WASHINGTON — Stars and Stripes is being threatened with litigation from a political organization whose full-page advertisement was initially accepted and then rejected for publication.
Not In Our Name is a petition drawn up by a New York-based anti-war organization that has appeared in The New York Times, USA Today, and the Chicago Tribune, among others.
The ad has also been rejected by the publishers of the Army Times and its sister publications for the other services, according to the group’s de facto leader, Clark Kissinger.
Kissinger said he was not sure whether his group would sue the publisher of the Times, the Gannett newspaper company. He said no other newspaper had refused the ad.
The advertisement, labeled “a statement of conscience,” is signed by academics including Cornel West and Howard Zinn, and celebrities including Martin Sheen, Susan Sarandon, John Cusack and Oliver Stone.
Many of the “big name” signatories have long been associated with liberal causes. According to the Web site, 40,000 people have signed local petitions or an online version.
It says in part:
“We believe that peoples and nations have the right to determine their own destiny, free from military coercion from great powers.”
“Stars and Stripes is under no obligation to accept ads,” Kissinger said, “but once they do so, they shouldn’t be deciding based on content — that’s censorship.”
Stripes’ publisher, Tom Kelsch, said he made the decision “based on the fact that I don’t think it’s right to profit from any discussion on [any possible war in Iraq.]”
Kelsch offered the group a spot on the opinion pages, or the opportunity to put its position in a letter to the editor, which the group rejected.
It instead had a law firm send a letter to Stripes demanding the ad be run, stating a “failure to do so, will lead to litigation.”
Stripes passed the letter on to the Office of the General Counsel of the Department of Defense.
