ABCNEWS.com W A S H I N G T O N, June 2
— Texas Gov. George W. Bush has yet to tangle with his GOP
presidential opponents, but his campaign is already sparring with an
Internet protester. “This
is a garbage man,” the front-running GOP presidential candidate said last
week, taking a shot at a 29-year-old computer
consultant. Zach Exley of Somerville, Mass.,
snatched up the unused gwbush.com domain name several months ago with the
hopes of forcing the Bush campaign to buy back the name. But as he learned
more about Bush, Exley says he decided to keep the address and use it to
parody the governor’s candidacy.
Cease & Desist
A professional protest firm helped build the site in a
slick red, white and blue that at first glance looks similar to the
official Bush campaign site — found a few letters away on the Internet at
www.georgewbush.com. But a closer look finds
biting jabs at the “unsuccessful Texas businessman,” including a fake
platform that promises Bush would “pardon convicts who have ‘grown up’ but
are still serving long sentences for possession of cocaine and other
illegal drugs.” Bush bristled at the
extensive parody site, saying “there ought to be limits to freedom.” His
campaign filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission and
delivered a cease and desist order demanding the parody material be
killed. “It is filled with libelous and
untrue statements whose aim is to damage Governor Bush in his effort ‘for
President’ in the upcoming election,” a copy of the FEC complaint provided
by Exley reads. Rtmark, the group that built
the site for Exley, complains filing with the FEC would constitute a
breech of free speech. “George W. Bush Jr.
apparently thinks small-time folk should have to register with the
government before exercising free speech on the Internet,” said Rita Mae
Rakoczi, a lawyer with Rtmark. “The implications of such a precedent could
be quite serious.”
Complaints Backfire on Bush
The parody George W. Bush Web site has gotten 6,451,466
hits during the first 25 days of May, thanks in part to the story’s
front-page treatment by The New York Times online edition, Exley
said last week. Meanwhile, the real George W.
Bush Web site has received only about 30,000 hits in May, according to
Bush spokeswoman Mindy Tucker. Tucker said
the George W. Bush Presidential Exploratory Committee was worried that
people would misconstrue the parody Web site for the genuine article.
“My concern is not that people are viewing
it, but that they’re viewing it in the right context,” she said.
Tucker said she recently got a phone call
from a reporter working for a major metropolitan newspaper asking for a
comment on Bush’s “Amnesty 2000” proposal to free drug convicts from
prison. While the Bush campaign now says Exley
has responded to its complaints by changing the site, the drug law parody
remains.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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S U
M M A R Y
An Internet parody of his presidential exploratory committee
riles Texas Gov. George W. Bush.
W E B
L I N K S
George W. Bush
Parody Site
The Real Bush site
Bush campaign FEC Complaint
Rtmark
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