christinebarry.com

By GLFox on Jul 6, 2007 | Reply

This is laughable because the left has failed miserably at several attempts in airing their own political programing. They started out with advertisers, but the ratings were so dismal, advertisers dropped them. Because they have not been successful in getting the necessary ratings to keep enough advertisers to support their leftist programs, they now want to create a different kind of level playing field. They want to force existing stations who air conservative political programs that achieve high ratings in their aired markets, to give them equal time. In other words, they want the time to be given to them and force stations to keep their shows on the air no matter how dismal the ratings are all in the name of “fairness.”

Apparently the left must have thought conservative talk radio programs were a passing fancy in the 80’s and would never be the success they are today. How unfortunate the left must feel in their failure to recognize early on the success radio can have. Now that they see the importance, it’s difficult for them to get a foothold in this market simply for the fact they started the race way too late.

This is typical of the socialist views many on the left have when it comes to success. They think it’s right to take things away from the successful and redistribute it to those who are not successful.

By GLFox on Jul 6, 2007 | Reply

Why would a privately owned radio station want to have forced upon to air a show for free in response to or counter to a successful show that is paid for by sponsors? The successful show is aired because it is making money. Now you want to take away valuable air time the radio station makes revenue on just to give an opposing faction equal time? Now I could see the reason in that the radio stations were government owned.

You complain that sponsors have “subsidized” the broadcasts of conservative talk radio programs. Excuse me, but do you not know how radio stations make money? I’ll clue you in. They do it by selling sponsorships for those broadcasts. Sponsors don’t shell out their money for a program nobody is listening to because that sponsorship is usually in the form of advertising. The whole point of advertising is to have your ads run on programs with a large listening audience. Withut a large audience or one at all, the ads are ineffective therefore the money spent on them is a bad investment.

There have been several very rich liberals in this country who have tried their hand at producing liberal talk radio programs. The problem was, they couldn’t find enough audience to keep advertisers sponsoring the programs. Ratings were very dismal.

Now you support, like those in the Democratic Party, a policy that forces radio stations to air program without the benefit of sponsors in the name of fairness. It sounds like you would support the government owning all the radio stations and deciding what you will hear. This fairness policy the Dems are seeking is not fair at all. It advocates a privately owned radio station to air programs for free that counter the ideas and expressions of programs that provide the owners of the radio stations revenue. That is only taking revenue away from the owners of those stations.

One more thought. If I owned my own radio station, I decide on the programing content to be aired. If I play classic rock and roll, should I be forced to play country as well because some folks favor country over rock? Or should someone who believes there is a market for country where I broadcast start a country station?

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 10, 2007 | Reply

Look, you’re kicking the right’s butt on the internet and print media generally. The right has found “niche market” advantages on radio and one cable channel (cable, by the way, isn’t subject to the doctrine as it is neither a public airwave nor “scarce” - indeed, the “Fairness Doctrine” was ruled upon during a time of scarcity in broadcast waves, giving the government a compelling enough interest to involve itself there — I doubt that one could sustain the evidentiary burden even with radio that those mediums are now scarce).

If you want “Fairness Doctrine,” then apply it across the board. Let’s require BFM and Michigan Liberal to allow conservative viewpoints (after all, the “Internet” was paid for originally by the government, and the bandwidth is finite) - they can start by uncensoring me. Of course, that would be absurd in so many ways - BFM and ML have a right to be arbitrarily and capriciously closed-minded even as it reflects poorly on them. Talk radio - as much as it is often and can be a poor representation of the right - shouldn’t be tampered with unless you have compelling evidence that the resource is scarce and its being monopolized, and even then I’m hesitant to the let the government make those decisions, rather than the person receiving the information.

That said, I think we, as consumers, should use our buying power and moral suasion to try to pressure news sources to be as objective and balanced as possible. Criticizing vociferously (but respectfully) your local editor is a good thing.

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 11, 2007 | Reply

BFM’s policy is much clearer than ML’s - no “conservatives” (actually, it says no conservative debate, and I felt that I was only commenting on the non-partisan issue of the other part of its mission, “quality” ” citizen journalism”), so I’m not surprised although I’m disappointed. I think ML in particular - although BFM reinforces it - just proves a general censorial and closed-mindedness on the left, and a desire to edit and control the thoughts of others (not including normal persuasion). The Fairness Doctrine argument - that government should try to control debate just feeds into my argument. Who decides what’s balanced? Why balance a Dem with a Republican, or vice versa (you’re essentially making a bi-polar choice reinforcing the system that way)? Why not include Libertarians, Socialists, Chetly Zarkos and Christine Barrys, and everyone? Where does it stop? In the early days of broadcast, some controls may have been necessary, when there were literally only a few media markets and the technology allowed only a few stations. Now small towns have media markets, towers abound every where and not just on the Fisher Building or in NYC, etc., but often anywhere, and bandwidth is available in surplus.

