In continuing 2012 election news, we look at those lame "grassroots" political ads. The ones that show "average Americans" – the Joe The Plumbers, The Soccer Mom Susies, dudes in plaid, etc – who tell you why they support a campaign. Well, if you didn't know they are all actors reading from a script! (I thought I knew you Soccer Mom Susie. So dissapointed – I feel like I've been lied to!).

Greenpeace obtained audio files of conversations between an American Petroleum Institute rep and a CNN advertising buyer. Shocking right? It's a little more twisted than you think.

From the Greenpeace Report:

Audio recorded during an American Petroleum Institute (API) commercial shoot reveals how the oil industry plans to stage citizen support for its agenda to influence the 2012 elections. The ads, which API officials said will launch in January and air during CNN's election coverage, aim to demonstrate authentic citizen support for the oil industry's agenda. However, audio recordings taken by activists inside the TV commercial shoot reveal that the ads are highly scripted, as one production assistant said: "the director feeds them the lines" after they "put them in costumes."

Audio recordings also expose API fretting about what "opponents of the oil and natural gas industry" could use against them with these ads, as well as one Greenpeace activist who refused to read from the script and expressed his own opinions to API. Additional audio recordings taken during the same API ad shoot by the Checks and Balances Project reveal how any deviation from its script was refused, despite the invitation for participants to "express their views in a Commercial Spot on American Made Energy!

Turns out the oil conglomerate couldn't find any "average American" to say something nice about them. Gee, I wonder why?

Audio after the jump.

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