Obama's Assault on Broadcasters

Fairness Doctrine? Might happen, but what is already happening, however, is far more dangerous, as we see in the video below. Mark Lloyd is the FCC's new Chief Diversity Officer. Lloyd started his new job on July 29 and is already busy trying to figure out how to tax radio stations out of business. It's not a joke. That's what Lloyd is up to. Lloyd and Obama hope to destroy privately operated radio stations, eventually to bring them under government control - if not literally, then effectively. It's just one more step in Obama's march toward dictatorship. Crazy? Consider: Why else would a national leader be so eager to take away our guns, limit our free speech and bring banks, industry and health care under his control? It's as though Obama is a master sleeper agent from an enemy nation, finally fulfilling the secret mission he was given decades ago. Watch the video - it should scare the bejeezuz out of you. Get ready for state-controlled radio - and television. See related items below the video. RELATED: History: Canada Debates Radio's Future Obama sets the definition of “excessive” SmallGovTimes.com Economic performance under Khrushchev in power Liberal Fascism Explained Do YOU have a Commie-Bama Tee Shirt and Cap? Leave a Comment... Chicago News Bench RSS Feed We're on Twitter...

The "Fairness" Doctrine and Russian "Treason"

Free speech is under attack everywhere, all the time. Russian lawmakers and their like-minded kin, the Democrat Party in the US, are busy launching the latest salvos against free speech. In Russia, it's a new law dealing with "treason," which is reminiscent of the old days in the Soviet Union. In the US, a proposed revival of the old "Fairness Doctrine," a cynically named piece of legislation that is reminiscent of the old days in the Soviet Union. The Associated Press reports this morning: A new law drafted by [Russian] Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's Cabinet would allow authorities to label any government critic a traitor — a move that leading rights activists condemned Wednesday as a chilling reminder of the times under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin....The draft extends the definition of treason from breaching Russia's external security to damaging the nation's constitutional order, sovereignty or territorial integrity. That would essentially let authorities interpret any act against the interests of the state as treason — a crime prosecutable by up to 20 years in prison....But Putin's proposed bill broadens the term "treason" to include inaction as well as action, includes a breach to internal security and adds international organizations to foreign ones as those forbidden to receive state secrets....In a related move, the upper house of Russia's parliament passed a bill Wednesday that would end jury trials for those facing charges of terrorism and treason....The bill strips defendants charged with some crimes — involvement in illegal armed units, violent seizures of power, armed rebellion and mass riots — of the right to jury trials. Instead they would face judges. (The irony of AP reporting this is rich. For years, AP and other mainstream media outlets have gleefully reported classified information and leaked sensitive items, to the chagrin of the US government and to the glee of our enemies.) Meanwhile, in the US, Democrats in Congress are pushing their agenda for the suppression of free speech. The original Fairness Doctrine, as columnist Bruce Fein recently noted, "suppressed free speech over the airwaves [starting in] 1949 by penalizing the broadcast of controversial issues." In short, it required that a radio or television station which featured a guest who took a particular side of a particular issue had to give "equal time" to somebody with an opposing view. In other words, the Government was messing with the free speech of the show's host and producers, as well as that of the station's management and owners. The Fairness Doctrine, which was not really "fair" at all, was thrown out by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Syracuse Peace Council v. FCC (1989). Fein notes that "During the ensuing 19 years, not a crumb of evidence has surfaced suggesting that controversial subjects have been shortchanged in the broadcasting marketplace of ideas - the evil that the Fairness Doctrine purported to address." FEIN: Exhuming the fairness doctrine The old Fairness Doctrine did not apply to print media. Newspapers and magazines were still protected by the First Amendment and did not have to kow-tow to Government meddlers. Democrats now, however, want to return us to those days. As noted above by Fein, the old Fairness Doctrine did not improve the "marketplace of ideas." Print media, by and large, tends to be politically oriented either towards the middle (more or less) or outright liberal (in most cases of the big print media, such as the NY Times or Time Magazine). Since 1989, however, a phenomenon known as "talk radio" has exploded in popularity. To the dismay of Democrat leaders, the unfettered freedom of speech in the broadcast media has been dominated by conservative talk show hosts. Liberal shows and hosts have failed miserably. Remember the liberal "Air America?" So, to be "fair," the Democrats argue, we need to resurrect the Fairness Doctrine. Again, Fein: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, in the 111th Congress is planning to exhume and breathe new life into the doctrine by legislative fiat. She will encounter a friendly Democratic president supportive of her gambit. Her motivation is transparent. The Democratic Party intends to brandish the Fairness Doctrine to marginalize the influence of conservative talk show hosts by making expression of their controversial views cost-prohibitive. Rush Limbaugh is their poster child. Democrats hope to better the instruction of their predecessors in making broadcasters shy from all conservative political viewpoints. All in all, the attempt to bring back the Fairness Doctrine is a tacit admission by Democrats that they have lost the battle for the hearts and minds of millions of radio listeners nationwide. To "fix" this "problem," they will impose firm new rules on broadcasters that will "ensure" a "balanced" presentation of "facts." Lenin, Stalin, Putin, oh my. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. RELATED: Fairness Doctrine would kill talk radio - Abilene Reporter-News House minority leader calls on Obama to speak out against Fairness Doctrine - SmartBrief Democrat Says Fairness Doctrine Should Extend to Cable, Satellite TV - CNSNews.com 'Mr. Accountability' - Human Events This Is Not the ‘Fairness Doctrine’ You’re Looking For - Heritage.org Liberals, too, should reject the Fairness Doctrine - Christian Science Monitor Letters: Let the market decide 'fairness' in broadcasting - Orange County Register Obama And The Fairness Doctrine - Forbes Don't Sweat the Fairness Doctrine?The Weekly Standard Chronicles of the Obamanation: If you can't beat 'em, shut them down - Truthbomber

