“Media Reform” Targets Conservatives
AIM Column | By Cliff Kincaid | June 3, 2008
In order to counter this conservative trend, “progressive” groups have proposed to stop the process of media deregulation, which included the FCC’s decision to abolish the Fairness Doctrine.
Led
by a Muslim Democrat, members of the Federal Communications Commission, and
Bill Moyers, Phil Donahue, and Dan Rather, a well-funded campaign to move the
media in a more left-wing direction will gather in Minneapolis from June 6-8. Thousands of
“progressive” activists are expected to attend. Accuracy in Media will cover
the event.
Moyers
recently achieved notoriety for using his public television program to give a
national platform to Barack Obama’s controversial former pastor Jeremiah
Wright, while Donahue, who began his career as a tabloid TV talk-show host,
recently completed an anti-Iraq War film. Donahue and his former MSNBC
sidekick, Jeff Cohen, the founder of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting who is
now a university professor, continue to travel around the country insisting
that the media are too right-wing.
Dan
Rather, of course, is the disgraced former CBS Evening News anchorman who used
phony documents in an effort to smear President Bush before the 2004 election.
He left CBS News and sued the network after this debacle, claiming he was
treated unfairly. Rather now anchors “Dan
Rather Reports” on a little-watched cable channel, HDNet.
Ironically,
Rather is appearing on a panel at the National Conference for Media Reform that
is supposed to unveil a “Big Media Hall of Shame.” Presumably, the inductees
will be conservative media voices.
At
the opening session of the conference, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Mn.), the first
Muslim elected to Congress, will discuss the “opportunity to wrest control of
media access and distribution from the few to the many,” according to the
official conference program. This is liberal doublespeak for using the power of
the federal government to hand over more media properties to liberals.
However,
as the Moyers example suggests, they already have access, courtesy of the U.S. taxpayers,
to 350 television stations affiliated with the Public Broadcasting Service. The
860 stations affiliated with National Public Radio are also regarded as
reliable outlets for liberal or “progressive” opinion. Pacifica Radio, an
openly “progressive” radio network, includes five stations owned by the
Pacifica Foundation, one associate station, and 132 affiliates. Pacifica has also
received taxpayer funding.
In
addition, they have MSNBC, the evening news programs of the three broadcasting
networks, and most of the national press.
In
Minneapolis,
the conference has the support of AM 950, KNTF, “The Voice of
Minnesota,” which is a home for Air America Radio, the liberal network that
went through bankruptcy and was bailed out by a wealthy liberal family that
includes former Democratic politician Mark Green.
But
this is not enough media control and reach to satisfy them. The “progressives”
are angry that since the deregulation of the media, beginning in the 1980s, the
liberal media monopoly has been challenged and that talk radio and cable news
have found that there is a receptive audience for conservative
programming.
In
order to counter this conservative trend, “progressive” groups have proposed to
stop the process of media deregulation, which included the FCC’s decision to
abolish the Fairness Doctrine, and force broadcasters to limit or even
eliminate airtime for conservatives and put more left-wingers on the air.
As
AIM has documented in the book, “The Death of Talk Radio?,” and in a TV advertisement, the movement to control the content of the media is
a real danger to the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. But the
Broadcaster Freedom Act, which would stop the return of the Fairness Doctrine,
is being bottled up by congressional liberals, who don’t want it to come up for
a vote.
As
a result, if Obama captures the White House and gets the opportunity to appoint
the FCC chairman, liberals would then have a 3-2 majority capable of bringing
back the Fairness Doctrine through administrative action, without the need for
congressional approval. A new Fairness Doctrine could be challenged in the
courts but the U.S. Supreme Court previously upheld it. In the meantime, as
court battles proceed, conservatives could be forced off the air by liberal FCC
bureaucrats exercising arbitrary power in the name of fairness.
The
potential danger has already been dramatized by the coordinated effort of the
radical Muslim group CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) to force
conservative broadcaster Michael Savage off the air through an advertiser
boycott. With a federal Fairness Doctrine in place, these groups could go
straight to the FCC with their complaints and get bureaucrats to fine, punish
or revoke the licenses of conservative broadcasters. Conservative complaints
about liberal media bias would, of course, be dismissed out of hand.
