[quote]jsbrook wrote:
People are really in favor of the Unfairness doctrine? Gimme a break.[/quote]
They’re called congressional democrats and college students.
[quote]Loose Tool wrote:
Gael wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
Gael wrote:
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This applies only to radio.
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The radio spectrum is property held by the public.
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Private organizations do not own their frequency on which they broadcast, they are granted a license (for free, they do not pay) to broadcast.
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As such, this is not an infringement of the first amendment anymore than a newspaper editor deciding which articles he wants to publish.
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If the system were such that private organizations could purchase the rights frequencies, it would be very different. In that case, they would own the frequency and it would be less legitimate for the government to control their use.
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This is really the only effective way the system can work.
Having said this, I don’t support this “fairness doctrine.” However, it is not an infringement of the first amendment.
Logically, point 4, does not follow points 1-3 above. The First Amendment states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Governmental intrusion into the content of programming, whether in radio or newspaper, abridges freedom of speech. In the newspaper context, the Supreme Court found, “Government-enforced right of access inescapably dampens the vigor and limits the variety of public debate.”
Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241 (1974). Though radio licenses are regulated by the government, the intrusion is no different.
What you are missing is that the radio waves are public property. A person does not have the right to do whatever he wishes with someone else’s property. Apparently, you would have it that if I wanted to run an ad in your newspaper, your choice to say no would be an infringement of my freedom of speech.
What I’m missing is how public ownership of the airwaves justifies content based censorship on licensees. Got a recent cite? By the way, in 1985 the FCC determined the “Fairness Doctrine” is not in the public interest and it in fact chilled public discourse.[/quote]
The question of whether it is a good idea is separate from whether it is a violation of the first Amendment. I already stated I don’t support it, at the same time understanding the error of thinking it violates the first amendment.
It does not abridge freedom of speech for the owner of a medium to decide content. It doesn’t matter whether it’s public or private. You do not have a ‘right’ to the airwaves. It is not an abridgment of free speech anymore than prohibiting nailing advertisements to trees in national forests is.
[quote]Gael wrote:
It does not abridge freedom of speech for the owner of a medium to decide content. It doesn’t matter whether it’s public or private. You do not have a ‘right’ to the airwaves. It is not an abridgment of free speech anymore than prohibiting nailing advertisements to trees in national forests is.
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When you are talking radio waves, the idea of “public property” makes no sense. There are no radio waves just hanging around in the ether just waiting to be owned. Absent transmitters (the radio station) and receivers (the radios), there is no medium.
What the government does hold in trust for the people is the ability to allocate use of the radio spectrum. When the government grants licensees use, they only retain certain rights of control over how the station operates (frequency, location, power level, operating hours).
The governments power to allocate spectrum, does not include the right to control programming (except with regard to obscenity). That is, the radio is not the mouthpiece of the government.
Therefore, when the democrats want to use the Fairness Doctrine to stifle right wing talk radio, they abridge First Amendment rights.
Not gonna happen:
"Okay, TAC readers, help me out if you would. Obviously the Fairness Doctrine is a horrible idea and we should be glad to be rid of it. It?s certainly possible that I missed something, but I did at least put in a fair number of hours trying to pay reasonably close attention to the 2008 election, and did so going all the way back to the last cycle. I don?t recall ever hearing a serious Democratic contender for president advocating the Fairness Doctrine. A quick look through the affairs of the President-elect and his transition team doesn?t turn up any trace of a hint of a soupcon of evidence that President Obama is going to burn through political capital that could be spent on (presumably) a guaranteed-to-fail-spectacularly bailout of whichever industry goes belly up next.
True, members of the Congressional party occasionally make noises about it, but the last time anybody tried to move legislation on the issue was Rep. Louise Slaughter?s 2005 bill that died quietly in committee. The Democrats have already controlled Congress for two years. If they were really the wild-eyed Bolshevik fanatics the Human Events crowd seems genuinely to believe they are, somebody in the Democratic caucus would have made some sort of move to bring back the Fairness Doctrine in the 110th Congress. It didn?t happen. And being a consumer of a fair amount of left-wing as well as right-wing media, I promise that the best thing to do in case you become convinced that there is a major grassroots push on the left to reimpose the Fairness Doctrine, is seek out a well-recommended therapist.
So as far as I can tell, the overwhelming majority of suggestions that a restoration of the Fairness Doctrine is in the offing come from right wing bloggers and talkers and writers who write as poorly as radio talkers talk."
http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2008/11/17/movement-cons-permanent-dem/#more-1271