Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group

Will She or Won’t She?: Sarah Palin and the Other Splashy Maybe Candidates and the Equal Time Rule

By Paul Siegel

Political pundits have recently been focusing on those possible Republican presidential contenders who would be giving up highly lucrative media and public relations careers were they to join the 2012 presidential race. First, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum were let go from their Fox News gigs, followed by Glenn Beck, then Mike Huckabee used his Fox program to take himself out of the race. Donald Trump – the day after NBC announced it would renew The Apprentice, also bowed out of 2012 contention. Attention has switched to Sarah Palin--- would she give up her Fox role, Sarah Palin’s Alaska on TLC (as well as her lucrative lecture business, which would be at least unseemly for a presidential candidate)?

Most news stories about who’s in and who’s out have suggested that these media celebrities are weighing dollar signs and considering the limited number of waking hours in a day as they decide whether to run. Missing from most accounts is the fact that one of the few remaining federal laws regulating political content on the airwaves plays a major role.

Section 315 of the Federal Communication Act, referred to more colloquially as the Equal Time Rule, tells broadcast stations (legal scholars are divided as to how strictly the Federal Communications Commission would apply the rule to cable stations) that if they allow one candidate for office to “use” their airwaves, they must invite all candidates for the same office to enjoy equal time in a similarly prominent spot at a future date, prior to the election. When Ronald Reagan was a candidate (both for governor and president), Bedtime for Bonzo had to be put to bed for the duration of the campaign. If Fred Thompson decided to run again for senator or for some other office, reruns of his Law & Order and many movie appearances would disappear from broadcast and likely from most cable stations too.

The rule applies not only to federal elections, but local ones as well. When The Tonight Show failed to realize that they had conducted an interview with the Mayor of Burbank when he was a candidate for re-election, the NBC affiliate in Los Angeles had to give free airtime to the other 11 candidates for that much-sought-after office. Similarly, when William Branch decided to run for a town council seat in Loomis, California (population 4,000 at the time), he had to give up his on-air duties as reporter for a local Sacramento station.

Thus it is that Fox News’ not having pushed Sarah Palin out the door (at least as of this writing) has suggested to some pundits that network management may know something we don’t know—that Ms. Palin may, like Mr. Trump before her, be teasing us with the possibility of a presidential run only to drum up publicity for her various media interests, that the Equal Time Rule will be invoked against her or her Alaska.

Paul Siegel is professor of communication at the University of Hartford. He was the founding executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Kansas and Western Missouri office, and he has served on the ACLU's affiliate boards in Illinois; Washington, D.C.; and Connecticut. He is the author of Communication Law in America: Third Edition. Go to www.paulsiegelcommlaw.com for more information.

After Dominique Strauss-Kahn?

By Sarah Tenney

The recent arrest and resignation of IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn emphasizes the importance of the institution’s legitimacy in the international arena.

Although often overlooked, the most fundamental role of the IMF is to serve as a trusted advisor to country authorities and other international organizations and groups. In this capacity, its staff of only about 2500 enjoys access to the highest government offices and officials in all of its 187 member countries. It has the “ear” of other important international organizations, civil society groups, the academic community, and the media. Indeed, its role as a trusted advisor lies at the heart of all of the IMF’s work and enables it to serve as the pivotal player in efforts to ensure a stable international monetary and financial system.

Over the past 67 years, the IMF has achieved the highest level of global legitimacy not only by recruiting and retaining the “best and the brightest” among the world’s economists, but also by maintaining a sound track record for impartiality, confidentiality, and policy analysis. Its staff and management are well-respected among member states for professionalism, cultural awareness, and diplomatic prowess.

All of this was suddenly called into question on May 14, when the leader of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was arrested on charges of sexual assault. Despite the tenet of the US justice system that the man is “presumed innocent until proved guilty,” the world’s media seems to have gone into a feeding frenzy, and Dr. Strauss-Kahn tendered his resignation to the IMF on May 18, 2011. (1)

While the IMF has been careful to separate the criminal investigation into Dr. Strauss-Kahn’s personal life from the work of the organization, the selection process for the next Managing Director will certainly be a matter for scrutiny. Indeed, the Executive Board was quick to give assurance that the selection process will take place in “an open, merit-based, and transparent manner.”(2)

Perhaps most interesting, the Executive Board has stated that the selection of the next Managing Director will be made without regard to geographic preference. In the period since 1944, convention has dictated that the President of the World Bank is always a citizen of the United States while the Managing Director of the IMF is a European. This informal understanding emerged at a time when these two groupings controlled the global economy and the conviction was that developing countries should not provide the leadership, because they were most likely to need assistance; thus, having a developing country national at the helm could leave the organization vulnerable to possible conflicts of interest.

Clearly, the sovereign debt crisis in Europe and continuing difficulties in the United States have rendered previous assumptions about those mostly likely to need help obsolete. Nevertheless, the United States and the European Union still wield the largest voting shares in the IMF’s Executive Board, and the current frontrunners seem to be Christine Lagarde, finance minister of France, and former UK Prime Minster Gordon Brown.

Regardless of nationality, the next leader of the IMF will have important work to accomplish if further progress is to be made in putting in place a fail-safe early warning system, reining in financial sectors, and promoting greater equality both within and between countries.

In order to accomplish these feats, the next leader will require at a minimum the qualifications set forth by the IMF Executive Board‘s press release of May 20, 2011:

. . . (s)he will be capable of providing strategic vision for the work of a high quality, diverse, and dedicated staff; and will be firmly committed to advancing the goals of the Fund by building consensus on key policy and institutional issues, including through close collaboration with the Executive Board, under whose direction (s)he will fulfill his or her responsibilities. (S)he will have a proven understanding of the Fund and the policy challenges facing the Fund's diverse global membership. (S)he will have a firm commitment to, and an appreciation of, multilateral cooperation and will have a demonstrated capacity to be objective and impartial. (S)he will also be an effective communicator.

Given recent events, the candidate may also need to have an unimpeachable personal background. Surely, the job will require a man or woman with bold conviction, fearless determination, and unparalleled political acumen to lead not only the institution, but also the world community in adjusting to a new and more complex global environment.

NOTES

1. IMF Press Release No.11/187, May 18, 2011.
2. IMF Press Release No. 11/191, May 20, 2011

Sarah Tenney is assistant professor in the Political Science and Criminal Justice Department at The Citadel and the co-editor of the Historical Dictionary of the International Monetary Fund : Third Edition (Scarecrow Press). She was a staff member of the International Monetary Fund from 1987 to 2003.