Ominously, one of the featured speakers at the National Conference
for Media Reform is Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND), a prominent opponent of media
deregulation who backs Barack Obama for president. Dorgan wants more FCC
oversight over and control of the media.
Equally
serious, a session on “Standing Up Against Hate Speech” in the media will
feature Mark Kappelhoff, Chief of the Criminal
Section of the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, and
representatives of various Hispanic and civil rights organizations. Their task
will be, according to the conference program, to use the “verifiable data that
links hate speech to hate crimes” and come up with “strategies and solutions”
to muzzle or remove offending radio and TV hosts and programs from the air.
They usually define “hate speech” as being commentary or news coverage that is
critical of illegal aliens or minority groups. Indeed, the term “illegal alien”
is even considered to be offensive.
Of particular interest is the panel, “Media Policy in a New
Congress and Administration,” featuring two members of the Federal
Communications Commission (FCC), Jonathan S. Adelstein and Michael J. Copps,
with comments also from Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.). Doyle was among the liberal
politicians who erroneously accused conservative radio talk-show host Rush
Limbaugh in a piece of legislation (H. Con. Res. 221) of calling combat troops
opposed to the Iraq War “phony soldiers.” The bill reflects the intent of
liberal legislators to monitor and control the content of what is said on the
air.
“Holding local broadcast stations accountable at the FCC” is the
name of another panel at the Minneapolis
conference.
In one of the most bizarre panels and workshops, “Owning Our Own
and Reaching the Masses,” somebody who goes by the name “stic.man” of a hip-hop
group called “dead prez” is one of the listed speakers. One of the group’s
songs is titled, “Revolutionary But Gangsta,” and their website features an
obscene gesture. Stic.man is supposed to be an expert on the dangers of
“corporate media.”
Randall Pinkston of CBS News will be appearing on a panel devoted
to how the FCC can “put consumer and citizen interests first,” while another
session is on “Purple Politics Coverage of LGBT Issues in the Media.” LGBT
refer to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender. One of the panel members is
from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, which exists to silence
criticism of the homosexual lifestyle in the media.
Some of the financial support for the conference is being
concealed under a reference in the conference guide to anonymous “public
charities, private foundations and individual donors,” but in the past the
event has been generously subsidized by the Open Society Institute of leftist
billionaire George Soros, another Obama supporter.
This year, the official conference sponsor, known as the “Free Press,” acknowledges funders that include the Wallace Global Fund, an entity named
after Henry A. Wallace, the “progressive” former vice-president under FDR who
was dumped from the ticket and was ostracized even by Democrats at the time for
his pro-communist views.
The 2007 National Conference for Media Reform, also covered by Accuracy in Media, included
members of the Revolutionary Communist party and other Marxist groups.
Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at
10 Comments
The need for a more liberal media was discredited yesterday when a video of Michelle Obama (speaking at the Trinity Church on May 19; this is the church that Obama quit) complaining that “whitey” had held her back. (Millionaire, grad of Princeton and Harvard: sound like she was “held back” to you? Her “poor” father earned 42k/year and this is decades ago, while the one-room apartment turned out to be a brick house on a fairly good piece of land.)
It appeared on FNC’s unwatchable morning program, Fox and Friends, where Bob Beckel, a dem and regular contributor, noted that he had heard info about this from several dem operatives in a way that really worried him and refused to give any details, but noted it was no small matter. FoxNews abruptly pulled the video later after it had been posted on You Tube, although a few other videos remained on You Tube with a couple of dems having a exists/doesn’t exist debate.
The video of Beckel’s heads up on Fox and Friends had been posted on You Tube, and a friend who was doing some work for me came to watch the original video of Michelle’s gaffe with me in the mid-late afternoon (around 4 PM; I wasn’t really paying attention to the time). It started out with Michelle speaking, then perhaps 15 seconds or so into the video, it abruptly morphed into a music video of Rick Astly (big ears and big red hair combed back, who had two big hits in the late 80s, then disappeared) singing.
Later that evening, the video was entirely Rick, but with the same title, but by about 8, had been pulled. Online, someone came up with a link to the video, but by the time I got to it, it was pulled.
