Playing with the Public

In a column earlier this week, Leo Zuckermann offers an entertaining picture of how PAN lawmakers found out about the spots interrupting sports broadcasts (borrowed from Reforma, which requires a subscription):

Reforma reports that some PAN senators came together to watch [the Super Bowl]. When they saw the [campaign ads], they got mad: "They whistled and threw peanuts in the room where they were watching the game." This was the reaction of legislators who approved the electoral reform in 2007 that precipitated the situation. We can make out the reaction of the general public that, this weekend, had its entertainment interrupted for political spots. It's easy to imagine the cursing of the parties who, to be sure, enjoy a horrible public reputation.

Reforma reports that one of the PAN senators, in a joking tone, asked: "What legislators approved that reform?," which "provoked the laughter of his colleagues." Another worried: "We have to do something." Of course the parties should be worried, and very much so. The fact is that the broadcasters simply scored a huge goal on the parties.

Zuckermann treats the episode as the broadcasters, long angry about the electoral reform that limited their flexibility in covering campaigns, angering the public so as to put pressure on the parties. The parties, in turn, had passed the electoral reform in a fit of pique related to what they all saw as the unfair coverage of the 2006 election. I'm not sure how accurate this is, and it seems likely to me that it wasn't 100 percent a calculated ploy on the networks' part, but that faulty communication also played a role. Whatever the case, what a raw deal for all of us sports fans: the parties and the networks either can't along or there was a misunderstanding, so the public gets a middle finger?