ML and BFM and people generally have a right (with some limits) to be unfair, particularly in their speech and views. It may be morally inconsistent and condemnable, but those are judgements for individuals in the marketplace of ideas to make - not government. When it comes to speech - government should at most be neutral, and at best be distant and outside of it. The FD superficially appeals to “neutrality,” but unless the medium is genuinely “scarce” or actually owned by the government (for example, government e-mail, which should only be used for government business and not used at all for politics), government should keep its nose far away.

As to radio, just like the Internet, the left has completely open access to the medium. They just haven’t been successful with it. No monopolistic practices have been shown where they are being locked out. Should the government step in where someone hasn’t been successful and subsidize their efforts until they succeed?

Show me monopolistic practices by talk-radio, and I’ll agree (with limited and narrowly construed enforcement of anti-trust law, no need at all for Fairness Doctrine). Show me that their is a scarce supply of radio stations (there’s a glut of stations going out of business right now - you’d be hard pressed to say their is any market in the US where you couldn’t buy bandwidth), and I might agree with some content regulation. The conditions just don’t exist, and Reagan was wise to recognize it. If you want to regulate radio speech, then I want to regulate your internet speech right along with it. That’s why we should regulate neither.

As to broadcast TV (which is dying), I think the FD still actually applies, but that no one has suggested anyone has violated it. Cable is so plentiful as to be absurd, and its not a public airwave anyway, so its not a debate.

If this is about money, the left has just as many rich Michael Moore’s and Jon Stryker’s, if not more actually, so if this is about left-right political balance, its a misnomer. If you’re talking about guaranteeing every little guy access to prime time TV spots and that includes one Chetly Zarko and Christine Barry, I’d love the opportunity, but I think the list of us is too long to be manageable. Besides, this isn’t about TV, because, as I’ve pointed out, none of the dying broadcast stations are implicated anyway.

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 11, 2007 | Reply

I noticed this in the article:

We need to limit radio station ownership to no more than 20 stations. We should encourage local ownership and minority ownership. Ownership of major city newspapers, radio stations and television stations in the same market should be prohibited.

The First Amendment:

Congress shall pass no law abridging …

This is plain authoritarian and anti-First Amendment. Who cares if someone owns 21 stations, or a newspaper and TV or radio station, so long as they don’t engage in monopolistic practices (do the anti-trust research and prove individual violations, rather than punishing everyone). The writer is saying government should have the power to dictate who and how much speech people engage in. The writer is saying that too much speech by any one person is per se bad, and therefore all speech must be regulated.

This is a fundamental threat to our democracy - no question. From those who, without evidence of individualized wrong-doing (anti-competitive behavior), want to regulate everyone by capping speech. And its not just “public airwaves” - the writer is clear that newspapers are in the mix too. If I recall, printing presses were relatively more expensive in the late 1700s than radio today, and there were fewer of them, and I don’t recall the founders saying the First Amendment right to press was limited to only 20 press machines or 20 markets.

By GLFox on Jul 14, 2007 | Reply

Equal time to political candidates is mandated already. Giving equal time to politicians is not. I listen quite frequently to Limbaugh, Glen Beck, and Neal Boortz. Beck never has political guests on his show. Limbaugh and Boortz rarely have guests on. The fairness doctrine the left wants to put into place is to force political programing that responds to other political programing. You should know how economically insensible that really is.

The radio station owner doesn’t own the frequency, but only the equipment and facilities to broadcast on it. They make their money by selling advertising on it. In order to sell sponsorship, the programs have to have a large enough audience to keep sponsors.

Do you honestly expect a radio station owner to cancel a successful program and then air a program where he/she cannot find sponsors for it just so it gives an opposing point of political view? You’re asking that radio station owner to fund the program if necessary.

You recognize the fact Air America failed because it was a poor business model. So what you want is to force Air America type programs by forcing successful stations to air them.

Do you not see the problems with that? Think about. Do you really want the government to force political programs of any kind on privately owned radio stations? What next in the name of fairness; forcing Christian radio stations to air extremist Muslim programs?

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 27, 2007 | Reply

Christine,

Of course, BFM mission of “quality journalism” is hardly “consistent” with its ban of conservative debate. One would expect quality journalists, even with an admitted bias, to welcome at least some managed debate so that its quality would remain top notch.

