail mail letter is very powerful too. To that end I've prepared a couple of introductory talking points to get you started if you aren't comfortable with doing stuff like this.

First, don't get mad. These people are very far away from the corporate decision and it serves no purpose to take out our anger on them. Tell them what you think and what you plan to do. Don't get bogged down in talking about your feelings or how upset you are by this. Make sure you mention that you will not buy their product or patronize their business if they support this thing and tell them that you are planning to talk about this with others to spread the word.

Calling the station managers and telling them that you are going to call advertisers is a good first step. I imagine that they are no longer talking calls today, but you can leave a message. Then call your local advertisers and tell them what you think. Use words like "controversy", "cheating", "unfair","unbusinesslike", "scam", "fraud" --- words with which businesses don't like to be associated.

Stay calm and make your case. These businesses don't want to deal with this crap and there's no reason to preemptively punish them for the acts of Sinclair. Speak more in sorrow than in anger "that it's come to this."

Here are a few phrases you might find will help you get started. Write in more in the comments section if you think of them and I'll pick the best ones and put them up too.

Sales managers:

Broadcast television stations have a unique responsibility to be guardians of the democratic process. You will not watch, nor will you patronize businesses that do not respect the rules and the law when it comes to fairness in elections.

You are going to call local advertisers and tell them that as long as they support this station's controversial intention of showing a political advertisement as news, you are not going to buy their product or patronize their business. Sinclair is cheating and you don't think that's fair. This is too important.

Corporate headquarters coming in and telling local news departments what they have to call news is just wrong. You are going to tell the local advertisers how you feel about that too. Local communities should have a say in what is shown on their own television stations. This is a scam on the good people of ____.

Local advertisers:

You don't care who somebody plans to vote for, but you think it's cheating for stations to run controversial political advertisements for one candidate and call it news.

You won't be able to support businesses that fund this kind of fraudulent and unbalanced partisanship.

After 2000, you realize that every vote counts and you think that elections are important enough to get involved with. You have a lot of friends who think the same way. This is something you feel strongly enough about to change your shopping habits over. This is unbusinesslike behavior and you don't think you can trust people who are so partisan.

You think that local communities letting corporations from out of state come in and tell local stations what they have to run us just wrong and you can't support that.


Josh Marshall says that station affiliates are asking callers to call Sinclair headquarters instead of advertisers.

Nice try, but we're not Republicans.