Rudy Giuliani Wants A Discount From The New York Times

The full page MoveOn.org ad that called General Petraeus General Betray Us in The New York Times is still causing a storm among conservatives. Cross town rival newspaper The New York Post found out that MoveOn.org only had to pay $65,000 for the full page ad. They reported that this was a $116,000 discount from the Times’ usual $167,000 price. According to director of public relations for the Times the open price for an ad that size is $181,692. A Post reporter called the paper yesterday and was quoted a price of $167,000 for an ad that size. Two of the Republican candidates saw this and felt they needed to comment about this obvious liberal slant of the Times. Rudy Giuliani wanted to run an ad that size in the Times too, and felt he should get the same discount. Giuliani said, “give us the same rate, the heavily discounted rate they gave MoveOn.org for that abominable ad.” Fred Thompson also reads the Post. Thompson said the Times gave the group “a discount to make sure it (the ad) gets the widest possible circulation.” I’m not sure how giving discounts increases circulation, but all this fuss sure did. There is one problem with all this fuss. $65,000 is the normal rate for an advocacy ad from a non-profit group, according to newspaper spokeswoman. I guess at the Post investigative journalism isn’t as thorough as it should be. Not surprising since they are part of the Murdoch empire. “We do not distinguish advertising rates based on the political content of the ad,” the Times said in a statement. “In fact, the advertising department does not see the content of the ad before a rate is quoted.” “We believe the broad principles of freedom of the press confer on us an obligation to keep our advertising columns as open as possible,” the statement continued. “In fact, there are many instances when we have published opinion advertisements that run counter to the stance we take on our own editorial pages.” The Giuliani campaign has developed an ad, and if you go there now you can contribute to Giuliani’s campaign. They hope to get it in the Times for the same discounted price. His ad also attacks Hillary Clinton who Giuliani said smeared General Petraus. If the Times does give in and give Giuliani the discount they should give it to any other candidate that wants it. His ad is not to rebut MoveOn’s ad, but is clearly nothing more than a campaign ad. He doesn’t even address any of the issues brought up by MoveOn.org or Hillary Clinton during the Petraeus testimony.
Alan Cosgrove