Obama: Hiding Behind Oprah's Skirt

Turn it off. Stop watching it. Take a walk instead. Oprah Winfrey, America's favourite daytime TV star, has refused to have Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin as a guest on her talk show. [Source] Apparently Winfrey, who supports Obama, is afraid that Palin is just too good to have on. After all, buddy Barack can't measure up to Palin for style or substance. Winfrey, a smart woman, knows this. So for political reasons, and power reasons, and personal reasons, Oprah Winfrey will be damned if she'll be party to allowing the American voters become more educated by hearing Sarah Palin in a one-on-one interview. How objective of her. Remember, she wants a Marxist in the White House. Barack Obama has conned Winfrey, just as she was conned so easily by fraud author of "A Million Little Pieces," James Frey. By the way, how would the Democrats square this behavior with their intended resurrection of the unfair Fairness Doctrine? Winfrey has every right to not put Palin on her show, but you have every right not to watch her show. Meanwhile, Oprah is risking serious harm to her ratings: A poll is here from TMZ and it doesn't look good for Oprah, with over 100,000 votes 71% of those that took the time to vote say she is biased. Who wins this "Behind the Scenes" battle - ]Oprah Winfrey or Sarah Palin? [Source] Why are you still watching that crap? RELATED: Obama-backer Oprah says no Sarah Palin on her TV show - Los Angeles Times US election: Storm as Oprah says no to Palin interview - The Observer Fashion store sues Winfrey's mom for unpaid bill - AP Oprah Winfrey’s mom sued by clothing store for pending bill of $155K - Newspost Online, India Eight Great: Oprah's Most Epic Failures - CollegeOTR, NY

Fairness Doctrine: Be Careful What You Wish For

An argument against the "Fairness Doctrine," Lar Daly - A brilliant piece of writing by friend John Ruberry: Excerpt: The "Fairness Doctrine" is anything but fair. Pundits have rightfully remarked that re-instituting such constraints on freedom of speech is analogous to Hugo Chavez shutting down opposition television stations in Venezuela. But the libs claim all they want are "equal voices" on the airwaves. Be careful what you wish for. (Note to Rob Nescavil: "libs" is short for "liberals")

Rob Nescavil Wants His Mommy

Suppose you were a person who hates the free market. You don't like the idea of people deciding what they like for themselves, and it makes you nervous that those people then seek out what they like and - worst of all - find a provider who gives them what they want. Rob Nescavil is such a person. He does not like the free exchange of ideas. He and some leaders of the "Democratic" Party are pushing to bring back the righteously defeated Fairness Doctrine.

