Pubdate: Mon, 29 Nov 1999
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 1999 The Washington Post Company
Address: 1150 15th Street Northwest, Washington, DC 20071
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Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Author: Terry M. Neal, Washington Post Staff Writer

SATIRICAL WEB SITE POSES POLITICAL TEST

Facing Legal Action From Bush, Creator Cites U.S. Tradition Of Parody

Sign on to www.gwbush.com and an altered, obviously fake image appears of a
gleeful-looking Texas Gov. George W. Bush with a straw up his nose,
inhaling white lines.

Www.gwbush.com is not, needless to say, the official Bush campaign Web site
(which is www.georgewbush.com).

And that's exactly the point, says the site's creator, Zack Exley, a
29-year-old computer programmer from Boston.

Www.gwbush.com is so outlandish that anyone would spot it as a parody site,
he says. Exley sees himself as honoring the great tradition of political
parody, which can be traced at least as far back in this country to the
days when patriots pilloried King George III as an incompetent tub of lard.

The Republican front-runner does not share Exley's sense of humor. He is
taking legal action.

While the vast majority of the hundreds of political parody or protest
sites receive little notice, the Exley case demonstrates how under the
right circumstances, a lone dissenting voice in cyberspace can ruffle even
the biggest feathers and how the Internet is playing a new role in the
political process.

When asked at a news conference in May what he thought about the site, Bush
let loose, saying it was produced by a "garbage man" and suggesting that
"there ought to be limits to freedom"--a line Bush's online critics have
vowed to never let the world forget.

By then, Bush's lawyers had warned Exley that he faced a lawsuit for his
Web site's use of photos lifted from the copyrighted official Bush campaign
site.

The Bush campaign also filed a complaint with the Federal Election
Commission, accusing Exley of violating election laws and demanding that he
operate under the rules and regulations of a political committee. FEC
officials said they could not comment on the complaint but acknowledged
last week that they are reviewing it.

Exley said Bush's intent is to intimidate and shut him down--a charge the
Bush campaign denies. And Internet enthusiasts and free-speech advocates
are closely monitoring the case because of its First Amendment implications.

Said Exley, who has reveled in his newfound semi-fame: "I think this says a
lot. . . . I mean, to get so worked up over some guy's Web site! And for
him to say on television that there should be limits to freedom. He pretty
much made a fool out of himself." Exley said that while there are parody
sites targeting all major presidential candidates, only Bush has made a
major stink.

Indeed, the number of parody or protest Web sites has proliferated.
Www.algore-2000.org opens with an official-looking letter from Vice
President Gore that says, "Working against the American people, we have
sparked moral decay across our country." Www.buchanan2000.com asks "Are you
sure you fit into Pat Buchanan's vision of America?" before listing his
most controversial quotes.

The headline on www.hillaryno.com, an anti-Hillary Clinton Web site, says
"U.S. Senate: For Proven Leaders, Not a Proving Ground." The headline on
www.rudyno.com, a site against New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, says,
"U.S. Senate for leaders, not HotHeads."

There are dozens of other Web sites that operate essentially as political
rumor clearinghouses, with some information credited to legitimate news
sources. For instance, www.realchange.org keeps a "Skeleton Closet" that
includes "All the Dirt on All the Candidates." Go to Bill Bradley's closet
and "click on the allegation of your choice" such as "the King of Bundling:
Pioneered ways to evade campaign finance laws."

Bush's reaction produced the exact opposite of what he intended. Exley
boasts that his site has had more than 1 million visits since May.

"Bush drew attention to it and legitimized it just by responding to it,"
said Jonah Seiger, co-founder of Mindshare Internet Campaigns, an online
political strategies firm. Officials from several other campaigns said they
avoid drawing attention to critical sites for just that reason.

"Our philosophy is the best thing we can do is draw more attention to our
site, www.billbradley.com, not whatever else is out there," Bradley
spokesman Tony Wyche said.

Gore spokesman Chris Lehane said: "Clearly, what used to happen with people
handing out negative brochures and things like that at campaign events is
now taking part on the Internet. That's politics. Most voters are savvy
enough to be able to distinguish."

Exley, a computer consultant and registered independent, said he wants to
reveal Bush's hypocrisy. Exley said it makes him angry that Bush refuses to
answer whether he ever used drugs as a young man, saying it is irrelevant
now that he has "grown up." Yet he has worked to toughen penalties for even
minor drug possession and to lower to 14 the age for trying juveniles as
adults.

Exley's site is filled with caustic, sometimes witty faux press releases.
Click on Amnesty 2000, for instance, to read about the governor's latest
policy proposal: "Governor George W. Bush, Jr. today met with senior law
enforcement officials, religious leaders, criminal justice academics and
federal prison inmates to discuss a bold policy initiative called 'Amnesty
2000.' As President, Bush would pardon convicts who have 'grown up' but are
still serving long sentences for possession of cocaine and other illegal
drugs."

Bush attorney Benjamin L. Ginsberg, asked to discuss the First Amendment
implications of the governor's FEC complaint, raised his voice in
irritation: "How is it a First Amendment issue? It is NOT a First Amendment
issue."

Ginsberg said the goal was not to shut Exley down. Because Exley's site at
one point urged voters to "Just say no to a former cocaine user for
president," he clearly was advocating Bush's defeat and must be regulated
as a political campaign committee, Ginsberg said. "The idea behind this is,
if he's going to act like a political committee, he should have to reveal
his funding," he said.

Bush spokeswoman Karen Hughes offered a different explanation for the
complaint: "There were links to pornographic sites on there. That's the
real reason we did this. We just cannot have the governor's name associated
with something like this." Exley vehemently denied Hughes's allegation and
suggested it smacked of a desperate attempt to smear him.

Jack Dempsey, senior staff counsel for Center for Democracy and Technology,
a nonprofit Internet civil liberties group, said an FEC ruling in Bush's
favor could have a chilling effect on political parody on the Web because
it would greatly complicate such endeavors. "The Bush campaign is not in
this for good government reasons," he said. "They're in it because they
felt they could burden Exley with all these disclosure requirements."

Exley expressed a similar sentiment: "I'm playing the same role as any
other publication. I'm satirizing Bush. I'm providing political commentary."

He said if forced to register as a political action committee, "I wouldn't
be able to do this. You really can't do it without getting a lawyer and an
accountant. If people who want to talk politics on the Web have to register
with the government, they won't do it and this won't be an area of free
expression anymore."

George Washington University associate professor Michael Cornfield, who
runs the Democracy Online Project, a nonpartisan Internet advocacy project,
said his group is working on a solution that would create a national
registry of official campaign Web sites with the FEC and state election
officials that could be made readily available online.

"That way you don't have to complain about people doing parodies of you,"
Cornfield said. "You don't have to go attacking the First Amendment."

Bush has shown a preoccupation with the Internet's potential to harm him.
In February, months before Bush announced his candidacy, his top political
adviser, Karl Rove, registered dozens of potentially off-color or
pejorative domain names--at $70 a pop--so one could use them to create Web
sites that parody Bush.

Congress took up, but put off, legislation to deal with the issue, often
called cybersquatting--in which someone registers an individual or company
name with the hopes of profiting from it.

Ginsberg says Exley offered to sell the rights to gwbush.com for $300,000
before lowering his demand to $80,000--a price the Bush campaign still
won't pay.

Exley does not deny that, but insists it was the Bush campaign that
contacted him and asked his price. "I was just having fun with them," he
said. "But I mean, obviously, I would have sold them the domain name."

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