America remembers Senator Bob Dole as a plain-spoken war hero from Kansas who was respected at home and abroad. Dole, 98, died in his sleep on Sunday, December 5, 2021, announced the Elizabeth Dole Foundation.
The billboard industry remembers — literally —a “thumbs up” from Dole.
In June of 1991, the US Senate voted 60-39 to reject anti-billboard legislation. From the Senate floor, Dole (then Senate Minority Leader) flashed the thumbs up signal to industry leaders seated in the Senate Gallery overlooking the Senate, recalled OAAA’s Nancy Fletcher. She was seated in the Senate Gallery with Dean White of Whiteco and industry lobbyist Vern Clark.
Dole (and a bipartisan majority of the US Senate) voted to support billboards.
Learn more about Bob Dole at https://robertdole.org
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I met Senator Bob Dole several times in the 1990’s. When we at Mitchell Communications Corporation were the leading lobby proponents on a bill sponsored by Senator Ernest Hollings. Which eventually became a “Bill HR4850” known as the “Cable TV Consumer Protection Act”. This was after George Bush Sr. veto was over vetoed by the full house. Which busted the cable tv monopoly up and for awhile we went from 50 channels to 500 tv channels. Diversity was very short lived though after Clinton/ Gore slid spectrum auctioning to the highest bidder of the Strategic Spectrum Reserve into the Budgetary Act of 1992 violating the Communication Act of 1933-1934.
IE: Cross ownership rules that barred one company from owning all communications systems in one city (tv, radio, newspaper) and no more than one station in 7 cities. And secondly fair access of equal time Point Counter Point were both done away with by the FCC in the Budgetary Act of 1992. This was pre internet so the reaction time of industry and communication lawyers was not sufficient to stop this draconian earmark. The highest bidder earmark in the Budgetary Act of 1992 displaced over 4,000 owners of communication pipes with less than two dozen owners today it has resulted in ZERO COMPETITION . We now have rank Pathological and very Biased communication providers Propagandizing the citizenry of the United States. Bob Dole was very cordial every time our staff and communications lawyers met with him. However he voted for the monopoly strait down party lines while it was a consumer issue not a partisan issue. Another factor that helped us to get the Bill passed AT&T was litigating fair entry into video delivery business on the “Free Speech” First Amendment standing during the same time we were lobbying the HR4850 Bill. At the time it was applauded that AT&T was championing fair entry. Not so much now that the behemoths have taken over all facets of all information that the public will ever see again. We are now seeing the demise of Free Speech in our lifetime. On a positive note Billboard Ownership is still diverse and still demonstrating “Free Speech” in the marketplace, for now. In war the first casualty is Free Speech !