Subscribe to Moronmeter!Fairness Doctrine Redux: Come Again?
Why are some Liberals so enamored with the idea of resurrecting the Fairness Doctrine, especially for ‘talk radio‘, and who does it really benefit?
Bill Press seems to think that the failure of Liberalism to conquer the AM radio dial is because of some sinister ‘right-wing conspiracy‘. I can only assume it is a ‘vast, right-wing conspiracy, right Bill?
Last week, Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) told Press on his radio show, “I think it’s absolutely time to pass a standard. Now, whether it’s called the Fairness Standard, whether it’s called something else — I absolutely think it’s time to be bringing accountability to the airwaves.”
This week, Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) agreed on Press’ show, saying, “By the way, I read your Op-Ed in the Washington Post the other day. I ripped it out, I took it into my office and said ‘there you go, we gotta get the Fairness Doctrine back in law again.’”
Now, I can understand why Bill Press would want to push for anything that might create a broader market for his services. Sure, he’ll frame it as a fight against an “exclusive, tightly held, conservative media conspiracy” which refuses to “serve the general public”, but at the end of the day it won’t hurt his bank account if his radio show was picked up in a dozen (or more) new markets. Mr. Press says that he is not in favor of a return of the Fairness Doctrine in its previous incarnation, but I find it hard to believe he would argue against anything that forced stations to carry (and pay for) his show.
Senator Debbie would seem to have a similar narrative. Yes, she is just fighting for ‘truth, justice, and the American way‘. I’m also sure that the fact that her husband is Tom Athans has nothing to do with her stated desire to force Liberal viewpoints into the airwaves.
Don’t know who Tom Athans is? Why, he was co-founder and CEO of ‘Democracy Radio‘, which produced liberal talk shows. He later worked for Air America as Executive Vice President for Programming. When Air America when bankrupt (I guess Bill Press would blame that “conservative media conspiracy” for Air America’s failure to catch on with the masses, who are obviously starving for what Air America had to offer), he started a company called TalkUSA Radio, another liberal radio production company (I would post a link to the company’s website, but it doesn’t seem to exist on the Internets).
I guess that seeming conflict of interest might by why Senator Debbie has since backtracked on those hearings she said needed to happen (of course, the fact that Conservatives went nuts over her statements might have had something to do with it, too).
There are two things I that really bother me about all of this, though.
First, why do they only focus on talk radio? I don’t recall Bill Press complaining about the “conservative media conspiracy” that refuses to “serve the general public” by providing balanced coverage and alternate viewpoints on television. Sure, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) will poke Fox News and say, “I think we should all try to be fair and balanced, don’t you?” (and hey, they are to the right of the center) but does he, Bill Press, Senator Debbie, and Senator Harkin think that media outlets such as ABC News, MSNBC, and CNN are balanced and fair? Maybe they know the bias is there, but they don’t want to bite the hand that feeds them good television coverage.
To be fair, I rarely hear any Conservatives complaining about Fox News’ coverage, so I guess it goes both ways.
The second thing that bothers me (and this one bothers me the most) is the assumption by Liberals that ‘fairness’ entails giving “progressives” more air time. I guess if you see the world in terms of “us” vs. “them”, the old “Liberals/Progressives” vs. “Conservatives” meme makes sense. While Liberals like Paul Krugman are happy to rail against “the destructive center“, it seems to me that most people fall somewhere near the center and quite a bit away from the extremes that seem to be running both major political parties in the United States. According to CNN exit polls from the 2008 election, 44% of respondents identified themselves as “Moderate” compared to 34% as “Conservative” and only 22% as “Liberal”, so I don’t think I’m too far off base.
Which leads me to my real point. President Obama has already had to deal with enough headaches caused by handing off the stimulus package to the far-left ( Jack Cafferty: You can blame Pelosi for Democrats’ stumbles) and it has done nothing to unite the country (although President Obama’s approval rating is still faring nicely). If the leftist want to make it even harder for Mr. Obama to succeed, they should keep up the divisiveness and alienate the political middle.
On second thought, that didn’t work out really well for the last President who had a tumultuous and divisive time in office. Does anyone really want to see that redux?
Link Roundup:
Michael Calderone’s Blog: Sen. Harkin: ‘We need the Fairness Doctrine back’ – Politico.com.
Talk radio: The return of ‘fairness’? – Michael Calderone – Politico.com.
Another Right-Wing Conspiracy in Washington? – washingtonpost.com.
