Does CBS Sports consider the Pledge of Allegiance “political” and, therefore, unsuitable for a TV commercial during a televised sporting event? Or was the ad in question, which features a 4-year-old reciting the pledge, “too local” for a national audience?
The 30-second spot, which is reproduced below, features the granddaughter of Dave Retter, owner of Windermere Real Estate/Tri-Cities, in Washington State.
According to Opposing Views, the ad was scheduled to run during the Wrangler Champions Challenge rodeo. In an interview with the Tri-City Herald, Retter explained the intent:
We just thought it’s around Sept. 11, Patriot Day, and rodeo is as patriotic a sport as it comes. We’ve had so many positive responses, we felt it would be fun to run something positive.
But CBS Sports refused to air the commercial, telling rodeo director Lori Lancaster in an email that the network objected to the spot’s “political nature.” CBS Sports insists the reason cited in the email was wrong and that the commercial had been rejected on the basis of its being “too local.”
There is another issue here, that of business owners parading their insufferably adorable children/grandchildren in front of the camera as an act of self-congratulation, but that’s a beef for another occasion.
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