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Two Changes of Heart, Please… Hold the Crow.

The WSJ [1] has an amazing story today… Seems that Sumner Redstone, whose record of supporting the far left I’ve gone into here in some detail, is endorsing the President for re-election. Says the article

:Speaking to some of America’s and Asia’s top executives gathered for Forbes magazine’s annual Global CEO Conference, Mr. Redstone declared: “I look at the election from what’s good for Viacom. I vote for what’s good for Viacom. I vote, today, Viacom.

“I don’t want to denigrate Kerry,” he went on, “but from a Viacom standpoint, the election of a Republican administration is a better deal. Because the Republican administration has stood for many things we believe in, deregulation and so on. The Democrats are not bad people. . . . But from a Viacom standpoint, we believe the election of a Republican administration is better for our company.”

I smell a fish, here, people. I’m concerned about the rather narrow way this wording is parsed by Redstone., focusing just on the business.  It’s called damning with faint praise, for one thing. But more importantly, he’s apparently trying to spew smoke, here. He’s been trying for weeks now, despite his rather public record of support for Kerry… it’s all in the FEC records, after all…. which I posted here [2]….to make like he’s not been supporting Kerry. 

The WSJ article itself points out:

“It was all the more surprising because the Boston-born Mr. Redstone was co-chairman of Edmund Muskie’s presidential campaign in 1972. He’s also a close friend of the other Massachusetts senator, Ted Kennedy. Monday’s New York Sun, quoting the Federal Election Commission, said that since 1998 Mr. Redstone had given $50,000 to the Democratic Party. He’s also donated the maximum $2,000 to the Kerry campaign, after supporting Al Gore in 2000.”

The reason for this attempt at misdirection, apparently, is to help in the attempt to remove Redstone himself from doubt on the SeeBS documents scandal.

This seems to me a ‘cut the losses’ move, on Redstone’s part… and I’m not buying. In my estimation, Redstone sees his company in serious danger as a result of this scandal and is seeking cover. He’s right, he’s in deep doo-doo. But I’m not buying the illousion he’s trying to project.

Another rat deserting the sinking ship appears to be David Brinkley, who at last admits it;

“John Kerry was not the war hero we thought he was.”

I suspect we’ll see more of this “cut and run” strategy in the next 7 weeks, even without any further revelations from the See BS investigation.

I tell ya, gang… It’s hard not to be giddy, today.

Update: Slantpoint seems to agree [3]with my call on Redstone.