Mano-a-mano: Shays vs. WWE

Christopher Shays is playing the YouTube card.

His Senate campaign today compiled an anthology of raw video footage from the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) in an attempt to drive home its point that the media empire of GOP rival Linda McMahon peddles violence and sex.

“Anyone who does a quick YouTube search on Linda McMahon’s family business can see that WWE has a long history of promoting violence, bullying and degradation of women and minorities,” Shays’ spokeswoman Amanda Bergen said in an e-mail blast to reporters.

Among the clips highlighted by the Shays camp is a May 2002 interview between McMahon and Bill O’Reilly.

Another clip referenced by the Shays camp was actually uploaded to YouTube in 2010 by the campaign of Rob Simmons, who lost a three-way Senate primary to McMahon that year.

UPDATE:

WWE contends that the videos cherry-picked by Shays’ political operatives are not reflective of its current content.

Hearst Connecticut Newspapers received the following statement from WWE spokesman Robert Zimmerman.

“Outdated video excerpts from ten years ago do not reflect WWE’s current TV-PG content, nor do they reflect our corporate commitment to our anti-bullying campaign, “Be a STAR” (Show Tolerance And Respect). Nearly 40% of our audience is female; we are the number one ranked entertainment program on primetime cable with Hispanic viewers and ranked number four among African-Americans. Our 13 million weekly TV viewers in the U.S. obviously do not feel insulted or degraded. More than 300,000 fans in Connecticut, approximately 10% of the state’s population, currently enjoy the episodic storylines, characters and excitement of WWE’s programming.”

The latest indictment of the WWE by Shays comes just a day after the Stamford-based company sent a letter to the former congressman accusing him of distorting facts about its content and anti-bullying initiatives during a recent interview with The Weekly Standard.

Neil Vigdor