A few hours after TPMDC detailed Connecticut Democrats using racy World Wrestling Entertainment scenes against GOP candidate Linda McMahon, WWE had YouTube remove the videos.
Connecticut political blog My Left Nutmeg caught their removal, but the Democrats mashed up the most eye-popping (and not-safe-for-work-or-children) scenes with voiceover of McMahon talking about how "PG" and "fun" WWE is. She's the former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment and wife of WWE principal Vince McMahon.
It's worth noting that WWE only removed a handful of videos, not the more than 500,000 that exist on YouTube. I've asked folks in their corporate headquarters for more information, and will update when they respond.
Also, a source points out that Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT), who McMahon hopes to defeat in 2010, has taken more than $922,000 from the TV and movie industry, according to OpenSecrets. The source wonders if Dodd condones violence and sex depicted on film.
Late update: WWE's VP of PR and corporate communications got back to me just now, saying accusations the removal had anything to do with politics are false.
"It's an ongoing battle with online piracy," Robert Zimmerman told TPMDC. "It's copyrighted material, it's our intellectual property."
He said they "scour" the Internet for their videos and said they go after all of them, not just ones used for political purposes.
"We would love to be able to take everything down," he said. "It's WWE content and if we own it we are asking them to take it down."

TPM Stories Now Surging on Digg.com

BlindBat
October 16, 2009 7:20 PM
I think we can do better than slam Ms McMahon on the content of WWE. While not my thing, it's considered "entertainment" by many. Much of Al Franken's work as an entertainer was unfairly criticized as if his comedy was a real reflection of his policy positions.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
tvguy34
October 16, 2009 7:47 PM
Around the same time this was reported my YouTube account was suspended because the WWE had a video I uploaded removed and in no way was it tasteless (it was a brief video of Macaulay Culkin's appearance on Raw a few weeks ago). Says who it's just because of this "political" crap? It could just be somebody in the WWE TitanTowers is going through YouTube tonight.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
tosh
October 16, 2009 7:55 PM
Christ... it's just embarassing that TPM is even covering this. Perhaps you can have Eric bust out some polling numbers on just how well Linda is doing in this horse race.
Slow news day at TPM Towers?
John, who loaths the McMahon Family more than the entire TPM Staff combined... but thinks that this is a waste of TPM space and time...
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
mastershake1
October 16, 2009 9:39 PM
tosh, I'm going to have to disagree with you. This is newsworthy. McMahon is using her involvement with the WWE as essentially a character argument for why she should be elected. The Connecticut Dems are pointing to certain old videos of wrestling matches to suggest that she was involved in something unsavory. The videos were pulled down alleging copyright violations, even though they were used for political commentary.
Whether the video clips themselves or the links to the clips were fair use is a legal question, but if the WWE did pull down the videos in order to silence criticism, that's newsworthy as it might be an abuse of copyright law.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
ttagaris
October 16, 2009 9:47 PM
I can't believe you allowed anonymous sourcing on that final paragraph ... for an open secrets link and an attack quote.
"The source wonders if Dodd condones violence and sex depicted on film."
You and this site are much much much better than that.
Tim
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
AJM
October 18, 2009 8:12 AM in reply to ttagaris
The use of an anonymous source here makes sense because the attack rests on argument and known facts -- not on the credibility of the 'source.'
As an argument it is interesting -- how much more responsible for degrading content is the producer of that content (Linda) than is someone who accepts money from producers who produce some degrading content?
McMahon is far more responsible -- more particularly as she was promoting her slime as PG fun. So she is for family values unless violating those values makes her money. An added charge of hypocrisy should stick.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
11A7E
October 16, 2009 11:42 PM
Mentioning the WWF and what they show is very fair game. McMahon talks about how she and her husband "grew" their business in her ads as a means of showing why she should be elected.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?
ProfessorB
October 19, 2009 2:18 PM in reply to 11A7E
She doesn't mention how they cashed in on indecency and trash tv. No she is a good "respectable" conservative not like those God forsaken liberals.
Reply | Flag Abuse
Are you sure this comment violates TPM's Terms of Service?