Admittedly, I don’t remember much about news/talk radio prior to the abolition of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. I was much more interested in listening to Vanilla Ice, Milli Vanilli or whatever kind of pop/rock dreck that we teenagers listened to in the late 80s/early 90s.
But that’s the point. AM radio was basically non-existent. Opinion-based talk radio was impossible. After all, if you bring up a controversial subject, the GM was obliged to bring in whatever yahoo objected for “equal time.” Talk about some boring radio. And who would want to deal with random people asking for airtime, interrupting your programming and putting people to sleep? Much easier to put on some big band or those awesome classified radio shows you can still hear in small markets.
The elimination of the fairness doctrine caused an explosion on AM radio. Rush Limbaugh is the king of this format, but there are hundreds more broadcasting locally and in syndication. Listeners flocked to the format, increasing advertising dollars, allowing those stations to hire more people in production, sales and journalism. For the purposes of transparency, I am one of those.
The vast, vast majority of these on-air hosts are conservative. PhD candidates could probably make several studies why. But for some reason, despite valiant attempts, liberal talk shows for the most part have failed miserably.
So, as many good liberals will do, instead of trying harder, they want to simply shut talk radio down.
According to The Politico, on Bill Press’ talk show (one of the liberals who appear to be successful), Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow (D, natch) decried the one-sided nature of talk radio and intimated that hearings are in the works to attempt to get “some accountability and standards put in place” on the AM dial.
It’s been a while since I read “1984″ or “Animal Farm,” but that sounds a tad Orwellian to me.
When the Founding Fathers wrote the First Amendment guaranteeing freedom of the press, broadcasting wasn’t even a thought. I’m no mindreader, but if there was a “Thomas Paine Show” back then, I’m guessing that the First Amendment would have extended to broadcast. But that didn’t happen, so the Communications Act of 1934 created the Federal Communications Commission to oversee broadcasting. While it serves an important purpose by ensuring broadcasters don’t overlap signals, it’s gone after free speech, mainly against so-called “shock jocks” for public indecency. Since broadcasters are using “public airwaves” to deliver its product, the argument goes, the FCC can censor speech in the best interest of the public. Nevermind that newspapers deliver their product using public roads, but I digress.
Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the democrats in the House and Senate say they’re not interested in re-instating the Fairness Doctrine. But since Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have become their punching bags, it’s hard to take them at their word.
To be fair, Limbaugh, Hannity and their compatriots have made it easy on them. After all, to get listeners, one has to be controversial. And filling 15 hours of airtime per week isn’t easy. So it’s a simple task to take their most controversial comments (usually out of context) as red meat to their constituents.
But one has to wonder — why does the Fairness Doctrine only apply to radio? After all, television also uses the public airwaves. Yet we’ve not heard any cry to censor the inflammatory rhetoric of MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. Instead he’s hailed as our generation’s Edward R. Murrow.
Regardless, talk of reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine is nothing more than attempt at censorship, a rollback to the days prior to 1987 and the death of AM radio.
The talent would survive by moving to satellite or Internet. But cheering for the death of Limbaugh and the like is short-sighted. Realize that power is cyclical, and the democrats would be setting a precedent that would be all to easy for the republicans to pounce on once they return to power. And is that really what we want?
Besides, the ultimate censorship is in your hands. After all, if you don’t like what you’re hearing, there’s probably a bevy of choices out there for you.
As for Stabenow, I’m sure her motives are nothing but pure. It’d be awful cynical of me to believe that being married to a bigwig from liberal network Air America would have anything to do with her outrage.
