WASHINGTON, November 7, 2007 — Accuracy in Media warned today that a scheduled Thursday hearing by the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is the opening salvo in a liberal push to silence conservative voices in the media. AIM editor Cliff Kincaid noted that Senators Barbara Boxer and John Kerry, two prominent members of the committee, have been quoted as saying they favor governmental action through a vehicle such as the so-called Fairness Doctrine to regulate and restrict conservative talk radio. 

The hearing is titled “Localism, Diversity, and Media Ownership.” But Kincaid charged that it was “a transparent attempt to justify Congressional interference in decisions that should be above partisan politics.” He explained, “Nobody, including AIM, favors giving the Big Media even more power. But if Congress can determine who owns the media, based on political considerations and under pressure from groups like the George Soros-funded Free Press, then using the Fairness Doctrine to monitor and regulate political speech over the air won’t be far behind.” 

“If the Congress is truly concerned about media diversity,” Kincaid said, “it should take a look at Tuesday’s article in the New York Times about how the MSNBC cable network is in the process of becoming a mouthpiece for the liberal-left and how its only remaining and reliable conservative host, Tucker Carlson, is in danger of being canned.” Kincaid pointed out that MSNBC, as part of a “Going Green” campaign, has been spending much of its air time promoting radical environmental theories.   

“It’s a safe bet that Senators Boxer and Kerry won’t have any quarrel with that,” the AIM editor noted. 

AIM, the nation’s oldest media watchdog group, is releasing a new book, The Death of Talk Radio?, which you can read about in the latest AIM Report at www.aim.org. AIM is calling on Congress to pass the Broadcaster Freedom Act to prevent liberal politicians and bureaucrats from interfering with the First Amendment right of free speech.  

Accuracy in Media, founded in 1969, is a citizens’ media watchdog organization whose mission is to promote fairness, balance, and accuracy in news reporting. For more information, please visit www.aim.org.

To arrange an interview with AIM editor Cliff Kincaid, contact Sarah Schaerr Norton at (202) 364-4401 ext. 107 or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). 

###

Share This

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

About the author