Bill,

I think that is the greatest GOP ad I've ever seen. Do you think they borrowed Taranto's subcolumn in Opinionjournal.com's "Best of The Web Today," called "Great Orators of The Democratic Party"?

Thanks for posting this.

David

From the link you posted:
"The 1961 Report of the Register of Copyrights on the General Revision of the U.S. Copyright Law cites examples of activities that courts have regarded as fair use: “quotation of excerpts in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or comment; quotation of short passages in a scholarly or technical work, for illustration or clarification of the author’s observations; use in a parody of some of the content of the work parodied; summary of an address or article, with brief quotations, in a news report; reproduction by a library of a portion of a work to replace part of a damaged copy; reproduction by a teacher or student of a small part of a work to illustrate a lesson; reproduction of a work in legislative or judicial proceedings or reports; incidental and fortuitous reproduction, in a newsreel or broadcast, of a work located in the scene of an event being reported.”"

umm... not listed: "for use in political advertisements"

Seriously. Under which facet of Fair Use so you think this falls? You know that a Fair Use defense is an Affirmative Defense ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_defense ), right?

The GOP played the wrong song in that clip

This would have been better since all the Democrats seen to do is whine.

http://www.sexylegsplaygirl.com/laverne/Crying.html

Bill,

Is it possible to download this ad to the computer? I'd love to save a copy of it to keep on the computer. One of the better political ads I've seen in awhile.

Kevin-

I would think the section you cited re: "for purposes of illustration or comment" would apply to political situations without specifically using the word "politics."

Political statements are made, and video clips back up the statements as a means of illustration.

But the distiction is that they are using copyrighted material to comment on a third-party issue, not the copyrighted material itself.

You can't use Mickey Mouse to comment on politics and claim that as Fair Use. You can use Mickey Mouse to comment on Disney.