• by Wayne Friedman , October 29, 2007

When it comes to advertising your presidential message, Fox News says there are limits.

Fox News Channel wants Sen. John McCain to stop airing a presidential campaign commercial because a big chunk of the 30-second ad uses material from an October 20th debate that aired on Fox.

McCain's campaign says using the Fox News debate video represents "fair use." It has, reportedly, flatly refused to stop using the commercial.

About 18 seconds of video from the 30-second ad, which was ironically aired briefly in the Boston market on a Fox station during last week's World Series, was clearly identified as coming from Fox News, with a FoxNew.com logo in the bottom left of the screen.

The ad focused on McCain's response to Hillary Clinton's idea for a Woodstock Museum, which would cost taxpayers about $1 million dollars. McCain is against that idea--he says it is wasteful.

Sen. McCain, who was a prisoner of war for 5-1/2 years during the Vietnam War, said, from the Fox News aired debate: "Now, my friends, I wasn't there. I'm sure it was a cultural and pharmaceutical event.... I was ... I was tied up at the time," to applause.

Other TV news networks also have similar restrictions in using their respective video content.