  

That doctrine was not fair, as it imposed the government's standards of "free speech" on the airwaves. In other words, Rob Nescavil and his ilk are pushing for dictatorial control of the media. Oh, but not ALL media. Specifically, these neo-Stalinists want to control what is said on the radio. 

They want to control what you hear, but they market this policy as "balanced" and "fair." "For some reason, partisan conservatives hate the idea of fairness and have been railing for weeks against proposals to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine," Nescavil wrote today. 

Yes, Mr. Nescavil wrote another in his long series of "Fodder for the Useful Idiot" today. His first line, quoted above, is right out of the Paul Joseph Goebbels Big Lies for Dummies handbook. It is precisely the opposite of what is factual. 

In a fashion that is extreme even for the nervous Mr. Nescavil, he resorts to irrelevant name-calling. Even as Al Gore III is being booked for driving 100 mph while in possession of drugs for which he had no prescription, Nescavil uses the now-old-news of Rush Limbaugh's resolved drug problems as a back door through which he thinks he can stage a bum rush on us. He is wrong. Such attacks only make us laugh, for we see his pitiful hypocrisy for what it is: Richly amusing. 

Nescavil wrote today, "Here’s a hint cons, if you can’t win by playing fair then the ideas you promote in order to win are of little value." Apparently, he thinks that calling us "cons" disturbs us, which is silly. 

But really, now: Conservative talk show hosts have won by playing fair. Liberal talk show hosts have not won because the market doesn't want what they're selling. That's the market, that's life. Liberals have every opportunity to sell themselves. Look, if a salesman can't sell a product because very few people want it, should the Government step and demand that his competition step aside, or that customers must buy equal amounts of products from him and his competition? Mr. Nescavil would say yes, that would only be fair! So he wants the Government, his surrogate Mommy, to step in and intervene. 

How amusing, indeed, but I am extremely flattered to be counted with giants such as John Ruberry, Bill Baar and Anne Leary, albeit by the likes of Nescavil! He is a tool of his party, not a free thinker or, worse, he is a free thinker who understands the dishonesty of the propaganda he vomits out in regular, pumping spurts. Nescavil can't even spell "Cosa Nostra" ["north coast," a nickname for the Mafia] correctly (he spelled it as "casa nostra," which would translate to "north house" or "house of the north"). The tone of his piece is so transparently one of panic. It also seems to scream that he KNOWS he is being a hypocrite. For those of us who understand the issue, his piece is an obvious piece of poorly done Stalinistic propaganda. 

What the Democrats (and little men like Rob Nescavil) want is control of the situation. They would like to use the force of government to require a radio station to "balance" its content by giving "equal time" to "opposing viewpoints." Translation: Commercial radio station owners, big and small, would be forced to schedule programming that would be guaranteed to bore the crap out of most listeners, thereby losing audience share and - frankly - wasting everyone's time. Reminder: Air America. How many listened? How many advertised? 

If you can't make it on your own, the Nescavillians believe, get the Government to force others to let you make it. We've seen them administer this philosophy for decades. It should come as no surprise that they still want to do it, or that they want to do it to free speech on radio. 

Imagine conservatives demanding a Fairness Doctrine to tone down the political slant of the majority of television outlets. They haven't. They won't. Oh sure, we love to complain about PBS, but that is not the private sector. That involved taxpayer money. Different realm, not truly relevant to this discussion except as an interesting aside. 

Is conservative talk radio "balanced?" Hell no, it's opinionated. Only a fool would think otherwise. But the last time I checked, the First Amendment guaranteed the right to be opinionated. Was Air America "balanced?" Of course not, and they didn't pretend to be. They were openly liberal, just as any conservative talk show is, well, conservative. Duh. 

Liberals already control what is said on some radio stations, those under the aegis of the Public Broadcasting System (PBS), for example. Those are friendly, left-leaning stations for the most part, financed largely by your tax dollars and partly by donations from listeners. They already have most of Hollywood in their corner, most of the major newspapers, and commercial television networks. 

Then there are the commercial radio stations, the ones that sell advertising. People buy advertising on those stations because they know that people like to listen to. People like to listen to them because the stations provide information and entertainment that audiences like in large enough numbers that they can stay on the air without your tax dollars supporting them, or without long boring donation drives. 

