Since When Did Fairness Become A Dirty Word?

Here is an item from the Radio and Records website that appeared last Thursday:

It didn’t take the new 111th Congress but a day or two to introduce partisan legislation in both the Senate and House that would block the re-imposition of the Fairness Doctrine. On Tuesday (Jan. 6), a pair of Republican senators, Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and John Thune (S.C.) introduced their bill to "prevent the Federal Communications Commission from repromulgating the fairness doctrine (S.34)." The companion measure was introduced the next day, Wednesday (Jan. 7), in the House (H.R. 226) by Republicans Mike Pence, of Indiana, and Greg Walden, of Oregon.

In 1987 at the close of the Reagan White House, the "Fairness Doctrine" which mandated that broadcast outlets present contrasting viewpoints on controversial issues was vacated. It was claimed that the statute had a chilling effect on freedom of speech. That of course was bullshit. We soon found out that without it, freedom of speech was curtailed even more. In the past a talk show host like Rush Limbaugh couldn't just spew his distortion without someone to counter them. When the doctrine was removed Rush seized on the opportunity. The result was a flood of conservative talk shows that permeated the airwaves after that.

I would agree that we might be best served without such a doctrine if the right wing licensees had played fair, but they didn't and for over two decades, left to their own honesty, it was hard hear anything else on the radio but the neo-con palaver. It would be nice to believe that given the freedom to do what was right they would have done so, but they didn't and if the doctrine comes back in some form, then they have no one to blame but themselves and their flagrant disrespect for balance.

Now these assholes are trying to prevent us from instituting any measures that would reign them back in. In fact Mike Pence one of the sponsors of the house bill was a conservative talk show host and station owner. Not exactly the kind of upstanding individual to talk about free speech when he was a perfect representation of that has been wrong without the doctrine.

The article goes on to state:

NAB Executive VP Dennis Wharton this morning (Jan. 8) said, "Since the Fairness Doctrine's elimination in 1987, America has witnessed an absolute explosion in alternative media outlets, providing a rich diversity of viewpoints from all sides of the political spectrum.

What absolute crap! The explosion in alternative media was not the result of the suspension of the "Fairness Doctrine" but with the creation of new uncensored media technologies, paramount among them being the internet. But mass terrestrial broadcasting represented by the NAB which offers more access for more people has failed to show any of this alternative diversity. In fact they have tried to prevent alternative voices as was seen with their war against satellite radio.

Back in 1991 when I was out of work, I had a meeting with the program director at WABC in New York. She had heard of me and positively so. In our talk she asked "What's your political bias?". When I told her I was a lefty, she blanched and said "oh my general manager would never want that!" This of course was the home of Rush Limbaugh and other right wing talk show hosts. That's what the doctrine's suspension created.

This doesn't mean that a host would have to present both views if the station presented a host with an alternative perspective. This means that those stations that ran Rush would also run Tom Hartmann. Currently liberal thought is relegated to a gulag of low power stations with numbers on the lower end of the dial, while the neo-con's are on the powerful stations higher up. To this day, the impact of the liberal programs is diminutive compared to the right wing shows and it's not because they aren't entertaining. It is because they are ghettoized.

For now let's not bring back the "Fairness Doctrine", but let's not make it's implementation impossible by passing a law. This way, the omnipresent fear that we could bring the "Fairness Doctrine back might just might force them to play fair.