Buried near the bottom of a mostly glowing feature piece written by George Soros’ disciple Ken Vogel at the left-wing Politico:

Brad Smith, a past FEC chairman who now heads the Center for Competitive Politics, which advocates for less campaign finance regulation, also counts himself a fan of Colbert’s campaign finance jokes in the past, but thinks that this year, he’s off base.

“I think his super PAC stuff has largely been misleading the public,” he said. “He’s giving very misleading impressions about how disclosure obligations work, and he’s given a misleading understanding about why there are rules about coordination in politics.”

The rule banning coordination is “intended to prevent campaign contributions from being essentially a substitute for bribery,” he said, and is not really as ridiculous as Colbert and Stewart try to make it seem.

More broadly, he takes issue with those who look at Citizens United as some kind of cataclysmic event.

(more…)

On Thursday, Stephen Colbert won a victory when the Federal Election Commission (FEC) ruled that he was cleared to start raising money for his ColbertPAC and could use Viacom resources – the parent company of Comedy Central – to make and show his political ads on his own show under a media exemption.

Close observers of the case who have a better-than-average grasp of the intricacies of campaign finance law understand, though, that Colbert’s claim of “victory” is dubious because the media exemption he really sought has less to do with whether Colbert was allowed to start his PAC and show his mock advertisements on his own show – that was almost assuredly going to happen – and more to do with whether he would have to report the support his show’s parent company, Viacom, as an in-kind contribution.

The original intent of the Colbert’s SuperPAC was to poke fun at the 2010 Citizens United court ruling that recognized the right of corporations, unions, and other groups to independently run ads supporting or opposing candidates. Colbert, in his attempt to satirically skewer the ruling, has actually wound up educating the public on just how burdensome and convoluted campaign finance laws are, and how free speech can be stifled by these laws.

If Stephen Colbert were not granted the media exemption, Viacom’s support of the SuperPAC would be subject to FEC disclosure filings. Their time and resources would have needed to be reported as an in-kind contribution to the FEC by law. This made executives at Viacom very nervous because they saw themselves as potentially listed as a top contributor to his SuperPAC not only to audiences who see his ads on Comedy Central but also those who see his ads on, say, ESPN. (more…)

“The Battle for America,” like “The Return of the King,” is the climactic end of an epic journey. In a concise, packed 82-minute film, Citizens United paints a vivid portrait of the atrocities of this present Congress and administration, reminding viewers that we’ve got one shot on November 2 to replace our elected officials, or endure another two years of bailouts and government takeovers. 

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This Tea Party dream film (complete with credits inspired by the “Don’t Tread On Me” flag) boasts a fiery visual narrative constructed from a collection of spliced interviews, C-SPAN feeds, news reels, Hollywood and archival footage strung together in a montage sequence making the film’s pace akin to a trailer. And that’s what “The Battle” really is. It’s a feature-length trailer, chronicling the last two years and calling out the government for atrocities committed. If everyone in America watched this trailer, I’d wager we’d have the highest turnout with the most conservative vote in U.S. history. 

And with section titles like “Village of the Damned: Radical Chic,” it’s hardly your stereotypical conservative documentary, as it pushes the limits through brilliant montage imagery that shows as much as it verbally tells. Combined with brilliant narrators, it’s smart but accessible, with insight sure to incite a revolution at the polls.  (more…)

The Obama Administration is retreating in the Global War on Terror.  It uses euphemistic phrases like “Overseas Contingency Operation” and “man-caused disasters” and tries to attribute “a variety of reasons” to attacks by Islamic radicals.  But the truth is that America is still very much at war – a war many believe we are losing.

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President Obama thinks that apologies, bows, and capitulation will disarm our enemies, but this kind of posture only encourages those who see such displays as weakness.  With the Iranian regime on the path to developing nuclear weapons, the United States must show a position of strength.  We are dealing with people for whom not even mutually assured destruction is a deterrent, “it’s an inducement because that is what they’re hoping for,” as America At Risk cast member Bernard Lewis says.

How can we prevail when our Commander-in-Chief won’t even call out the enemy by name?  Citizens United’s latest documentary “America at Risk” attempts to answer that question.  Hosted by Newt and Callista Gingrich, “America at Risk” features some of the top terrorism experts in the world including former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, former UN Ambassador John Bolton, former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, and 1993 World Trade Center bombing prosecutor Andrew McCarthy.  (more…)

After the Supreme Court decided against his favored position in 1832, Andrew Jackson supposedly explained, “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!”  The idea was that the judiciary had the power to make pronouncements, but only the executive branch had the power to carry them out. 

This March, the Federal Elections Commission under President Obama began channeling Jackson.  We had hints that this would happen after the Supreme Court decided in Citizens United v. FEC that restrictions on corporate funding of independent political broadcasts were prohibited by the First Amendment; that ruling also held that nonprofit groups like Citizens United could freely produce and distribute their documentaries. 

