BRING BACK THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE
I took up a whole bunch of space at Lizzy's excellent blog (The OCD Gen-X Liberal, see links) and decided it might stand alone as a rant on my own blog, so here it is. It is in response to very recent comments by Rush Limbaugh, in which he says he feels "liberated", like he shouldn't have to "carry the water" anymore for people in his party who "won't stand up for themselves". You can go to YouTube and find Rush on video if you can stand to watch and listen... I learned more about his comments by actually going to his (gag! choke!) website. What do I think?
I'm going to have to rant here. Lots of the following is gut-based emotional blabbering, but when the topic is Rush Limbaugh, I have a hard time being reasonable and keeping myself from getting totally pissed off:
This guy is SO full of himself. He says it isn't about him, but it IS. He is probably one more of the many things that people who didn't vote GOP are getting tired of. Rush has been a driving force in the Karl Rove/neocon "divide and conquer" approach to American voters. People have made a statement, that they are TIRED of this kind of bullshit.
A caller on Rush's program was saying he was afraid that the center would move to the left, and that conservatives would no longer have a voice. I am guessing the guy must have been in, maybe, his twenties... He obviously hasn't been around long enough (or maybe hasn't been paying attention enough) to see how far to the right the "center" has been pulled, through the hard work of people like Rush, and organizations such as FOX "News".
When I was in my twenties (now WAY ancient history!) we had a center on the political spectrum that really was in the center. We had a Fairness Doctrine in broadcasting. People like Rush would likely have been laughed off the air, or at least equal time would have been given for the left. I'm not sure it was the right-wing talkers' messages that were resonating with Americans as much as it was more a matter of rich people buying up lots of radio and TV stations, and getting such crap on the air, enough that AM radio became saturated with it. Kind of a form of mass brainwashing, if you will. Find talkers who are good at using fallacies to get listeners to bypass their critical thinking skills and come around to the side of the talkers... who happen to be Republican tools, convincing voters to vote in favor of preserving wealth. The wealthy have their tool for getting people to vote against their own best interests, and instead for the interests of the wealthy. How cool is that! Pretty cool if you are one of the "haves". And then with all the repetition of their talking points, did this wave of talkers actually start believing what they were saying?
It has been tough for the past 15 years or so, listening to people like Rush Limpbaugh sucking in the suckers and spitting out his venom. As far as I'm concerned, the loss of the Fairness Doctrine and the emergence of such people as Rush represents a national tragedy.
I hope one thing the Democrats try to reinstate is the Fairness Doctrine. Media should not just be for entertainment, but also for education and information. How can the public stay informed if certain parts of the media are dominated by a particular political party? This is at least true in the case of AM radio, which has been dominated by froth-at-the-mouth people who call themselves "conservatives" for the last fifteen years or so. Dwight Eisenhower was a real conservative. Barry Goldwater was a real conservative. This current bunch is full of nationalistic types, fascists at heart, who have been given way too big a podium.
I would answer people who refer to the mainstream media as "the liberal media" by saying I think it is not (and never really was) a "liberal" media, but that this idea was put forth by people who felt that a media functioning as a "watchdog" might uncover things they didn't want the public to know about. If anything, I think the media is "corporate". The mainstream media outlets are businesses, and if things are run as businesses should be, the "bottom line" is the number one priority. Networks could be genuinely informative, OR they could include "news" such as what Michael Jackson is up to, or maybe about murderers, or about Jean Benet Ramsey. I think the mainstream media is all about showing what sells, what people will tune in to see. And what sells is certainly not an in-depth analysis of American politics...
Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly... they rely on fallacy and sensationalism, and due in large part to the latter, they have gained popularity. I wouldn't deny them their success, but just the same, I think they are prime examples of why we need the Fairness Doctrine again. How well could they fare if they actually had some competition?
Liberal media, my ass.
Rush and people like him make my blood boil. For now, it's time to wallow in the knowing that he has been beaten back a bit, at least for the time being, and that as a major influence in his party, HE is a big LOSER this week. By extension, Karl Rove is a big LOSER this week too. So is Cheney a big LOSER. Dumbya is a big LOSER. But I have to think that nobody deserves that LOSER tag more than Rush Limbaugh, who could be a viable candidate for King of Media Hyprocrisy. He can say whatever he wants, but right now I think he needs to realize people may not take him as seriously as they did in 1994!
And I think that's a wonderful thing.
For more on the Fairness Doctrine, you can go here:
http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/F/htmlF/fairnessdoct/fairnessdoct.htm
I think reinstating this would be helpful in keeping our country from swinging too far to the left or the right. What do you think, about Rush, about the Fairness Doctrine, about where the "center" of the American political spectrum actually is?
I'm going to have to rant here. Lots of the following is gut-based emotional blabbering, but when the topic is Rush Limbaugh, I have a hard time being reasonable and keeping myself from getting totally pissed off:
This guy is SO full of himself. He says it isn't about him, but it IS. He is probably one more of the many things that people who didn't vote GOP are getting tired of. Rush has been a driving force in the Karl Rove/neocon "divide and conquer" approach to American voters. People have made a statement, that they are TIRED of this kind of bullshit.
A caller on Rush's program was saying he was afraid that the center would move to the left, and that conservatives would no longer have a voice. I am guessing the guy must have been in, maybe, his twenties... He obviously hasn't been around long enough (or maybe hasn't been paying attention enough) to see how far to the right the "center" has been pulled, through the hard work of people like Rush, and organizations such as FOX "News".