It so happens that radio listeners, as a group, favor conservative talk shows. In other words, they are commercially viable and successful in the marketplace. You know - the complete opposite of the liberal Air America. 

Bill Press is a liberal radio talk show host and advocate of the Mommy State. He wrote a piece today as well, or as poorly, in which he unintentionally reveals his - and the Democrats' - desire to force "fairness" upon us [emphasis mine], complete with my interruptions: A new report, released by the Center for American Progress, tells why. In May 2007, listeners were offered 2,550 hours of conservative talk radio on commercial stations, Monday through Friday, but only 315 hours of progressive talk. In other words, for every one hour of liberal talk broadcast, there were eight hours of right-wing propaganda.

Of course, Press would never call the progressive talk "propaganda."

The center further found that almost 90 percent of all talk radio broadcast on stations owned by the five largest ownership groups is conservative. Most of their stations do not offer even one minute of progressive talk on any given weekday. Houston, we've got a problem. But what to do about it?

Gee, this is problematic! Did you know that most Toyota dealers do not offer even one car made by General Motors on any given weekday? Detroit, we've got a problem. But what to do about it? Well, if you're Bill Press or Rob Nescavil, you get the Government to mandate that Toyota dealers do the right thing and give GM products equal play at their car stores. Right? Sure, unless you understand (a) the free market, (b) the real world, (c) how to please your targeted audience, and (d-z) a whole lot of other stuff that any kid operating a lemonade stand would get, but Press and Nescavil don't, won't or just can't.

One answer, proposed by Sen. Dick Durbin [D-IL] and others, is to bring back the Fairness Doctrine - a possibility that makes right-wing commentators absolutely apoplectic. Calling it "an assault on the First Amendment," former House Speaker Newt Gingrich accused Democrats who seek to restore the Fairness Doctrine of wanting to wipe out conservative talk radio. "They want to kill it because every time we have an extended conversation with the American people, liberalism falls apart and its ideas collapse."

See? The Nescavil-Press-Durbin-Marx clique does not like the open market of ideas. Well, they do sometimes, like when it goes their way. Again, that's why they're not complaining about "unfairness" in TV land or Hollywood or newspapers. Only talk radio. Because that's where they are losing.

And here's the REAL bitch for Democrats: Newspaper, television and movies have proven lately to be far less effective at swaying public opinion than has conservative talk radio. This making them crazy. Crazier, I mean.

This is something that some Democrat leaders do not understand or cannot tolerate. They want control, or at least the feeling that they have not lost control.

So they ask for a "level playing field." But their idea of a "level" playing field is one like this: Imagine a level field, and on one end is a team whose players average 6 feet in height. On the other end is the opposing team, and their average height is 5 feet. The Liberals want to place a 5' 6" ceiling over the field. That's what the "Fairness Doctrine" does. It hinders fair play.

When they go up against a rival in competition, and the scoreboard is not in their favor, these "fair-minded" players demand that their Mommy tell the mean old scorekeeper to reset the scoreboard because it's not fair, it's not fair! it's not fair! It's a politically correct scoreboard, in a twisted search for fairness. But it ignores the score, it's not really correct and it is certainly not fair. 

To the politically naive, it must sound odd to hear conservatives rant that the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the majority of the "mainstream press" leans to the Left. But it's true. Democrat leaders know this, and tacitly admit it by not targeting television in their attempt to revive the Fairness Doctrine. Similarly, they acknowledge that the majority of commercial talk radio - and now we're getting into real war zone - leans to the Right. 

They cannot stand this. They are underrepresented in talk radio, and talk radio has proven its mighty reach and influence time and again. But remember why conservative talk radio has a mighty reach: It is a product that millions of people want to hear, or else they would not listen. Were that true of Air America or other leftist attempts at talk radio, the Democrats would not be trying to bring back the unfair Fairness Doctrine.

Life ain't fair. There will always be people who are smarter, prettier, funnier, richer than you or I. Most of us accept this. We don't let it bother us. But the Nescavillians amongst us never got beyond that point in their lives, about 8 years old for most of us, when you run to Mommy crying that it's not fair! it's not fair! What isn't fair is getting Mommy to intervene in your fight.