Note that Hillary, expected to give a concession speech, was all smiles and charm...but did NOT concede the election.
Did anyone else catch any of this? Something stinks here. Could be Hillary’s ace in the hole or an October surprise for McCain.
Michelle and Barrack are both racists or they couldn’t have sat through 20 years of hate speech from the “Rev” Wright, also really well off, despite blasting being “middle class” as a trap.
If “the term “illegal alien” is even considered to be offensive.” does that mean telling the truth or calling something what it really is will always be offensive? Or is it only offensive if it doesn’t fit into the left wing agenda? I think we all know the answers.
God Bless America, God Save The Republic.
We need a strictly conservative news station.
Fox is not fair and balanced, if anything it leans towards the left. I could not believe my ears, especially the last 2 days. The reporters are magnifying Obama and bashing McCain.
I can’t stand it anymore.
McCain may not be our first choice, but he’s who we have. Fox reporters do us a great diservice by saying the greatest things about Barack and knocking McCain. Today, I felt like I was going insane, in what I heard.
Fox news is ‘liberal’??? I haven’t had TV for a couple of years - but boy, things have changed.
Obama was chosen to be President - long ago and every news outlet has favored and protected him.
It isn’t a liberal/conservative thing - it is the global agenda on the march.
It does get tiresome to see black people who have had every advantage complain about how hard life has been on them.
I remember when Ms. Rice hosted the get this, ‘Black Journalist group’ and she told them how she had been treated so badly because she was black. A woman who has had better chances, a better life than probably 95% of the people in this country - any color - and still she whines.
It isn’t a lib/cons thing. We have no conservatives - I doubt we have any liberals - just opportunists and globalists.
Yes, illegal alien is termed to be offensive, although I have heard it is the legal term used by immigration, and yes the liberals protect the illegals. We have to be honest though, and remember this President’s speeches. He suggested anyone who opposed illegal immigration was bigots and called the border watchers - vigilantes.
Ummmmm....with all due respect...and I said this on another comment...I AM OUTRAGED!
Do you happen to realize that the Senate just did a report validating all of the left-wing, George Soros sponsored (allegedly), nut jobs ...that the administration lied about the intellience that got us into a war that killed many of our people...not that the intelligience was flawed..they MADE IT UP!
Fox made it clear to me that this is not news. And you know what...there were enough people that validated this through the years but they were too busy doing character assassinations that we never got to the merits of the so called “nazi-appeasers”. This is not about conservative or liberal issues...this is not about who is biased..the fact that we don’t hear more about this..from ANY of our media, is an issue. They know damn well we make decisions based on what little information we are exposed to in our daily working lives. There was blind faith in supporting our presidents decisions and with a very major cost..and I am not Anti-American for saying so.
If you don’t know about the Senate report..then we all have blood on our hands...Conservativism is not being an easy voting block because we claim to be Christian,pro-life or pro-military, or more American than the next guy. Our constitution intends for us to deliberate...and we didn’t (under the guise of being fair and balanced which is even more scary). Michael Moore is evil, huh? This is what I fell for...I am sorry, but I appreciate more now, how dangerous it is to have a media slanted any one way...do you? Have you read the books they encouraged you not to read or do they have so much credibility that you would listen to our conservative “voice”? Even knowing their blind faith in the administration? (Yeah, okay, there was hype about our borders security, etc...but the other issues, silence)
If you don’t agree, I guess my words are for naught..I am outraged at the media in general..we need to demand it. I want all different points of view..not people who claim to have different points of view but who are hand picked by their conservative colleague because they are weak (Alan Colmes). Tax dollars being spent on PBS bothers us huh? Well, now, I appreciate the differing perspectives even more..it is the basis of our democracy...again, some of the arguments against tax sponsored reporting included a promotion of “anti-american “ sentiment, and the belief that the alleged facts of issues aren’t presented. Actually, now I can appreciate that someone has to promote democracy...no person should be too left or too right...balance.