When I was in my twenties (now WAY ancient history!) we had a center on the political spectrum that really was in the center. We had a Fairness Doctrine in broadcasting. People like Rush would likely have been laughed off the air, or at least equal time would have been given for the left. I'm not sure it was the right-wing talkers' messages that were resonating with Americans as much as it was more a matter of rich people buying up lots of radio and TV stations, and getting such crap on the air, enough that AM radio became saturated with it. Kind of a form of mass brainwashing, if you will. Find talkers who are good at using fallacies to get listeners to bypass their critical thinking skills and come around to the side of the talkers... who happen to be Republican tools, convincing voters to vote in favor of preserving wealth. The wealthy have their tool for getting people to vote against their own best interests, and instead for the interests of the wealthy. How cool is that! Pretty cool if you are one of the "haves". And then with all the repetition of their talking points, did this wave of talkers actually start believing what they were saying?
It has been tough for the past 15 years or so, listening to people like Rush Limpbaugh sucking in the suckers and spitting out his venom. As far as I'm concerned, the loss of the Fairness Doctrine and the emergence of such people as Rush represents a national tragedy.
I hope one thing the Democrats try to reinstate is the Fairness Doctrine. Media should not just be for entertainment, but also for education and information. How can the public stay informed if certain parts of the media are dominated by a particular political party? This is at least true in the case of AM radio, which has been dominated by froth-at-the-mouth people who call themselves "conservatives" for the last fifteen years or so. Dwight Eisenhower was a real conservative. Barry Goldwater was a real conservative. This current bunch is full of nationalistic types, fascists at heart, who have been given way too big a podium.
I would answer people who refer to the mainstream media as "the liberal media" by saying I think it is not (and never really was) a "liberal" media, but that this idea was put forth by people who felt that a media functioning as a "watchdog" might uncover things they didn't want the public to know about. If anything, I think the media is "corporate". The mainstream media outlets are businesses, and if things are run as businesses should be, the "bottom line" is the number one priority. Networks could be genuinely informative, OR they could include "news" such as what Michael Jackson is up to, or maybe about murderers, or about Jean Benet Ramsey. I think the mainstream media is all about showing what sells, what people will tune in to see. And what sells is certainly not an in-depth analysis of American politics...
Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly... they rely on fallacy and sensationalism, and due in large part to the latter, they have gained popularity. I wouldn't deny them their success, but just the same, I think they are prime examples of why we need the Fairness Doctrine again. How well could they fare if they actually had some competition?
Liberal media, my ass.
Rush and people like him make my blood boil. For now, it's time to wallow in the knowing that he has been beaten back a bit, at least for the time being, and that as a major influence in his party, HE is a big LOSER this week. By extension, Karl Rove is a big LOSER this week too. So is Cheney a big LOSER. Dumbya is a big LOSER. But I have to think that nobody deserves that LOSER tag more than Rush Limbaugh, who could be a viable candidate for King of Media Hyprocrisy. He can say whatever he wants, but right now I think he needs to realize people may not take him as seriously as they did in 1994!
And I think that's a wonderful thing.
For more on the Fairness Doctrine, you can go here:
http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/F/htmlF/fairnessdoct/fairnessdoct.htm
I think reinstating this would be helpful in keeping our country from swinging too far to the left or the right. What do you think, about Rush, about the Fairness Doctrine, about where the "center" of the American political spectrum actually is?
5 Comments:
What's interesting to me as a Texan is that Texas is equated with conservative, and yet a lot of the media people from the time you mention were Texans. Walter Cronkite was trusted more than anyone in the nation. If he represented Texan values, then he probably represented a semi-conservative interpretation of the news from that time period?
It's like you say about the Barry Goldwater conservatism. They have redefined the word "conservative" to trap people who associate that word with themselves, but I doubt that Walter Cronkite would spew the kind of nonsense from his lips that a lot of these modern media types do.
PS I want the democrats to rework the Telecommunications Act of 1996, so that we get our media back. You can't even blame Bush for that one, but it's paved the way for all the BS that has occurred since.
You've got to give equal time to both sides if you're going to have an honest debate about the issues. Currently the majority of political talk on the radio is just a form of Republican brainwashing. Bring back some version of the Fairness Doctrine!
I'm not sure if it's worth fighting to bring back the Fairness Doctrine. It sucks that it got repealed, but I don't know if this is a partisan battle that's worth fighting.
As obnoxious and venomous as the Rush O'Hannity types are, it's hard to tell how much damage they've done. If nothing else, they're keeping millions of losers off the streets. If these wackos weren't sitting around listening to Rush O'Hannity, God knows what they'd be doing.
We're gonna be stirring up enough hornets' nests when we investigate Republican scandals and try to get ourselves out of Iraqmire. Like I said, it sucks that the Fairness Doctrine was repealed, but I think trying to bring it back would take away our focus on larger issues. Just my 2 cents.
Who Hijacked Our Country
I admit that I did listen to Rush during his short-lived TV show circa 1994 or 1995, but I stopped listening before his ratings pushed him off the FM dial. In my defense, remember that I'm only 29 years old, and I was young and dumb back then. I admire the late great Barry Goldwater. He was more of a republitarian, and he wasn't afraid to tell the "Christian" Right where to stick it (as if he was ever shy about sharing his opinions on anyone). He also bears remembering for being the victim of the first modern television attack ad, Daisy, which today serves as but one of many reminders that presidents who were first Texas governors suck.
Tom, at this point, I agree with you. I would only go further and say that I don't know how much Rush and O'Reilly are harming themselves. There always have been and always will be partisan muckrakers as long as this is a free nation, and their tendency is to self-destruct. Eventually, people tend to wake up and smell the guano.
Post a Comment
<< Home