For example, Wizardkitten’s recent post “Mike Bishop’s Tuition Increase” is so devoid of evidence and truth (see my posts showing how U-M and MSU administrators get 6% pay raises, while the remainder of employees average three percent but also are spread out over a 3% increase in hiring (meaning the average employee is often not getting a raise or certainly one smaller than 3%, although its hard to track individually since there are 38,000 employees). My data prove two things - first, universities are behaving exactly like Democrats argue evil Corporate CEOs behave (except they use our tax money), so even Dems shouldn’t ignore this. Second, tuition increases of 6 to 16% can’t reasonably be explained because Mike Bishop kept higher ed spending the same.

There’s a difference between the internet and the radio because you side is doing better on the net and worse on the radio. You have plenty of Strykers and Soros to go buy your radio talk show space - its either not their focus or choice, or they think their $500 million in subsidies better go to SoapBlox, Sunshine Fndt, and the network of subsidies for micro-think tanks that keep your message steaming from the net. It’s an interesting decision - and attacking radio is part of the strategy too, so it makes sense, but I’m not buying it. Show me anti-trust behavior and I’ll think about switching sides (or supporting the anti-trust litigation) — but don’t get lazy and try to regulate the area without evidence. To address your point about cross-markets, prove to me radio frequencies are scarce enough that you couldn’t buy into any market you want for a price competitive to that market.

If your theory is right, why not guarantee local rock bands the right to play their music in a system that is far worse than the political talk scene. “Equal time”. And there’s marginal anti-trust behavior in the music radio business - from payola to subtle lock outs. I have some friends who are pretty damn good who like their equal time too. And why not let Ralph Nader and the Libertarians and US Taxpayer’s have their radio time. You just have to live with some market losers to have a practical market - it ain’t pretty, but its real. Even I’d love greater diversity of voices on the right than Coulter or Limbaugh (it’d be better for us to have a deeper bench), but I don’t believe in tampering with their rights through government.

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 27, 2007 | Reply

Hey, if the comment was gone before you got their, then what purpose do you serve on BFM’s board? Token? It seems that you’d be entitled to at least see what is censored, and that the content would inform you in your decision of whether to censor or not.

By Chetly Zarko on Jul 27, 2007 | Reply

Yeah, but the rule is subject to some interpretation. Regardless, whatever WK and Z’s “experiences,” since the board owns the site and has complete discretion anyway, why even have a “blanket policy” and throw the “baby out with the bathwater.” One could deal with a case-by-base decision - I could certainly see good reason to have some conservative voice if it is well tempered. I’ve sat on panels I’ve been invited to attend by reknowned liberals such as Reginald Turner, and get along quite well (despite considerable disagreements in substance) with the likes of David Boyle, Larry Kestenbuam, and the guy I consider the founder of the Michigan liberal policy blogosphere (2002-04 while a U-M student writer for the M-Daily, before he moved to DC with PFAW), Rob Goodspeed.

Bottom-line — I couldn’t imagine running my own site with a policy anywhere near either BFM’s clear cut blanket policy or ML’s arbitrary “we just don’t like a person we disagree with challenging us intellectually so we’ll ban you” policy. Sure, I’ll use tech to wipe out content spammers and perhaps eventually censor a poster after repeated warnings if s/he becomes obscene or disruptive — but I’d like to see ML make a case that comments were disruptive. Sure, its within their rights - but its unbecoming and violates the spirit of open debate and inquiry. You unfortunately tolerate that and accept it to the extent you have to fit in — and as a political consultant I understand that.

As to radio v. internet. They are different. But not substantively different from a First Amendment perspective. Certainly, the case for government regulation of the internet can’t be based on “scarcity”, so the internet should theoretically be legally safer from regulation. But the basis for regulating broadcast in the 30s was bandwidth scarcity. I’d suggest the governmental compelling interest then is little different than the interest in anti-trust regulation. To prevent excessive control over resources that allows one to prevent the positive competitive forces of market from operating through coercive distortions (that would be the best libertarian justification of limited anti-trust law). When radio was deregulated 60 years into its existence - 50 after the FCC - by Reagan, technology 1) allowed transmission in tighter bands, higher wattages, and more bands per range. 2) There are up to two dozen FM stations on my local dial, and a handful more AM (with possible AM ranging into the dozens, but mostly unused). You can buy pre-existing unused frequencies simply by spending money (which is nothing more than a high-tax called the FCC license), and complying with the pre-existing rules.

So I’d argue - and this might be novel - that we need not address the idea of “overturning” the Fairness Doctrine as a question of breaking “stare decisis” or some groundbreaking ruling if we simply re-evaluate its underlying logic. Is there radio scarcity? If not, no compelling reason exists to re-regulate radio speech in that way since the facts (not law), have changed.