If this is not a wake up call, and doesn’t make you question the basis of the talking points by our favorite conservatives, I don’t know what is. As I have said before, nothing is more scary to me, not a preacher, not associating with Ayers, etc., then a government who is run by paid lobbyists, and who lies to us in the name of patriotism and God. Nothing is more scary to me than the pundints that don’t call them on it..and who have no credibility because they got us to vote for Bush twice. Yes Sean, we all have to get closer to our constitution, but the republicans won’t as long as they disregard it and don’t respect it. Having a network run by a former republican advisor (Roger Ailes), and paid correspondents such as Karl Rove (who despite was Fox tells us, the jury is still out), makes me question their credibility and motives as well.They lost credibility with many of my conservative friends..they are not speaking for them at all...they are not more objective than the other networks they claim to hate. Period.
Where is Osama Bin Ladin? Why in the first four years of the war did we not hear about the lack of equipment for our troops? We all need to look at all sides of the argument ..we will all be better Americans for it. Am I a left wing nut now? No, but, we do need to clean house. The things they told us weren’t true, ended up being true. What else are they wrong about?
Pretty soon, the republicans you support will be persecuting you!
Republicans, put away your hate and greed. It is consuming you and turning your hearts black and makes america an enemy of the world. Do good. Tell the truth. Quit pointing fingers at those trying to make the nation a better place. Quit indoctrinating yourselves with the Gobbels-style FOX network. Return to reason and reject demagoguery. The whole world views you as the modern day version of the Nazi party. Doesn’t that concern you people in the least???
Rico,
Yes, it concerns me! They have behaved liked the Nazi party...that was my point! The Senate, in a bi-partisan way confirmed it, as if at this point there was any doubt!
As a country, we need to wake up! We need to find time to read again..all different perspectives. Now that we know that Richard Clarke wasn’t a crazy nut, read his book. Afterall, he told the truth!
We continue to think in terms of lib vs. con or Dem vs. Rep at our peril. There is no difference except rhetoric.
The Democrats have voted to allow this war to take place and to continue - who are they kidding?
They didn’t know??? Give me a break. If I had had the power and gave in and allowed this to happen because of ignorance, I would hang my head in shame and spend the rest of my life trying to stop it.
Where were these smart Democrats when this was being put in front of them?
Not sure Nazis fit this administration, but overbearing - you bet.
If any of you were alive or adults during the 60’s and 70’s - you will remember it was the Dem’s turn to be overbearing and forceful. They pushed through things in this nation that have been so detrimental.
Think welfare (as a way of life) - it has been a huge waste of humanity and a way to totally control those who have come to depend on it.
Think education. They took over the education system and it’s been going downhill ever since.
Think affirmative action and all the other ridiculous ways they put in place to control who one hires, fires, rents to.
They even thought it was necessary for small children to be put on a bus before daylight, be sent across town to another school because a little black child couldn’t learn unless a white child sat beside them.
They told black children they couldn’t learn as well as white children so they didn’t have to perform as well.
They told black adults that everything wrong in their live was because of white people.
If someone even whispered that this perhaps was not legal, let alone moral - it was awful. You were branded a ‘racist’ and you were fair game for any ‘do gooder’ who wanted to insult or riducule. If you should use the wrong word ( it changed with the wind) in speaking, you could loose your job.
As long as we adhere to the idea there is a dime’s worth of difference between them, we are lost. We are right where they want us.
Please, please wake up and give it some thought. You will realize it, but if you do it now, we may have a chance. If you wait much longer, it won’t matter.
We don’t need a liberal media or a conservative media. We need a media that tells the TRUTH, the whole TRUTH, and nothing but the TRUTH. Lies, innuendo, and information hiding have no place in the media.
June 4 at 9:16 am | #1 | Link
As strong Conservative Republicans...what can we expect? Sean Hannity is abusing his situation by boring us all to tears..picking on Obama...for his choice in churches! O’Reilly is pandering to
Hillary Clinton....Rush keeps working his Operation Chaos bull....which should have been folded three weeks ago! Our Conservative roots...are losing their edginess! What about dealing with the real issues? McCain is a flaming
liberal moderate in sheep’s clothing! What will Conservative Talk Radio and TV do....between now and Inauguration in 2009? Study up on Black History..we guess!