The Fairness Doctrine. A Broadcaster's Perspective.

I first went to work in broadcasting in July, 1949, the very year the Fairness Doctrine became a ruling of the FCC. Last November I wrote in my blog about the Fairness Doctrine. As April Clark has pointed out, liberal Democrats want to silence conservative talk radio. True. But there is more to the Fairness Doctrine than that.

Here is part of what I wrote:

The old Fairness doctrine was in place throughout my career in broadcasting. I hated it worse than anything I ever encountered as a broadcaster. It totally robbed us of the ability to speak out on matters we believed to be politically important.

Broadcast news people are often the best informed segment of our population. How often have you heard someone ask, "Did you hear the news report about..... ". I once could reply, "Hear it? I read it this morning at 6:00 and at 6:30 and at 7:00, ..."

Unlike a print reporter who may have spent most of their day honing a single story, the broadcast news man reads all the stories, from many sources, over and over. So, doesn't it follow that they would be well equipped to comment on the news? Doesn't matter. If they did comment, they were then beholden to invite some dummy to come on their air and comment with an opposing view.

I know many will lawyerly argue that that was not the exact requirement of the rule. But lawyerly opinions are a costly option out of reach of many small broadcasters. If time and money prevent you from getting a reliable legal opinion, you are restricted to a single course of action: Just forget the whole thing. You could not risk jeopardizing your license or even exposing your station to the need to hire the lawyers you could not afford in the first place.

The Unfairness Doctrine.

In 1964, 45 years ago this April, I built a radio station in Salina, Kansas. While we were on the air, we assembled a fabulous news reporting machine. Our regular staff, largely eager, young, unmarried men and women, worked countless overtime hours without pay, for the sheer joy of accomplishing something excellent in broadcasting. We used to say that if you hear sirens in this community, turn on your radio. Within minutes you would know why and to where the emergency vehicles were responding.

This was the Viet Nam era. At one point a group of Southeast Asian journalists were brought through our city while on a U.S. tour. I was privileged to spend several hours in serious discussion with an editor from a Saigon newspaper, learning his perspective of the war, why it was important for the U.S. to help the South Viet Namese. But if I wanted to talk about it, I would have to invite a local war protestor to present an opposing view.

I attended every political rally in our area for three major elections. I had interviewed every candidate for every state or local office, and every Congressional race. I had a wealth of information about the candidates and the issues. But if I wanted to broadcast commentary, I would have to contact each opposing campaign and offer a chance to rebut.

If, indeed, some modern politician speaks of reviving the Fairness Doctrine - in any form - please oppose it. Or you will forever end the ability of broadcasters to share their knowledge in the discussion of any serious issue.

How the Mighty Have Fallen

"We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people." ~John F. Kennedy

"If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all." ~Noam Chomsky

"Take away the right to say "f***" and you take away the right to say "f*** the government."" ~Lenny Bruce

"You can cage the singer but not the song." ~Harry Belafonte, in International Herald Tribune, 3 October 1988

How ironic that the party that embraces these men is the same party that is now contemplating the imposition of a "Fairness" Doctrine to muzzle their opposition.

Never mind the fact that the major broadcast television networks are openly supportive of the Democrats and their Messiah, or that the vast majority of newspapers published in this country exhibit an extreme bias toward liberal thinking. There shall be no curtailment of their speech. Only talk radio, the one bastion of conservative thought that has proven impossible to defeat through free market tactics is to be targeted.

Air America, the progressive radio network, began broadcasting on March 31st, 2004. Nearly five years later, their most popular hosts, Thom Hartmann and Lionel, are estimated to each have over 1.5 million unique listeners a week. Simply put, no one cares to listen. Liberal radio cannot compete with liberal television, liberal newspapers and liberal magazines. There are only so many liberals available, and with such a plethora of available information sources, they are all otherwise occupied. In October, 2006, Air America filed for bankruptcy. With no listeners, it's difficult to find sponsors in a free market system.

Contrast that to the wild success of conservative talk radio. Rush Limbaugh averages nearly 15 million unique listeners a week, Sean Hannity more than 13 million. While their numbers are not as impressive, Michael Savage, Glenn Beck, Laura Ingraham and Mark Levin each have more than triple the listeners of Air America's star attraction. With virtually no other palatable choices, conservatives flock en masse to talk radio, and are fiercely loyal to their preferred host(s). No one forces them to listen, just as no one bans anyone from listening to Air America. They listen because they are desperate for sanity in this crazed political era of ever larger entitlements and ever smaller freedoms.

This drives the liberals mad. They refuse to recognize the extreme imbalance which exists in the media, focusing only on that one last bastion of conservatism that they do not own. They have not been able to destroy it through competition, so they wish to legislate it out of existence with a narrow, likely unconstitutional, definition of free speech. They are not bothered in the least that almost every other medium is in the tank for their side - no demands for "fairness" will be imposed on network television or print media. Only the domain of the opposition must be regulated, forced to provide "balance." The true hope, of course, is that radio stations will not be able to tolerate the pain of ensuring equal time or the financial losses caused by airing liberal talk and will refuse to continue broadcasting conservative talk, thereby destroying that which the liberals could not crush through honest means.

I suspect they will have problems passing this bit of legislation. We conservatives tend to be somewhat laid back, not given to demonstrations or protests. But, as least for me, this would cross a line that is absolutely unacceptable. Democrats may well find that they have misjudged the strength and passion of free men and women this time...

"The only valid censorship of ideas is the right of people not to listen." ~Tommy Smothers