The only real argument you’ve made is that radio is a more costly medium. In some ways, it is. But cost of the medium is not the barrier the framers sought to protect us against — printing presses were exorbitantly expensive in 1789. And truly effective internet is not cheap - often costing as much or more per reader than radio listener. Website design is costly - effective ones even more so - and the raw abundance generates an even greater need for advertising and methods to penetrate the flood of information (an opposite problem to scarcity). The internet and/or computers have also lead to the greatest concentrations of wealth and informational power the world has ever witnessed - Google and MicroGod(Soft), both of which present real challenges of regulation if your concern is concentration of power.

On the other hand, let’s ask - What if the Internet bandwidth became “scarce”. Say YouTube demand takes off but bandwidth tech can’t grow. Should we regulate internet video? This is why I sympathize with the idea that even the Fairness Doctrine was flawed - although understandably a different concept when their were three TV stations and a dozen radio outlets.

Finally, when I make the comment about “your side” doing better on the net v. radio, I’m not referring to you personally. I don’t know that that is your motivation - I do believe it is the larger underlying reason why the Democratic Party seeks to regulate radio though. It’s part of a power play. That’s politics. It’s a mere observation.

By John Wallace on Jul 20, 2008 | Reply

On June 24, 2008, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), while at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast, told reporter John Gizzi, that she favored a return of the Fairness Doctrine. The imposition of the Fairness Doctrine would force radio broadcasters to provide equal time to opposing points of view, which would essentially give the government control over what the people can and cannot hear.

Ms Pelosi also said she supported the efforts of Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) who has been very active behind the revival of the Fairness Doctrine. Rep Slaughter had introduced the 2004 MEDIA Act to bring back the Fairness Doctrine and reintroduced it in 2005 as the Fairness and Accountability in Broadcasting Act.

The Democratic leadership knows that they can’t directly pass a “Fairness Doctrine” piece of legislation, so they will most likely try to slip it in under another name or attach it to some ‘must pass’ piece of legislation. Their support of the ‘Fairness Doctrine by any means’ strategy poses a direct threat to American citizens’ constitutonal right of Freedom of Speech.

The important questions for Americans to ask are: Why is Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats against free speech for the American people? Why are they so determined to bring back the Fairness Doctrine? and why is the Democratic leadership refusing to bring a true piece of Freedom of Speech legislation, The Broadcaster Freedom Act HR-2905, to the floor for a vote?

I believe that it was the collapse of the radio station “Air America” a Liberal talk station, that has led to this attempt to re-introduce the Fairness Doctrine as a form of de facto censorship. It appears that if certain political views can’t compete in the world of ideas, then the solution is to pass a law that forces radio stations to air those views.

I am opposed to any resurrection of the “The Fairness Doctrine,” the 1940’s law that effectively censored political talk radio for many years, because it is a violation of the First Amendment and limits Free Speech. The real issue here is not what you “are able to” see or hear, which is what the Fairness Doctrine was about originally. It’s about placing limitations on the Freedoms you currently have to “choose” what to see or hear.

In the 1940’s and 50’s, Americans had few choices with only three major networks and there was some validity to the Fairness Doctrine. Today, Americans have an almost unlimited choice of where to get their information: regular TV, cable TV, regular radio, satellite radio, internet, web-blogs, etc., which makes the Fairness Doctrine unnecessary.

I support the Broadcaster Freedom Act (HR-2905), introduced by Representative Mike Pence (R-Ind) which would prevent these first amendment restrictive regulations from returning. Representative Mike Pence introduced the BFA last June, where it is still awaiting a vote. As of June 25, 2008, two hundred Members of Congress have signed a discharge petition which would force the House to make an up or down vote on the legislation, but an additional 18 signatures are still needed. So far, not one single House Democrat has signed the petition to bring the legislation to the floor for a vote.

It should also be noted that two of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Commissioners have already indicated that they favor the return of the Fairness Doctrine. All that would be needed to reinstitute Fairness Doctrine regulations would be for the next President to appoint a third sympathetic commissioner. Then, the regulations could go back into effect without any vote at all and the constitutional Freedom of Speech rights and guarantees of all Americans would suffer another blow.

By not bringing the Broadcaster Freedom Act to the floor for a vote, Speaker Pelosi is attempting to limit the constitutional rights of Free Speech of those American citizens who happen to oppose her political views.

The constitutional right of Freedom of Speech guarantees that people or organizations have the right to express their ideas without danger of censorship, interference or punitive action by the government. It does not mean that people or organizations with different views must be provided with a meeting hall, a radio station or a printing press through which to express their ideas. Those who value the First Amendment, as I do, must oppose the Fairness Doctrine, in any form, as a serious threat to their Freedom of Speech.

By:
John Wallace
Candidate for Congress
NY’s 20th COngressional District
www.FreedomCandidate.com