Obama quickly responded by targeting the Supreme Court itself, boldly (and wrongly) proclaiming in his State of the Union Address, “Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests – including foreign corporations – to spend without limit in our elections.”  Members of the Supreme Court were sitting directly in front of him at the time (one, Justice Samuel Alito, had the unmitigated temerity to shake his head softly when Obama lied about the ruling).  (more…)

The controversial  new film, “Generation Zero” which is an insightful perspective on the causes of the recent financial meltdown and the economic debacle it triggered,  will be featured during the Citizens United Film Festival at the annual CPAC 2010 convention in Washington,  D.C., Friday evening, February 19th.  “Generation Zero” is a searing look at the financial meltdown and the economic debacle it triggered through the prism of the cultural collapse in the United States, commencing in the 1960’s.  

New media entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart will provide introductory remarks regarding this epic film. ”Generation Zero,” which debuted at a special screening at The National Tea Party Convention in Nashville earlier this month has been receiving high-praises from the media and public alike, who have seen it. “There have been some highlights at the Tea Party Convention… one of them was the screening of ‘Generation Zero’, a smart and comprehensible look at the results of fiscal irresponsibility,”  states John Avalon for The Daily Beast. “Generation Zero blew the roof off The Tea Party Convention,” exclaimed Jesse Watters of FOX Nation  And, Andrew Breitbart of breitbart.com, called ‘Generation Zero’ “remarkable”…and “insightful.”

“We are extremely encouraged by the reaction thus far to our film,” stated David N. Bossie, President of Citizens United Productions and Producer/ Executive Producer of the film. ‘Generation Zero’ has particularly struck a chord with those Americans who oppose ‘big government’ and wasteful spending and are themselves one of the country’s best hopes in making sure the ominous predictions of “Generation Zero” do not come to fruition.”  Citizens United Productions produced the film in association with Victory Media. Citizens United Productions produced the film in association with Victory Media. (more…)

Continued after the jump. (more…)

Barbra Streisand writing at HuffPo.

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Truth Translator Rephrase: Barbra Streisand writing at One Of Those Companies The Left Is Okay With Using Unlimited Resources To Affect The Outcome Of Elections:

I felt like I was in suspended animation as I read the Supreme Court decision which essentially enables a corporate coup d’état of America’s Democracy. …

Corporations are not people nor are they individual citizens. They are chartered by states to conduct commerce. And while I certainly don’t pretend to be a constitutional scholar, I have been reading a lot about this and thankfully, many brilliant minds do agree with me.

The intellectual dishonesty from Hollywoodists on this issue is so… so… so… expected.

If you’re opposed to corporations being involved in our electoral process then be opposed to corporations being involved in our electoral process.

But Leftists and Hollywoodists are not opposed to media corporations being involved in our electoral process because 95% of media corporations are liberal. Neither Babs nor Adam McKay nor any Leftist has ever complained that media corporations were exempt from the unconstitutional law the Supreme Court justly overturned — because CNN, ABC, NPR, The New York Times, CBS, etc… all carry water for left-wing causes and politicians. (more…)

The abject failures and endemic corruption of the United Nations are issues that I’ve always tried to bring attention to, especially since there are so many blindly faithful UN promoters in the film industry.  In fact, the 2nd film that I ever made was Broken Promises: The United Nations at 60 with the late Ron Silver, who continues to be a source of inspiration to me and so many others. 

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Today, President Obama arrives at the UN to continue his policy of appeasement in person.  He will become the first president in American history to chair a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, and despite the fact that he had full power over the agenda to be discussed, he decided to take the Iranian and North Korean nuclear programs off the table.  (more…)

We’ve all noticed that coverage of the war in Iraq has dropped off over the last year or so.  Ever since it became an incontrovertible truth that the Bush Surge worked, The New York Times and MSNBC seem to have decided that there wasn’t much worth covering anymore.   Clearly, editors sitting in glass towers in New York City believe that “stories” like Korans being flushed down a toilet sell far more magazines than non-fiction accounts of hope and change in Iraq stemming from the hard work of our armed forces.  Now that things are going better in Iraq and controversies are more difficult to create, it doesn’t merit the “coverage” it once did. 

This phenomenon, while unfortunate, is not the most egregious failure of the mainstream media in covering the war in Iraq.  Focused as they were for the last five years on finding (or inventing from whole cloth) reasons to blast President Bush for anything that happened in Iraq, the reporters tasked with covering the conflict missed some of the most incredible acts of courage and sacrifice that have ever been performed.  Four soldiers, sailors, and marines have posthumously been awarded the Medal of Honor for acts of courage performed in Iraq, but few of us could name one of them.  (more…)

Last week the United States Supreme Court held oral arguments over a fascinating question:  whether or not the federal government has the authority to decide if a movie/documentary is a form of entertainment free from most broadcast restrictions or if the video is instead a lengthy attack ad – albeit 90 minutes long – against a candidate for federal office subject to the landmark 2002 federal campaign finance law. The BCRA (Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act) prevents “electioneering communications” within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.  The case is Citizens United v. FEC and Hollywood should be greatly alarmed by its implications. 

David N. Bossie, President Citizens United

The movie in question is “Hillary the Movie” and as a low budget documentary it bills itself as providing the untold story of who Hillary Clinton is by presenting nearly “40 in-depth interviews with experts, opinion makers, and many of the people who personally locked horns with the Clintons.”  Regardless of one’s perspective on the electoral merits of Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, it should be seen by industry insiders as truly remarkable that such a movie is subject to federal government regulation.   (more…)