CBS has rejected Super Bowl advertisements from two groups, saying the ads violated its advocacy rules.
At the same time, the network has in the past and could again accept spots from the White House's antidrug office, raising questions about what is acceptable and what is not, and why.
Last week, The Associated Press reported that CBS rejected an ad from the Democratic political group MoveOn.org. The ad uses images of children working at adult jobs to criticize the federal budget deficit. The network also rejected an ad prepared by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals that asserts that eating meat causes impotence.
Executives at CBS, which is owned by Viacom Inc., said that their policy originated in the 1950s and prohibited the showing of advertisements that took stands on controversial public-policy issues.
Although Wes Boyd, a founder of MoveOn.org, said that he had no evidence that the ad was rejected on the grounds that it was anti-Bush, he said, "I worry that it's about ideology."
A spokeswoman for PETA, Lisa Lange, said that CBS' policy was inconsistent, because she had seen ads against smoking and drunken driving on Super Bowl telecasts.
The MoveOn.org ads, said Martin D. Franks, an executive vice president of CBS News, took a stand on "matters of the public debate where there are discernible sides, and we don't want those who have deep pockets to have an undue influence on the debate. Pick an issue, NAFTA, gun control, abortion."
Antidrug or antismoking ads, on the other hand, he said, do not wade into such controversial waters. "If you can find somebody responsible who is for drug abuse," Franks said, "or someone responsible who is for teenagers seeking to smoke, then it would be a credible rebuttal of our policy. I don't know anybody who does."
Asked sabout last year's drug policy advertisement that linked drug sales to international terrorism, Franks said, "Is it an absolutely perfect system? Absolutely not. On the other hand, the MoveOn.org ad wasn't even close. I didn't need to rewind that one in the VCR."
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