First Amendment not worth the paper it's printed on

If the Obama people have their way. From Seton Motley at NewsBusters.

Behold one of the new "Fairness" Doctrines - "media diversity" - coming soon to a radio station near you.

President Barack Obama's Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has released the names of the thirty-one members of their Advisory Committee On Diversity For Communications In The Digital Age. This May 7 gathering is made up of a laundry list of left-wing grievance groups, with a smattering of radio and television companies included to break up the monotony.

Not a single conservative organization is taking part in this Commission - more than a dozen Leftist groups are. A little ironic for a "diversity" panel, is it not?

Chairing the meeting is Henry Rivera, a former FCC Commissioner who was (and presumably still is) a strong proponent of the Censorship Doctrine, also mis-known as the "Fairness" Doctrine.

[snip]

[H]ere is just a fractional listing of the organizational attendees of next week's gathering:

Emma Bowen Foundation for Minority Interests in Media (Rivera's outfit)
Minority Media and Telecommunications Council
Black Entertainment Television Holdings, Inc.
Afro-American Newspapers
Inner City Broadcasting
National Urban League
National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters (yes, again, NABOB)
Spanish Broadcasting System
American Women in Radio and Television
Chickasaw Nation Industries, Inc.
Asian American Justice Center
Rivera got the gig heading up this racial grumble group because he has long championed the concept of "media diversity."

[snip]

Many on the Left see the media pantheon as fraught with racism and sexism. And of course the airwaves are dominated by ideological monopol-ism. There are too many white men owning too many radio and television stations that broadcast too many conservatives to suit liberal tastes.

They truly believe the former is the only possible explanation for the latter. The existence of Laura Ingraham, Monica Crowley, Tammy Bruce and other un-white males in the talk radio universe fails to persuade them. Neither does the ratings argument - thems that get the ratings get the airwaves. Conservatives have listeners; liberals do not.

According to the Left, these white male station owners don't put conservatives on the air because they make them money, they put them on the air because they are conservatives. The anti-free speech/anti-free marketeers remain as always steadfastly impervious to facts.

Again, the CAP report's subtitle is "Measure Media Diversity According to Democratic Values, Not Market Values." Why would the Left care about the bottom line of a bunch of white male station owners? There's a media world to be re-made, and these liberals don't care how many billions it it costs these racist-sexist bigots to make it happen. Besides, they deserve to get the shaft; it's only fair.

The broadcast license is of course a station's lifeblood; take it away, or make it impossible to meet the regulatory obligations to keep it, and they are literally out of business. The Left, no longer comfortable with trying the top-down, all-out assault that is the "Fairness" Doctrine, intends instead to silence conservative and Christian talk via this broadcast license manipulation.

If they can succeed in making it impossible for talk radio to operate as a business, talk radio will cease to operate. Leftist problem solved.

"Media diversity" is just the latest Leftist attempt to get this done.

I would very much like to know how this stacks up, Constitutionally speaking. Any First Amendment experts out there?