Google's uneven application of its "language that advocates against" standard creates the perception of bias, or worse.  Perrspectives was dropped as a Google Adwords advertiser for referring to the Bush administration as "secretive, paranoid and vengeance-filled."  As a Perrspectives reader notes in the email thread below, the web site for the upcoming movie "Michael Moore Hates America" is apparently fine with Google:

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From: "AdWords Support" <adwords-support@google.com>

Date: June 23, 2004 4:35:18 PM PDT

To: XXXXXXXX

Subject: Re: [#11506352] Report of side that violates editorial guidelines

Hello XXXXXX,

Thank you for your email. I understand that you are concerned that an  AdWords ad you saw violates our Editorial Guidelines.

Google believes strongly in freedom of expression and therefore offers  broad access to content across the web without censoring results. At the  same time, we reserve the right to exercise editorial discretion when it comes to the advertising we accept on our site, as noted in our advertising terms and conditions.

Our editorial staff reviews all the ads that run on Google to make sure they meet our criteria. Since we show ads immediately, there may be a  short period of time when an ad is running before it has been reviewed and approved by Google. Please note that we try to keep this lag as brief as  possible and do remove ads that we find to be outside our guidelines.

In response to your email, our AdWords Specialists have reviewed the ad in  question. At this time, we have found that this ad complies with our Editorial Guidelines.

Please know that we appreciate your comments on this issue, which will help inform our future policy discussions. Thank you for taking the time to write us.

Please feel free to email us at adwords-support@google.com if you have additional questions or concerns.

Sincerely,

The Google AdWords Team

==========================

Original Message Follows:

From: XXXXXXX

Subject: Report of side that violates editorial guidelines

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 03:52:29 -0000

I am curious why an ad as quoted below. clearly advocates against a person  which is a violation of the the editorial guidelines sent to other AdWords  participants upon termination.

    Sponsored Links

    Michael Moore

    The story of a rebel who took

    on Michael Moore.

    michaelmoorehatesamerica.com

XXXXXX